Neil Young

In that Tori Kudo interview I posted a while back, Kudo said this about Neil Young:

"I would prefer believe that he sings as though there were something that needed to be sung, and plays guitar as though there were phrases that needed to be played, not because of his convictions but because of his physical make-up."

Despite one of my best friend's being obsessed with Neil Young, I never tuned into his music. Never listened to it. Then I came across a posting of Young's 1975 album Zuma. I listened to it, and damn if it didn't hit me really hard. Particularly the two epic tracks "Danger Bird" and "Cortez the Killer." It's exactly the kind of guitar music I like. Heavy, plodding, and with a generous amount of blood-wringing guitar solos.

I've now started reading Jimmy McDonough's Shakey: Neil Young's Biography. So far it's fascinating, very well-written. It's also epic, something like 700 pages long.

Lastly, here's a quote from an interview I found with Young:

"Q : What advice would you give a guitarist just starting out?

NEIL : Start playing, learn a few chords and play with somebody a little bit better than yourself. Don't try to learn from books anything you don't already know. Music is learning directly from others. Take certain riffs from here and there and use them to write songs and to discover new sounds and new chord progressions. Create. But even if the results sound shitty, keep creating. Soon, it'll be great."