Photographer Eric Meola Talks About His Springsteen Fandom and How He Ended Up Shooting The "Born to Run" Cover

For anyone subscribed to this website, Eric Meola needs no introduction. He’s the photographer that captured one of the most indelible images not just in Springsteen fandom but in rock and roll history: the cover of the Born to Run album. His dramatic, black-and-white shot of Scooter and the Big Man defined and set the tone for the era that followed, and few covers have looked as good since. 

That epic gatefold set a new standard in album covers; the image was immediately duplicated into thousands of bootleg posters that adorned college dorm rooms. The live version of that image was the first thing millions of television viewers saw at the XLIII Superbowl halftime show in 2009. I even have a small excerpt from that shoot -- the sneakers hanging off of the guitar headstock -- tattooed on my left forearm and I know I’m not the only Springsteen fan who’s done something similar. 

I’ve always wondered about Meola’s inspiration for the images and how he ended up being the photographer who got the call. Graciously, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the creation of that artwork that looms so large in all of our legends, he agreed to let me interrogate him and where we went long on his Springsteen fandom across the decades (he is a frequent Brucebase user!), and learned that a lot of what I thought I knew – or had assumed – about this image that has followed me for most of my life had a much different story. Our conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.