Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. DLXXXIII--Neil Young: The Needle and the Damage Done

She said, hey babe, take a walk on the wild side, and the coloured girls go...I'm (seventeen days late, a new Friday Night Jukebox record!) late again....

My introduction to this week's tune came one Christmas in the late seventies (couldn't remember which one, though 1978 would be my guess) when my parents bought me this week's artist's triple album greatest hits, Decade.  I was just beginning to learn there was a lot more to life than they taught me in high school, and simultaneously that there was a lot more to rock and roll than top forty radio, and that album opened my eyes even wider to both.  And I'll never forget Young's self-penned liner note about this week's song:  "I am not a preacher, but drugs killed a lot of great men."  Just as true today....

I've written about Neil Young as a solo artist twice before (here and here) and once as a member of Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young for the greatest protest song every written, "Ohio."  In the little more than a year since I last wrote about him, Young has released two albums (one of which has been in the vaults since the 1970's) and headlined the Glastonbury Festival.  Even better, last year he released another protest song, "Big Crime," which he wrote in response to Donald Trump, piece of shit that he is, sending the National Guard into Washington D.C.  One of its lyrics was "Got to get the fascists out, got to clean the White House out...."  Bravo, Mr. Young!

"The Needle and the Damage Done" was originally released in 1972 on Young's rather accumulatively named album, Harvest.  The song was released as the B-side of Young's single "Old Man" which peaked at #31 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100 (it reached #4 in Young's native Canada--so many cool kids in the Great White North!), The album was the only #1 of his career.

(Not so) Fun Fact:  Young wrote the song about the effects of heroin addiction on musicians he knew, including his Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten.  Sadly, Whitten would die of an overdose the same year the song was released.  Even worse, the next year Young's roadie Bruce Berry also died of an overdose.

"The Needle and the Damage Done" is two minutes of sheer fucking brilliance.  Rather than record a studio version, Young used a version he'd performed in concert, just him and his guitar, for the album release. The sparseness of the show strips the song to its bare essence which captures both the song's beauty and its sorrow.  Neil Young has written a lot of great songs, but this is his greatest.  The lyrics reveal Young's compassion for these troubled folks and avoids even the slightest hint of self-righteousness as he chronicles heroin addiction and the chains with which it wraps up its victims.  Young's vocals are spare, honest, and convey the tragedy he has seen unfolding around him.  Add in Young's beautiful melody, picked adeptly on his acoustic guitar, and you have a masterpiece, a short story in song. 

Lyric Sheet:  "I've seen the needle and the damage done/A little part of it in everyone/But every junkie's like a settin' sun..."

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump

Peace,

emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. DXXIII--Neil Young: Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)

Yikes--almost two weeks late.  To steal a phrase, it's alright, Ma, it's life and life only....

My introduction to this week's tune was my turntable in my bedroom at my parents home in Kokomo, Indiana.  I had a big assist from noted rock critic Robert Christgau and a stellar review he wrote in The Village Voice for this week's album--which prompted me to rush right out and buy a copy.  Christgau nailed it--it was a great record and with the passage of time became quite the influential album....

I wrote about Neil Young in Jukebox Vol. LXXX, and if I do say so myself, it was a nice bio paragraph, and other than his marriage to actress Daryl Hannah, releasing nine (!) more albums (Young was nothing if not prolific) and adding one more Grammy nomination it was a pretty bland nine years for Young (note:  tongue planted firmly in cheek).  I also wrote about Young for his brilliant protest song, "Ohio" in Vol. CCLII, which was ever so nobly performed by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. That's six links in three sentences--you'd think this was Wikipedia....

"Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" was the closing song on Young's seminal 1979 album, the rather oxidizingly entitled Rust Never Sleeps.  The single would peak at #79 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Pop Singles chart, while the album hit #8 on (just to show you how old the album is) on the Billboard Top LPs & Tape chart.

Fun Fact:  Rust Never Sleeps opens with an acoustic version of this week's song, entitled "My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)."  Pretty damn sure that's a Friday Night Jukebox first (and one hell of a song in its own right).

Give "Hey Hey, My My" one listen and you can instantly tell why Young is considered the Godfather of Grunge.  From the thrashing slashing guitars to the ripped raw lyrics, Young takes on his relevance, his music's relevance, and what exactly should become of rock and roll (one of pop music's great ironies is that punk music did burn out rather than fadeaway).  It was a singular achievement for Young and sparked a musical movement for the rest of us.  Did I happen to mention that it's also simply a great song?  The vocals, the guitars, the band, the lyrics--just an ultimate piece of work that ranks with any of rock's greatest songs.

