Bruce Springsteen, “Only The Strong Survive.”

The new Bruce Springsteen record of soul classics is going to be misinterpreted by some. A 73-year-old superstar cashing in on a quick cover record? An old guy making a statement about old music? A fantastically productive songwriting machine for decades running out of gas?

Why?

Misinterpret away. Springsteen doesn’t care; not that he doesn’t have to—he doesn’t—but because he’s too busy singing, waist-deep in the joy of what the music was always, and still is, supposed to mean.

Springsteen’s new record, Only the Strong Survive, makes no statement other than reminding fans of some wonderful music that still stands as the base of the soul music reaching into today’s R&B and pop (and soul – it still exists).

But it’s not just music to which people can dance. Springsteen’s version comes from someone who’s felt it, knows it and wants to celebrate it. It’s a simple and kind of wonderful concept.

This is Springsteen’s voice at its best; thick and dripping with emotion; vulnerability, love and desperation (is there a difference? Maybe not on these songs).

His voice ages (which isn’t a bad thing), but his feelings haven’t disappeared. He didn’t just show up in a studio and knock these out in time for dinner, and he didn’t have to Google the lyrics. Springsteen has always been one of the great soul singers. He was just too busy looking like a white, blue-collar rock and roll icon.

For all his songwriting prowess, his strength has always been climbing onto a stage and emotionally ripping apart and rebuilding himself 20 or 25 times a night, laying himself bare for thousands. This music was made for that.

It’s right there in the first sentence he sings on the opening title track: “Now, I remember my first love; of course, the whole thing went wrong.” The Jerry Butler song sets a simple and effective tone for the rest of the record: Catchy-feely songs making you move, arranged like they used to do it: Full bands, tasty horn parts, enthusiastic phrasing from male and female voices, spare-but-tight snare drums, driving bass and warm guitar slotted where it should be.

The Boss brings in Sam Moore on Dobie Gray’s lovely “Soul Days,” and pays tribute to the greats who paid tribute to the soul greats on the Commodores’ underrated 1985 hit “Nightshift.” People seem to forget The Commodores existed after Lionel Richie left. Springsteen didn’t, and it’s a joyful reminder.

Springsteen’s choice of songs isn’t just a Motown or Stax greatest hits for the white rock singer to prove he loves soul music. They’re songs that have obvious points of reference for Bruce Springsteen.

But you know the sounds, if not the names. Frank Wilson’s “Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)” gets right to the point of its double-time, call and response message. Springsteen knows how to appropriately pull back, let it rip and solemnly pull back again on The Walker Brothers’ “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine Anymore” (which Cher and Frankie Valli also did back when everyone covered everyone and songs weren’t necessarily private property).

The thickness of Springsteen’s older voice is front and center on Tyrone Davis’ “Turn Back the Hands of Time,” when he convincingly pleads for one more chance. Doing the well-known Temptations classic “I Wish it Would Rain,” he simply pushes his voice to the point where no one can doubt his sincerity on a classic that can’t be easy to sing.

Since he was already warmed up and tackling some of the greatest singers of the century, Bruce Springsteen went on to cover Aretha Franklin’s “Don’t Play That Song,” putting his vocals out on an island with fantastic results (within his limits, instead of trying Franklin’s, which is key).

Speaking of singing until you can’t talk, another Four Tops song, “7 Rooms of Gloom,” may be the best song on the record. He just goes full Preacher Bruce with no frills or extras, and lets the song do the rest. About the time that Springsteen gets to Jimmy Ruffin’s “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted” – on which again he just blasts full speed ahead – one starts to wonder how those 73-year-old vocal cords don’t seem to run low on fuel.

Springsteen’s enthusiastic 15-song guided tour through rock and roll’s soul roots ends with a big statement of good songs just being good songs. His makes the Supremes’ “Someday We’ll Be Together” his own, without losing what makes the song great or cheapening it up. Of course, he uses a full chorus of great female voices; he’s not stupid. But Springsteen again proves his point: Great music is great music and an artist can make something his own without abandoning the feel of what made it great to begin with. Though having a generational voice defying time and buckets of sincerity doesn’t hurt.

Follow music critic Tony Hicks at Twitter.com/TonyBaloney1967.