If Bruce Springsteen’s latest iconic offering, “Western Stars”, is a veiled repudiation of the current condition of his native state, here’s what a more direct version would sound like, sung in a raspy, tired, gravelly, world-weary and grimly forsaken voice:

“Eastern Mediocrities”

I wake up in the morning, just glad my Men’s Techloom Phantom shoes are on

Instead of empty on the manicured putting green.

On the set the makeup girl brings me a café latte and more technicolor orange

Then I give it all up for that little white ball

That promises to bring it all back to you again

Golf cart me down easy, golf cart me down easy, frienemy

Tonight the eastern mediocrities are pulsating through pot haze again.

Here in the strip mall parking lots, where there aint no such thing as fight

A mall rat with a house cat stuck in its grille slinks through the suburban night.

Someone from the Economic Development Authority cuts a deal down in Camden

Smiles and says he thinks he remembers me from the senate caucus room.

Hell these days there ain’t no Cherokee Partners building the Tivoli in Denver

Tonight the eastern mediocrities are pulsating through marijuana haze again.

Hell these days there ain’t no more, now there’s just the remains of former men
Tonight the eastern mediocrities are pulsating through marijuana haze again

Sundays I take my sport utility vehicle, throw my $700 phone in and sit

And write snarky comments on my Facebook page

About the usurpation of the republic, on display in their personal trophy case
Tonight the eastern mediocrities are in the parking lot cracks like Queen Anne’s Lace.

Once I was shot in the back by Joe Pesci, yeah it was on the cutting room floor

That one scene’s gotten me whacked a thousand times in my dreams

Here’s to the bureaucrats and gangsters, the static swamp in the shit storm.

Tonight the eastern mediocrities are shining dimly, catatonically reborn.

Tonight the choked highways are smothered in the sound of an angry, whiny voice

And the eastern mediocrities are blazing forth obscenely.
Come on and golf cart me down easy, ride me down easy, frienemy
‘Cause tonight the eastern mediocrities are shining bright again

I woke up in the morning, just glad my Men’s Techloom Phantom shoes are on…