To him, it was his downfall to me, it was the best thing about it.” When I went back and listened to that record, I was like, ‘Yeah, it doesn’t sound good.’” He laughs.

“He talks about his first record not sounding good, production-wise, and about how insecure he was about his voice. “It’s a fun thing to pick up and put down because you can take the time to listen to the records he’s talking about,” says Rostam, who’s 37 and works under his first name.

Asked if he hears it too, Rostam smiles and reveals that it wasn’t just that formative experience at play: Throughout the process of making his “Changephobia” LP, he was listening intermittently to the audiobook of Springsteen’s memoir, “Born to Run.” So it was probably inevitable that the musician and producer (and former Vampire Weekend member) would end up decades later with a song like “4Runner” from his mesmerizing new album.Ī sexy-dreamy bop about two lovers’ road trip up the West Coast, “4Runner” carries some big Boss energy - the propulsive tempo, the images of “stolen plates” and a “blanket on the backseat,” the very “ I’m on Fire” falsetto at the end of the tune. “must have been 13 or 14,” he figures - he used to ride around in his older brother’s car listening to a collection of Bruce Springsteen’s greatest hits. When Rostam Batmanglij was a kid growing up in Washington, D.C.

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