David Crosby

The phrase ‘keep your friends close, but your enemies closer’ springs quickly to mind here, as perhaps the least likely person you’d expect to by waxing lyrical on his hatred of Young – at least in a public capacity – is his very own bandmate. But it seems those sweet CSNY tones were gladly fooling the world, because underneath was a swirling current of pretty acerbic ill will.

Crosby told The Guardian in 2021 that: “Well, he’s probably the most self-centred, self-obsessed, selfish person I know,” leaving no illusion on his not-so-glowing character reference to Young. He then added: “He only thinks about Neil, period. That’s the only person he’ll consider. Ever!” Young’s selfishness is clear insofar as Crosby is not the only one to take a disliking to his supposed comrade, because those CSNY punches just keep on rolling.

Graham Nash

It’s a miracle Crosby, Stills and Nash ever even made it into the recording studio, as the dynamic between the three was famously never exactly plain sailing at the best of times. But add a controversial figure like Young into that mix to stir the pot, and suddenly they were concocting a recipe for disaster.

Although Nash agreed with Crosby’s testimony of Young’s arrogant tendencies, he admittedly gave a slightly more diplomatic view of the singer in saying that he respected his “willingness to adhere to his artistic principles”. It’s a nicer way of saying he was a stubborn pain in the arse, basically, but it still goes a long way in shining a light on the toxic fumes the air of CSNY was filled with.

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is perhaps one of the only classic musicians who sits on a par with Young in terms of musical prowess and lyrical ingenuity. In this sense, the parallels between the pair are easy to draw up – both rooted in the folk scene, breaking into the rock world in the 1960s, and never shy of pushing the boundaries when it comes to their sonic lamentations. However, this is exactly where the crux of Dylan’s issue with the Canadian guitarist lies.

In his eyes, Young is simply his inferior carbon copy, a shadow haunting him around the boards of the industry and nabbing every original idea for himself. This is particularly true with reference to one special seminal hit by Young, which Dylan feels is just a prototype of his. ‘Heart of Gold’ may have propelled the singer to superstardom on Harvest, but with its rousing acoustic strum and raspy harmonica drawl, the New York ‘Tambourine Man’ felt he was being emulated and didn’t exactly take kindly to it.

Lynyrd Skynyrd

While this may have been a more covert sparring match than the rest, the unsuspecting war of words between Young and the 1970s Florida rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd says as much about the social and political tensions surrounding their respective heydays as the artists who found themselves stuck in the middle, scrambling for a way to respond to it.

For Young’s part, he came out blazing against the plague of racism and campaigned wholeheartedly for desegregation in the form of songs like ‘Southern Man’ and ‘Alabama’. But those two titles may ring a bell with Lynyrd Skynyrd’s own seminal hit, as their 1974 anthem ‘Sweet Home Alabama’, defending their territory against Young’s accusations that the entire American south were to blame for the root of the issue. Certainly, in lyrics like, “Southern man don’t need him around anyhow,” a fiery feud was well underway.

George Harrison

Lastly, we turn to Young as his swathes of enemies take on a transatlantic calibre, heading straight for the ‘Quiet Beatle’ George Harrison, who, in his not-so-usual way, made no secret of his misgivings for the Canadian star in a series of scathing swipes over his competency as an artist.

Hailing from the biggest rock band in the world, Harrison’s wounding words would have undeniably made for a cutting jibe, especially when he was taking aim at Young’s vocal ability. During a 1992 recording session with Bob Geldof, Harrison lashed out at the singer’s voice, declaring that: “I hate it. Yeah, I can’t stand it,” before backtracking only slightly to make the tongue in cheek quip, “His singing is even worse than me.”

If one thing has been made abundantly evident, as much as Young may possess an intoxicating commercial charm, behind the scenes he most definitely isn’t a person with a ‘Heart of Gold’.