I think High hopes was just a way to keep touring as he enjoyed the wrecking ball tour so much. Same thing happened in 2008/9 with Working On A Dream - he wanted to keep touring. In his defence the songs on both high hopes and WOAD would have shone in a tracks style format, but are not strong enough as albums to stand against his main work. But he can’t win - after years of complaints that so much work went unreleased, he relaxes his approach to put more out and people complain about the quality. A second album of Born In The USA songs released in 86 to extend the tour another year may have faired the same way.
Anyway Western Stars is great in my opinion. Not all the songs hit but it’s a personal thing - I’m finding Sundown the weakest but others seem to like it.
If you dig around in the old comments here you will find that someone (can’t remember who) posted when Magic was released that Last To Die was his best song since Born To Run. Another post following WOAD release said Good Eye was his best song in ages.