August 18, 2003
Old Young on the New Revolution
Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,
We're finally on our own,
This summer I hear the drummin',
Four dead in Ohio,
Gotta get down to it,
Soldiers are cutting us down,
Shoulda been gone long ago,
What if you knew her and,
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
-- Neil Young, "Ohio" 1969
Interviewed in Rolling Stone, Neil Young had some interesting things to say. Here are a couple of excerpts:
This is a time, I believe, of great inner turmoil for the majority of the American people. There is a new morality coming out of this administration -- fundamentalist religious views; a holier-than-thou attitude towards the rest of the world -- that is not classically American.
I don't think Americans felt holier-than-thou in the twentieth century. We were happy and successful, with a great lifestyle. But something else is going on now. That what Greendale [Young's new theatrical music production] is about. That's what Grandpa's problem is. He can't understand what's going on. He sees all of these things that the Patriot Act has taken away from what he feels is America.
Young recently performed his song "Rockin' in the Free World" with military funeral music and a musical reference to "Taps" played with feedback. He refers to it below.
That's for the soldiers who die in Iraq ever5y day, because of this stupid plan that the administration didn't have. They didn't know what the hell was going to happen. Bush makes Clinton look like sandpaper -- that's how slippery he is.
Referring to the last two songs on Young's Greendale, Young says:
That's youth rising out of this. It hasn't gotten to the point where things have started moving yet, but this period is the biggest breeding ground for revolution in this country since the mid-Sixties. I don't think there's been a more ripe time for a generation to come along and rebel against all this.
The interviewer says, "Many people your age see a generation lined up to buy Justin Timberlake albums. Young says,
That's not what I see. You can't fool youth. There's a lot of kids who do not like waht's going on. They don't like the country the way it's being run. They don't like the corporations getting off scot-free.