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| - As a music fan, I've often wondered why? Why is it that some older acts continue to play the same old songs year after year, touring the beer/rib festivals, and generally sounding worse and worse playing rote versions of their most obvious hits? Hootie & the Blowfish and Gin Blossoms were already on this circuit only a few years after their biggest hits. I think I saw an ad once for Foghat appearing at a local car dealership. The Beach Boys? We won't even discuss them.
Whereas other veteran artists continue to pay attention to their craft and continue to write and record solid music even if it doesn't sell as well as it used to. They still sell the larger venues and still put an effort into their shows. I'm talking acts like John Mellencamp, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Robert Plant, Carlos Santana, John HIatt, Bonnie Raitt, and a few others. They also seem adept at attracting younger fans.
Neil Young clearly falls into the latter category.
And that's who my brother Paul, my dad & I saw this past week at the Pete. Neil Young is clearly an intergenerational artist. The dad loved his music the first time around and the bro and I got into him back in the 1990s when he started appearing with Pearl Jam, Nirvana, & others. Neil Young is also multifaceted. You're either going to get Acoustic Neil (a la the movie "Neil Young: Heart of Gold") or you're going to get the hard rock, distortion, fuzz tone Neil, especially when he plays with Crazy Horse. And that's what we got!
Curiously, the set began with Neil's roadies setting things up, dressed either as construction workers or lab technicians/scientists. One of 'em, apparently the leader (wearing an Albert Einstein wig), was giving directions as faux amps were lifted out of their faux crates. Then they applauded themselves as a huge novelty vintage mic was set up center stage. It was really bizarre, especially when you consider that Neil Young is not known for his sense of whimsy. They also played a prerecorded version of the "Star Spangled Banner", but since Neil's Canadian, shouldn't they have first played "O Canada" like at the ballgame?
The band then went into thundering versions of some of their best known material like "Love and Only Love" and "Powderfinger". He then went into a new song (don't roll your eyes), "Walk Like a Giant" which addresses some of his generations successes and failures. "Walk Like a Giant" ranks up there with the best he's ever done. And those of us who like Acoustic Neil were treated to a haunting version of "The Needle and the Damage Done" and "Twisted Road", an homage to Bob Dylan and Roy Orbison.
Oddly enough, Neil Young & Crazy Horse did not perform any material of their 2012 album, "Americana". But we did get "Cinnamon Girl", "Hey Hey, My My", and "Like a Hurricane", which was the encore.
The song "Hey Hey, My My" tells us "It's better to burn out/than it is to rust". Ironically, sitting there I could not believe I was watching a 67 year old man on stage.
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