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Just read about Neil Young’s Living With War (hear it) in the NY Times today. I’ve got to say that while Jon Pareles showed some appreciation for the significance of the project there was also much he didn’t “get” about it. First, this is a musical project quite unlike any ever attempted. Young recorded the music less than four weeks ago for God’s sake and it’s already being widely distributed. And distribution is happening (at least initially) entirely outside normal commercial channels. The record is currently available in a free audio stream. In another break with even online music distribution, Young insists that everyone who does listen has to listen to the ENTIRE album in one continuous loop. No surfing through tracks looking for the one you like most. You’ve got to sit through the entire thing if you want to hear it. The message is: “I’ve got something big here, something important to say. Listen on my terms if you listen at all.” I think people will respect that. It will resonate with them.
I think that all of this will create exponentially greater interest in the album when it does become available via more conventional outlets. If I’m right, then this should blow entirely out of the water the standard record industry whining about how making music available free (via filesharing) destroys the value of the commodity and renders it less attractive to those who would otherwise buy it. And if the music honchos are right, then Young’s previewing the album online as he’s done will spoil its sales momentum by deflating the balloon of expectation. I know that they’ll be wrong. But let’s see who’s right.
A lot’s been written about this album already. So there’s little I can bring to the conversation that isn’t new. But the most salient comment I can make is that this is a red hot burning album, full of rage against the established political order. Naturally, George Bush and his minions come in for the most savage treatment. But this is not a one note album. Young is too powerful a lyricist and social observer for that. His blazing eye roves the entire American landscape and finds rich fodder for his outrage.
To find like-minded literary efforts one thinks of Dylan Thomas’ line: “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” But in this case, Young rages against the needless dying of our boys in Iraq. I also think of Jeremiah raging against the people of Israel for turning their backs on the poor, hungry and destitute. There is the same pure prophetic fury in both Young’s lyrics and vocals.
The haste with which Young recorded Living With War allowed him to preserve the mood of simmering rage while he was in the studio. This is no “emotion recollected in tranquility.” No, old Wordsworth would definitely not approve of this album. It’s too raw, too visceral, too ‘of the moment.’
I don’t know that we’ll be listening to this album much in twenty years (but I could be wrong about that). But we’re sure gonna be hearing a helluva lot of it over the last few years of the Bush reign. And we’ll hear it everywhere: on the radio, the internet, at anti-war demonstrations, in our friends’ homes.
The Times reviewer rightly compares Living With War to Ohio as a companion work of protest created in a white-hot fury. But the difference here is that Young has created an entire album, not just one song. And it’s not just available on radio as Ohio was when it was first released. Anyone can go to Young’s website and hear it. Millions are no doubt doing so as I write this. In the digital age, the means of distribution are democratized. Would that our political processes could be similarly democratized.
One of the album’s best songs is Living With War. Here are the lyrics:
I’m living with war everyday
I’m living with war in my heart everyday
I’m living with war right nowAnd when the dawn breaks I see my fellow man
And on the flat-screen we kill and we’re killed again
And when the night falls, I pray for peace
Try to remember peace (visualize)I join the multitudes
I raise my hand in peace
I never bow to the laws of the thought police
I take a holy vow
To never kill again
To never kill againI’m living with war in my heart
I’m living with war in my heart in my mind
I’m living with war right nowDon’t take no tidal wave
Don’t take no mass grave
Don’t take no smokin’ gun
To show how the west was won
But when the curtain falls, I pray for peace
Try to remember peace (visualize)In the crowded streets
In the big hotels
In the mosques and the doors of the old museum
I take a holy vow
To never kill again
Try to remember peaceThe rocket’s red glare
Bombs bursting in air
Give proof through the night,
That our flag is still thereI’m living with war everyday
I’m living with war in my heart everyday
I’m living with war right now
What resonates especially powerfully is the quotation from the Star Spangled Banner (sung here with a gospel choir): “The rocket’s red glare/ Bombs bursting in air/ Give proof through the night/ That our flag is still there.” Yet, Young takes the meaning of the original lyrics referencing a real military battle and transforms them into an anthem for peace. Those bombs bursting in air confirm not war, but the true American patriot who waves the flag of peace.
