Rust Never Sleeps

About

Part of what makes <i>Rust Never Sleeps</i> so extraordinary is hearing all the various Neil Youngs in one place: the acoustic (the first half), the electric (the second); the crass (“Welfare Mothers”) and the cosmic (“Pocahontas”); the gentle (“Sail Away”) and the unhinged (“Sedan Delivery”). He’d never had a consistent persona, per se—just listen to “Heart of Gold” next to “Tonight’s the Night.” But he often used the album format, not to mention different groups of musician, as a way to segregate his wayward impulses: the polite orchestrations of <i>Harvest</i>, the swampy, paranoid <i>On the Beach</i>, and so on. <i>Rust</i> doesn’t reconcile those impulses as much a, to paraphrase the author F. Scott Fitzgerald’s definition of intelligence, prove that he’s capable of holding them all together while still managing to function. But it’s also the first—and arguably clearest—illustration of the radical self-transformations that have defined Young’s career. While his peers from the Woodstock era were taking refuge in fame and the comfort of a cultural battle well-fought, he turned toward punk, not just as the post-apocalyptic sound of the Cold War and early Reagan era (“Sedan Delivery”), but as the inheritor to the rebellion of early rock ’n’ roll (“Hey Hey, My My”). And as much as “Powderfinger” is cloaked in the scenery of early America and the Old West, the essential metaphor of the song is someone so wed to their way of life that they’re willing to die for it. A brave death, but a death neverthele. .

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

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