“My favourites”: the two musicians Neil Young called his greatest influences
While the label of being a musical chameleon is often afforded to the likes of David Bowie and Lou Reed, who were known for changing up their style from album to album, but someone who doesn’t get the credit he deserves for doing this quite as much is Neil Young.
Yes, a lot of his early work was straightforward rock that took inspiration from blues music, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t introducing other elements and influences into his work. Young’s determination to bend the rules and boundaries of what rock music could be was always bubbling underneath the surface rather than shown explicitly in the same way that others choose to highlight their versatility, but just because it has to be searched for doesn’t mean it’s not there.
The 1980s would be a tough decade for Young in terms of him having to endure a period of declining commercial success, but one could argue that this is when he was at his most experimental and hyperactive. Moving from albums like the electronic-heavy Trans to the brief yet unabashedly rockabilly Everybody’s Rockin’ without so much as a pause in between, Young’s chaotic approach to trying his hand at new things around this time was bound to split opinion, but it was also him expressing himself in an honest way that felt true to his ethos.
By the time he came to working alongside his band, Crazy Horse, on 1990’s Ragged Glory, it was clear that his attention had diverted elsewhere yet again, and during a 1995 interview with Mojo, he reflected upon how two titans of jazz significantly influenced the way he was improvising around this time.
“Miles [Davis] and [John] Coltrane,” he enthused. “They’re two of my favourites.”
While a jazz style isn’t necessarily something that many people would associate with the music of Young, he further explained how their respective approaches were more in line with the way he wanted to work.
“My guitar improvisations with Crazy Horse are very, very Coltrane-influenced,” he continued, before expressing a love for two of his most expansive and free-wheeling records. “I’m particularly taken by work like Equinox and My Favourite Things.”
However, his admiration for Davis was seemingly rooted even less in overall sound and more in the mindset that one has to approach music with. “Miles, I love just because of his overall attitude towards the concept of ‘creation’, which is one of constant change,” he said. “There’s no reason to stay there once you’ve done it. You could stay for the rest of your life, and it would become like a regular job.”
Without question, Davis and Coltrane were two of the biggest icons in jazz music, and two of the most adventurous ones whose influence stretched far beyond their own immediate circles, so it’s understandable why Young would find plenty to admire in their work.
However, while he may not have entertained a jazzier side on Ragged Glory in truth, with the record often being observed as adjacent to the growing grunge movement of the period, his shared ethos with Davis of refusing to stay in the same place in order to keep creativity feeling fresh is something he’s stayed true to for the whole of his career. It may not always have worked in his favour, but you have to commend him for fearlessly wanting to work in this fashion.
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