Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, Part 4
It takes some serious guts to be Neil Young. Who else out there is willing to roll the dice on their make or break second record with a zero-overdubs, unrehearsed and unmanly acoustic weeper, a 3 chord, 9 minute ramble, or a smoking hot rock single that's mixed to celebrate its backing vocals over the lead?
And who else is willing to leave untouched a bandmate's mid-song, instantly shame-faced, vocal eruption that's akin to a hot, wet fart in church?
How else can you describe what must be Danny Whitten, pictured above, interrupting Neil's slow strutting regrets with a muppet-level exhortation at the 2:45 mark?
I have no idea what Whitten is hollering here. Maybe he's asking his lady friend for vittles: "All right Missy, cook it!" Or maybe he feels like it's time to hand out a few long lost Dr Pepper competitors to his white brethren. "All white, Mr Pibbs!"
Either way, the moment is akin to me rocking a speedo at your wedding, or Animal interrupting Ricky Gervais' favorite Muppet song.
Where else can you find anything quite so musically dubious? There's J Mascis's YOU! chants (not to mention the song's garbage-bin-level-muppet video) on his otherwise splendid cover of Just Like Heaven,
and the opening mudslide of Dylan's harmonica at the 3:50 mark of You're A Big Girl Now.
Sure, the Bobster eventually rescues his solo and Mascus, I guess, successfully prevents any of us from thinking that he straightforwardly admires Robert Smith, but all these moments leave you scratching your head: why didn't the artist try another take, or just edit that bit out, or get a little advice on how not to suck?
I imagine Young and his screw-you-world producer David Briggs got plenty of guidance from record label types here and everywhere about how not to suck. But they made a career out of ignoring all such advice. And thank goodness: we love him Shakey, not slick.
Happily, the album cut is not Neil's last word on The Losing End. Indeed, it took Whitten's death, Ben Keith's ghostly slide guitar and the Tonight's The Night tour for Young to finally mine the song's rich core.
"Light that pipe!" Neil calls out here, in place of Whitten's incomprehensible screech. I have no doubt everyone on stage and in the audience at that point had already done so, repeatedly.
No version of The Losing End has any business lasting six minutes. It's a lovely, but simple, song. But I wish Neil would unearth and issue an hour long Santa Monica Flyers rehearsal of the piece, complete with false starts, chortles and light up sessions, especially given the vibe we're getting of Shakey's forthcoming record. I trust Woody Guthrie's heirs are getting royalties for Neil's just released, enjoyably-silly-but-still-pretty-bad, This Land Is Your Land ripoff:
P.S. My famous brother, as usual, has theories. He thinks Whitten's call out is: "alright Neilsy — pick it!" Neil, thankfully, doesn't comply with this directive: he does not pick his nose. Rather, he offers up a very tasty little guitar solo.
What do you all think of my brother's theory? I declare it BORING, and, probably, correct.
