"I fear he doesn't have another Badlands, Rosalita, or even Tunnel of Love in him."

I agree with you, however I'm not necessarily expecting Bruce to have another one of those in him, as his life has changed, his musical vocabulary has changed, and times in general have changed. I'm not defending this mess of an album, but I also can't expect him to come up with another Born To Run or The River, just as I wouldn't expect Townshend to come up with another Who's Next or Tommy or expect U2 to come up with another Unforgettable Fire or Van Morrison to come up with another Astral Weeks or Moondance or Elton John to come up with another Madman Across the Water. What I do expect, as I think someone else already brought up, is that an artist dig into themselves a little bit to come up with something authentic that has some resonance, not just 10 or 12 songs that can be played well enough and produced well enough to try to hide the flaws.

I do agree that there should have been an A&R guy, or Landau, or Little Steven, or someone that could give some objective criticism to Bruce about the shallowness of the songwriting on this album. Too much of it is in the first person, most of the emotion is one-dimensional, and when there is a character involved there isn't much happening to engage us with them.

I'm starting to wonder if Bruce is slowly turning into Jimmy Buffett--release a mediocre album every year or two but continue to tour like a 25 year old.