Hank Azaria has unlocked his most challenging voice.
As the voice of hundreds of Simpsons characters for the last 37 years, speaking in tongues for a devoted audience is Azaria’s job. Now, after years of being an obsessive fan of The Boss, he’s taking his experience as Moe the bartender and Police Chief Wiggum to take on the ultimate impersonation, Bruce Springsteen.
For his 60th birthday party, Azaria threw a “reverse surprise party,” headlined by a Springsteen cover band. Azaria’s friends and family were a bit confused as to why they were chosen to perform until Azaria took the stage. To the crowd’s shock, Azaria spent months learning the Bruce voice, an impersonation he’s mimicked since a teenager — back when he swapped Bruce bootlegs with his buddies and took the subway from Queens to MSG to catch countless Springsteen live shows.
After that night, the thrill of simulating Bruce’s cadence was too fun to let go of. Last year, Azaria and his EZ Street Band performed at The Stone Pony, a rite of passage for anyone who tries to bear Bruce’s helm. Even though Azaria has more experience in showbiz than most Springsteen cover bands, coming to Asbury was what made things click. Since the show at The Pony, he’s been playing gigs around the country, with all the proceeds heading to charity.
Azaria could have portrayed Springsteen in Deliver Me from Nowhere; he has the voice, the stories, and, most importantly, the Tri-State Area charm. Nevertheless, playing with the EZ Street Band is practically his version of a Bruce biopic.
Most cover bands have either the talent or the passion going for them; Azaria has both, and taking his obsession for Bruce onto the stage is one of the thrills of his career. Before Azaria returns to NJ, we discussed Springsteen bootleg recordings, the importance of storytelling, and went back and forth about The Simpsons toward the end.
We’re coming up on the anniversary of your show at the Stone Pony. What was it like to perform in the house that Bruce built?
It was sort of an out-of-body experience. I couldn’t really believe it. Simply being in the Stone Pony kind of freaked me out because of its legendary status, let alone trying to imitate Bruce. Just yesterday, it really hit me that we gotta go back there. I really loved it in there. There is a definite magic in that joint.
I imagine being in Asbury Park helped kick-start the live show.
I feel like it christened us as a band. We just played in Ocean City, Maryland, and it’s amazing how all boardwalk towns look alike, right? Ocean City looks like Asbury Park and Venice Beach. I tell you this because I realized that we have to work up the song, “4th of July, Asbury Park.” We play those venues a lot, and it just kind of has to be played, right?
I read that you’re a big Springsteen record collector and love finding bootlegs of his. Is there a particular Bruce bootleg or live show that stands out to you?
I didn’t see myself as a collector; I just loved them and wanted to listen to them. It was never about saving them for me. I had them in the era when all you had was vinyl or cassette, so we would pass them around to each other, just to listen to. One of my favorites was the legendary Main Point concert he did in ‘75.
Today, one of my favorites is the very early London concert he performed at Hammersmith. I love those recordings. Apparently, Bruce felt that he had a very off night. It took him many years to listen to that recording, because he was confident he had screwed it all up [laughs]. When he listened to it years later, he realized that muscle memory must have kicked in because it was really good, and it still is.
What’s your favorite Bruce show you’ve been to?
Oh, that’s a tough one. I’ve seen him 26 times.
I’ll certainly never forget the first time I ever saw him live. It was the No Nukes tour in 1979, where he played at Madison Square Garden, and I was 15. A year later, I saw him at the Garden on The River tour, and I’ll never forget that.
I think my favorite show I ever saw of his was a few years later, in the early ‘80s, in Worcester, Massachusetts. I went to school in Boston, and that was just one of those shows where he played longer than usual, like four and a half hours. He sat behind the stage that night, and he just felt like playing to the back of the house. It was unforgettable; they caught fire that night.
You’ve discussed how loving the communal feeling of being at a gig led to the start of this project. Can you tell me about concerts from your childhood that sparked the feeling of “Wow, live music is the best.”
Nothing really ever touched Bruce, but my first concert was in 1976, I was 12 with some of my buddies, and we took the train from Queens into the City to see Jethro Tull at MSG. I love Tull. That was an amazing, amazing show. I saw The Who at MSG not long after that.
I will never, ever forget, in about 1982, seeing Prince at Radio City. I was a huge Prince fan, but I had no idea that he played every goddamn instrument. No idea that he was that unbelievable of a guitarist, and that blew my brains out.
You’re playing big cities like LA, but also towns like Englewood, NJ. What’s it like to play in more intimate settings?
