Watch Neil Young cover Bruce Springsteen’s hit song ‘Born In The USA’
In the realms of contemporary rock musicians, they don’t come much more eminent that the great Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen. Having formed relentlessly courageous careers for decades now, the two musicians have crossed paths both creatively and personally a number of times over their time at the top.
Here, we see the merging of two greats as Young pays homage to Springsteen by putting his own spin on ‘Born In The USA’ – a song that remains undeniably ironic given Young’s Canadian nationality and what was a long-drawn-out attempt to gain a US citizenship.
“Yeah, there’s a change [in me]. [Being a rich man] doesn’t make living easier, but it does make certain aspects of your life easier,” Springsteen once said following the incredible success of the song and subsequent album. “You don’t have to worry about rent, you can buy things for your folks and help out your friends, and you can have a good time, you know?” he added.
“I don’t really think [money] does change you. It’s an inanimate thing, a tool, a convenience. If you’ve got to have a problem, it’s a good problem to have. Money was kind of part of the dream when I started. I don’t think…I never felt like I ever played a note for the money. I think if I did, people would know, and they’d throw you out of the joint. And you’d deserve to go. But at the same time, it was a part of the dream.”
Not wanting to focus too much on the mountains of cash that Springsteen made from that one song, we decided instead to explore the world of Neil Young and his band Crazy Horse. While Young and Springsteen have performed together a handful of times in the past, this is the only footage we could find of one of the aforementioned names paying tribute live on stage.
Young’s band, joined on stage by keyboard and guitar player Nils Lofgren, ripped through a rendition of the Springsteen hit while performing at the ‘MusiCares’ pre-Grammy benefit show back in 2013. The inclusion of Lofgren, a musician who toured with Young and Crazy Horse in 1973 after the group’s founding guitarist Danny Whitten died, proved to be an emotional move for Young and the band.
The footage isn’t great, but the sound quality makes up for it. “I’m a long gone Daddy in the U.S.A, I’m a cool rocking Daddy in the U.S.A”
