Happy 78th birthday to Neil Young!

 

Now I think I will have mentioned that my wife introduced me to Neil Young as she played me albums called Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, After the Gold Rush and later a disc called Harvest and I loved his unique highpitched voice and his guitar style . . . . we all went on to follow him with his forays into CSNY and of course followed his resurgent solo work in his later years (1989-1999) from his solo work on tour to performances like his playing at Bob Dylan’s 30th Anniversary celebrations All Along The Watchtower* with Booker T and The M.G.s!

"Everything is much more now - you know, it's not just about music. Back then there were movies, but it was mostly music. People closed their eyes and listened to music. Today there's a lot of images that go with the music. A lot of music is crap and it's all commercial and the images are all trying to sell the record or somebody's image. And that's all cool, that's what they do. But that's not what we were doing. And that's not what I'm interested in trying to do. I just wanted to tell a story and create a point of view and put across a feeling with some music and use the video that way. 

I live for playing live. That's what I do. All my records are live, since After the Gold Rush, with the exception of Trans and the vocals on Landing on Water. Everything I've done has been a live thing. It is what it is. I go in and sing the song and arrange it and mix it and that's it. It's no different that playing in clubs. I hate studios. Studios are passe for me. I'd rather play in a garage, in a truck, or a rehearsal hall, or a club, or a basement. Anywhere but a studio where you have to go down the hall and see other people playing, and you feel like you're in some kind of complex. You feel like you're a soup, you're cream of mushroom and they're tomato. I don't like that."

Photo: Jay Blakesberg

* Said to be Jimi Hendrix’s favourites guitar player no less!

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