Musical Confessions: the songs Neil Young used as a self-portrait
For any singer-songwriter, the song is the one moment where they can be the most honest. It might not be easy to articulate what you want to say with words, so putting it all down on paper and hiding behind a guitar has helped many artists share their feelings with the world. Whereas Neil Young had a habit of making characters in his works and quoting his heart more than a few times, tracks like ‘The Loner’ and ‘Drifter’ were the first times he began to critique himself.
Granted, Young was never going to be the engaging type whenever he sat down for interviews. What you saw was what you got when it came to his music, and whenever you asked him what songs were about, chances are you were going to get a similar answer. After leaving the ashes of Buffalo Springfield, ‘The Loner’ introduced the world to how Young really saw himself.
Although he’s addressing this character in the second person, it’s not hard to see what Young is getting at with lyrics about a man who keeps all of his pain inside, either when it comes to separating from his wife or struggling from day-to-day. There are also a few hints about Young’s role as a songwriter, calling this man a “feeling arranger” in his spare time.
It’s that kind of earnestness that made Young so endearing. Even if everything wasn’t exactly in tune on his records, the honesty behind the performances was what sold half of his greatest albums, whether that was the rustic bent of Harvest or the savage live guts on Rust Never Sleeps.
Somewhere along the line, though, Young began to lose the plot a little bit, trying for new sounds that he had no business trying out on albums like Everybody’s Rockin’ and Trans — the former of which would see Young sued by his own label. Despite being the last 1970s star equipped to manage the 1980s era of MTV, Landing on Water did give us a look at that same drifter a few years later.
As opposed to talking about his personal life, ‘Drifter’ feels like Young saying everything that he wanted to say to his record company in one track. Since the label wanted something more en vogue with the times, Young wrote a track saying his piece about the whole thing, confessing that he likes to change things up as soon as people think they’ve figured him out.
He might not have been the same kind of musical chameleon as David Bowie, but Young could flex his muscles outside his usual wheelhouse. It’s not always the soundest musical decision, but Young would rather have followed his muse than do what some stiff in a suit thought the new trend was.
It’s not like sticking to his guns didn’t pay off, either. After trying his hand at working with Crosby, Stills, and Nash again, Young’s return to heavy rock on Freedom couldn’t have come at a better time, almost laying the groundwork for the grunge movement on the rise just a few years later.
Looking at both pieces, ‘The Loner’ and ‘Drifter’ is the perfect explanation for why Young is considered the ‘Godfather of Grunge’. The tone might be similar, but the key behind every song he sang was about not being mainstream. He could only be himself, and fans have thought that was more than enough for years.
