Danny Elfman brought all of his selves to the ‘White Noise’ score, as composer of ‘A Night at the Opera’ and as a composer in his own right.
With the music of Neil Young, I have a slightly different perspective. I can see how the very best of what he’s done – the songs ‘After the Goldrush’, ‘On the Road’, the albums ‘Harvest’ and ‘Drive’ – has brought him closer to the peak of what he does best.
Neil Young: ‘I’ve always had a love of music, and I have to say – to that degree – I wasn’t a musician first. But I did want to be. I did it in the first band I played in, which was a jazz group. I started doing it when I got kicked out of school. I started this record company and I did these radio shows, and then I had a show on a television station. I was touring that. And I had a lot of other interests, and I got to the point where I did it full-time.’
Neil Young: ‘Music kind of opened the doors to other musical things.’ 1.
The first time I saw Neil Young was at the legendary Fillmore West. It was late afternoon and there was a large, nearly empty audience. I had never listened to Young before and had just seen him in concert. I was in the front row when he started playing. The first song he played was ‘After the Goldrush’.
The lights changed as he continued, and while they were on, a man in the aisle turned around to look at Neil. I was standing beside the stage and I couldn’t believe my eyes. He was wearing a cowboy hat and his shirt was buttoned up – it was the same guy who had been in the crowd a few minutes earlier.
I heard him in the earpiece on the earpiece of my earphones and said, ‘You did that?’
‘I did it when the audience was leaving.’
‘What song was that?’
‘The one about the Gold Rush. The one where he went out in California.’
Neil Young: ‘We used to have so much fun at Fillmore West. I wanted to bring my guitar up there and do that show. They had a