I love it. I never really went out on the road as an actor, and I never did any regional theater or touring. What’s interesting about playing a gig is that once you’re inside a venue, you really could be anywhere, whether it’s a club or a theater. So, once you’re inside, we’re all just Bruce fans. It doesn’t really matter where you are. And I kind of love that, that’s the experience that I love. So I’m kind of happy wherever we are. I enjoy traveling around and experiencing the country and its people.
Part of the Springsteen live show is his ability to tell a story that contextualizes and leads into a song. I’ve read that you’ve taken your own spin on this. Can you tell me a bit about that?
This all started at my birthday party. I turned 60 and had this crazy idea to do this just as a one-off. I called it a “reverse surprise party” because I had rented out City Winery in New York for the night, and I told everyone, “We have a Springsteen tribute band coming.” But I didn’t say that I had been working for months to front it.
I knew only half the crowd would really be Bruce fans, so I figured I would give the songs context. Especially for folks who might not be familiar with “Jungleland” or with “Prove It All Night.” I gave a lot of personal stories that night, because a lot of my old friends were there. And I figured I’d kind of look at it that way. Once we decided to keep going, I really thought a lot about whether I should tell the stories in my own voice or in Bruce’s voice, even though the stories were about me. Somehow, telling stories about me in Bruce’s voice in this context kind of works. Sometimes, I just tell the story of how Bruce wrote the song or what I’ve read about what it means to him. It’s all sort of semi-inspired by Bruce’s show on Broadway.
One of the things I love about Bruce’s music is that his songs play a movie in your head, maybe more than a lot of other artists. He’s a storyteller; even when there’s no narrative to the song, it still plays this movie in your head. When you listen to a Bruce song, you feel like he’s singing to you, about you. I try to convey how that feeling hits me as I’m imitating these songs as closely as I can.
You gave me a little hint of the Bruce voice there. You’ve done hundreds of voices. What was the process of building the Bruce voice and finding his cadence like?
[In Springsteen voice] Well, I’ve been imitating the way Bruce talks since I was a teenager. Because of all those bootlegs, or ‘talks’ as we called them, we’d pass them around and go, “There’s a great bop on this before ‘Thunder Road.’” His messaging about trusting your own instincts and being who you are made an impression on me almost as much as the songs.
I started with the vocal impression, trying to sing like Bruce, and because I’m a mimic, I said, ‘I need to first home-style this.’ I spent a few months trying to sing like Bruce on my own, knowing I was probably making a lot of mistakes and not doing it right. I wanted to make sure that the singing impression, which I’d never tried to do before for anybody, was in place. Then I started working with a vocal coach to make me sound good, and help me get the right notes, to protect my voice, because singing like Bruce will wear your voice out.
I’m not sure if any Simpsons voices sound like Bruce, but I suppose Moe Szyslak has that distinctive rasp. Were there any Simpsons voices that you could draw on to get to Bruce?
It’s funny you say Moe, because it’s one of the things I say in the show. [Pauses] Here, I’ll give a little piece to show: [In Springsteen voice] The impressions you’re hearing right now are based on hero worship. As a young man, the guys I idolized, I really wanted to sound like them, and I found that I was kind of good. So I did other voices besides Bruce.
[In Al Pacino voice] For example, young Al Pacino, right? Godfather out, Dog Day Afternoon out. I’m dying here. Everybody’s coming down.
[In Al Pacino/Springsteen/Moe Szyslack voice] Fun fact, if you take young Al Pacino on one end and Bruce on the other end, right in the middle is Moe the bartender. He’s a mash-up of those two people. Which is true; it was a combination of Bruce and Al Pacino that made Moe.
I think Kirk Van Houten, Millhouse’s father, has certain similarities with Bruce’s voice, except Kirk’s a bigger loser.
Thank you for that, I’m a huge Simpsons fan and have been watching since I was four years old.
Oh, wow, is that right? Yeah, that’s what keeps us going. Young folks like yourself are discovering the show, and that’s why we’re doing Season 37.
I hope it never ends. You just mentioned Kirk, who sings my favorite song in the show, ‘Can I Borrow a Feeling?’ The Simpsons have some of the best original songs on TV. Do you have a favorite Simpsons original song?
“Can I Borrow a Feeling?” was pretty good. I don’t do Apu anymore for socially appropriate reasons, but that song of his about the Kwik-E-Mart is hilarious. That was [laughs] pretty good.
Retiring that voice was the right thing to do, and I hope they bring back the character with an Indian actor someday. Chief Wiggum has a nice voice, too. He’s got a good belt, a good Broadway belt.
Could we ever hear Bruce’s voice in a Simpsons episode?
They’ve tried to get Bruce a couple of times over the years. One time, he couldn’t come on, so we got Sting, which is a pretty good replacement. There have been a few other times, and we replaced him with a random celebrity. I have never done the voice. I still have hope that we’ll get the actual Bruce on the show.