Lyric Sheet:  "Hey hey my my/Rock and roll can never die/There's more to the picture than meets the eye/Hey hey my my..."

Enjoy:

Bonus acoustic version:

Fuck Donald Trump

Peace,

emaycee

A time to dance, a time to mourn

Another great is gone

 

Sadly, the world of rock and roll has lost another of its all-time greats with the announcement today of the passing of David Crosby at the age of eighty-one.  Crosby was a founding member of two of rock's most seminal bands, The Byrds and Crosby, Stills, and Nash (and Young a bit later), and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of both.

While I'll obviously remember Crosby's musical contributions to the bands noted above, I'll also remember him for his primal scream of "How many more?" in CSNY's "Ohio" (still the greatest protest song ever written), his never-ending promotion of liberal causes and accomplishments (a master tweeter), and his epic bitch slap of second-rate talent and perfect asshole Ted Nugent when he whined that he wasn't in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame because of "political correctness."

While Crosby had his demons (drug addiction--eventually he did five months in prison for drug and weapons offenses), he would eventually conquer them, and late in his life he noted (quite correctly, I might add) that, "Music's a lifting force.  Music makes things better."

RIP and Godspeed, Mr. Crosby.

While I'm not a religious man, The Byrds "Turn! Turn! Turn!" with its lyrics taken from the Bible book Ecclesiastes seems an especially appropriate endpoint...Enjoy:

Republicans = Losers

Peace,

emaycee

How many more?

AGAIN: Days after a shooting during a baseball game in Charleston, children ran from gunfire during a high school baseball game tonight in Chicago.

This is the logical outcome of allowing gun lobbyists and their lawmaker allies write our nations gun laws.

Text ACT to 644-33 pic.twitter.com/hZMYeDxatP

— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) April 29, 2022

Republican = Traitor

Peace,

emaycee

 

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CCLII--Crobsy, Stills, Nash, and Young: Ohio

Regular readers (both of you) may recall that way back when Friday Night Jukebox began, the first song I wrote about was Crosby, Stills, and Nash's "Suite:  Judy Blue Eyes."  We're two hundred and fifty some odd featured tunes into this experiment, and this week we're going back to our first group...and adding the inimitable Neil Young, with arguably, the most powerful protest song ever written.

Crosby, Still, and Nash formed in 1969, with each of the members (David Crosby, Stephen Stills, and Graham Nash) coming from successful groups (the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and the Hollies respectively).  Joined off and on by Neil Young, CSN had a lot of success from the late sixties (including an appearance at the original Woodstock) to the late seventies.  To call the band volatile would be an understatement--Neil Young has left numerous times (in fairness, Young did have much more solo success than the others), Crosby did time in prison, and both Crosby and Stills had serious problems with freebasing cocaine.  Still, they have managed to release eight studio albums throughout the years, four of which hit the top ten (including one #1), and have had a #1 live album and #1 hits collection as well, and they have also had 30 (!) tours over the course of the last fifty years.  CSN was elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997; each of the members was also inducted with the bands noted above (Neil Young has gotten in for his solo work and, like Stills, his work with Buffalo Springfield).  While the band has not been together since their last tour in 2015, all of the members have said they wouldn't rule out another reunion.

"Ohio" was released as a single only in June of 1970, though a live version was released on their #1 live album, 4 Way Street.  The studio version did not appear on an LP until their first greatest hits collection, So Far, in 1974.   "Ohio" would go on to reach #14 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100.

Written (by Neil Young) and recorded only two weeks after the National Guard murdered four students at Kent State University on May 4, 1970, "Ohio" is a powerful testament to the evil the right wing is capable of, even as people exercise their constitutional right to peacefully protest.  It wasn't an accident that Young singles out Richard Nixon--conservatives have never believed in the right to dissent, only believing that dissent should be crushed by any means necessary.  From it's ominous guitar at the song's beginning (not sure Young has ever played a better guitar part) to David Crosby's plaintive wail of "How many more?" toward the end, CSNY sing a song that indicts a subset of American leaders who, for all their talk about the sanctity of life, seems to only revere life when it still resides in the womb.  It also serves as a stark reminder, especially in the age of Donald Trump, of the people who seek to subjugate us--and the power we still have in numbers to mourn the dead, to honor their sacrifice, and to change the world.  Literally one of the most stunning works of art pop music has ever produced.

Lyric Sheet:  "[Ad-libbed] How many more?"

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee