Neil Young
Thought I would share a few thoughts here.
Neil Young is again on tour, so I am again giving this artist some thought.
I remember reading an interview with Bryan Ferry where he said that Neil Young was one of his favorite artists. I thought this odd given the glam rock of Roxy Music. But he described Neil Young as a musical chameleon, always changing up his music and bands, which is why he liked him so much.
That quote stuck with me. Buffalo Springfield, Laurel Canyon, Solo Acoustic, CSNY, The Shocking Pinks, The International Harvesters, Rockin’ In The Free World, and so on. Always a new twist for Neil. He really doesn’t stay stagnant.
Then, reading about his current tour it seems at every stop he is breaking out some long forgotten and unplayed live tune to keep his set lists interesting.
I’ve never seen him live, and frankly don’t think I have that much interest in seeing him live. Yet I own a metric ton of his recorded material. I remember reading someone else who described Neil as a one string soloist when it comes to rock guitar playing. That kinda stuck with me.
I do appreciate his approach to analog releases from his vast catalog.
Anyway, he is indeed a hall of famer.
FWIW, learning to play up and down the neck on one string is often prescribed for players who are stuck in pentatonic boxes. Especially when used in conjunction with neighboring tones on adjacent strings, this can be a very useful approach. |
It’s both amusing and disheartening to witness, again and again, complaints about artists "injecting their politics" into their art. These comments reveal a deep lack of understanding about both art and politics. First of all, it is neither the function of art nor the responsibility of artists to reinforce your personal opinions about the world. Quite the contrary. Secondly, you cannot divorce politics from the artist. To suggest so displays a profound ignorance regarding the roots of individual’s political leanings and the depth of these roots. Those of you who like Neil Young’s music but don’t like his politics must be listening to him on a very superficial level. Whether explicitly spelled out in his lyrics or not, his politics are there, deeply entwined with everything else that makes him unique. As @rivington66 asserts:
You cannot have the soul and not have what matters to him at a deep level. You cannot expect him to move you yet be inauthentic. You cannot expect him to entertain you but censor his humanity. You cannot expect him to be passionate and discount his conscience. If this is what you want from art, you are looking in the wrong place!
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