Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend XX
[0] I had a really terrific conversation with Neil Young recently that aired on SXM's Team Cocoa Radio, Channel 106.
[1] We talked about music that inspired Neil when he was very young.
[2] And because it was on the radio on SiriusXM, we were able to play the songs and then get Neil's in the moment reaction to hearing this material sometimes for the first time in years.
[3] I love the conversation so much.
[4] that I wanted to share it with my podcast listeners.
[5] But here's the catch.
[6] Unfortunately, we're not able to play the songs in the podcast itself.
[7] So here's what I would encourage you to do.
[8] I would encourage you if you're listening right now.
[9] And you want to hear these songs that Neil Young is responding to.
[10] If you're a serious XM subscriber, open up the SXM app and search Conan.
[11] And you'll be able to find the conversation with the song.
[12] or if you're not a serious XM subscriber, we're going to provide a list of the songs in the episode notes so that you can listen along to the songs with the music streaming service of your choice.
[13] I think it's just going to make the experience much cooler.
[14] So without further ado, here's my conversation with Neil Young.
[15] Fall is here, hear the yell, back to school, ring the bell, brand new shoes, walking loose, Climb the fence, books and pens I can tell that we are going to be friends Yes, I can tell that we are going to be friends Hey, this is Conan O 'Brien And what you're about to hear Is a very special sit -down with Neil Young Incredibly special to me He's one of my heroes And he has a new record out called World Record, and this was an opportunity to use his new record as a jumping off point, but then move on to look at the entirety of Neil Young's, his work, but also his intentions as an artist and have some fun along the way.
[16] And I'm joined by Jim Pitt, Jim.
[17] Hello, Conan.
[18] I'm very professional.
[19] I like it.
[20] Jim is also my accountant, and my parole officer.
[21] Jim, you know, booked all the music on my show for, you know, 95 % of my late -night career.
[22] And so he was responsible for a lot of the great stuff that we were able to accomplish musically with the late -night show.
[23] But also, he's a fellow Neil Young fanatic.
[24] Correct.
[25] So then this is cool because Neil doesn't do a lot of stuff like this.
[26] So we were really honored that this came together.
[27] Yeah, yeah.
[28] We've talked about this before, but Neil has such a special place in the history of your show.
[29] You know, the week that he did when the Prairie Wind album came out, that was a big deal for us.
[30] Just a really special time.
[31] He was there every night of the week.
[32] And again, it's not something Neil Young.
[33] really does.
[34] Right, right.
[35] And yeah, he moved in with us for a week.
[36] Yeah.
[37] And it's not like And we felt really good about it until the following week he did every episode of the Muppet TV show.
[38] And that, I mean, I don't know.
[39] It ruined it for me. I'm kidding.
[40] I have to ruin moments with my jokes.
[41] But no, that was very special.
[42] He came on at the end of the tonight show.
[43] And a special performance.
[44] He did an amazing performance there and has always been a friend to us.
[45] So just great to get to sit down with him.
[46] And one of the fun things about this interview is we asked Neil to give us some songs that inspired him when he was a young lad coming up in that northern climate and up in Canada.
[47] and he gave us some incredible songs.
[48] Some I didn't know, had never heard of before, and there were a great window into Neil Young, his early life, what inspired him, and it's incredible that he let us do this.
[49] It's just such a treat.
[50] It was.
[51] It was really touching to watch him listen to some of these songs.
[52] And yeah, and we talk about some of his TV appearances and his experiences.
[53] Some of those crazy TV appearances, including one on a crime detective show from the 60s with the Buffalo Springfield.
[54] So all in all, this is really fun.
[55] This is, you're about to hear me having the time of my life.
[56] So let's begin this special sit -down with Neil Young.
[57] I wanted to start out by thanking you from the bottom of my heart because you have famously been very nice to me throughout my career and in ways that I can never repay.
[58] But then when COVID hit, we were forced to move into a studio, Largo studio.
[59] And because we couldn't have an audience, I said, I asked all my fans to send in life -size cutouts of themselves and we put them in the audience so that my cardboard fans would be represented, what shows up from you, a life -size cutout of you sitting, and we were blown away, but you had this photo taken, turned into this life -size thing, sent it in.
[60] So you were in the audience front and center every night during COVID that I went out and did my COVID show and told my jokes to know one.
[61] The eyes I was looking that I was looking into were yours, Neil.
[62] You didn't crack a smile once.
[63] I was supporting you.
[64] I was there for you.
[65] Very serious.
[66] No, it was that's my, when I think about COVID, everyone has their memories of COVID and what we all went through.
[67] And mine is Neil Young staring at me, sitting in the audience made of car board.
[68] Well, I'm trying to make something happen.
[69] So I want to thank you for being here and congrats on World Record.
[70] I'm going to tell you I really enjoy the record.
[71] What I love the most about it is that there's some optimism.
[72] You're obviously talking about serious shit and the environment and where are we and what are we doing to this planet.
[73] And this has been an important cause for you but what I really love so much is on songs like Love Earth and this old planet there is a feeling like there's a way forward if and we can do this and the songs are lovely but to me my experience has been when I try to be optimistic with people in this current climate they sometimes get angry with me, and I really appreciate people that are saying there is a way forward here.
[74] There really is.
[75] I don't really know what it is, but I do know there's a feeling when people get together to do something good.
[76] Yeah.
[77] It happens no matter what level you're on.
[78] If you're joining into something good, you can see it on street corners when you see like the people cheering for the on behalf of the women of Iran and they are possessed by this good feeling that they have if they're expressing themselves but that's not the same as doing something good like something good for the land like dedicating yourself to you know not doing some bad thing that you had been doing to do you know things that people can can share everyday people can good do good things together and it gives you a feeling of power and that's and power is very important to the recovery of what we're trying to do because we're here yeah i'm not really making a good a good story for it but uh there's a feeling when people do something good together like uh trying to make something happen that you know is good yep and a lot of people are into it I think in the end, that's all we're going to be able to do.
[79] Well, I think so many people feel, if you look at the whole picture, it's overwhelming because you think even if I do all the right things, technically, that doesn't stop, you know, if you really get technical, that doesn't stop India, it doesn't stop China.
[80] Even if the United States completely got its shit together, it doesn't stop the rest of the world.
[81] So what's the point?
[82] And I think what you're tapping into, which I completely agree with, I think it's, you know, and it can be anything, it can be music, it can be comedy, it can be, you know, anyone's sphere of life is let's try and do something, let me try and do something positive with some other people and you get a charge from it.
[83] You get a, you're empowered because I think when you look at the whole thing, it's overwhelming.
[84] And that's what I really, what I really liked about the new album is that it made me unafraid to be optimistic and maybe a little inspired as opposed to we're all screwed which is I think of being as negative or putting somebody down or making some comment there's that we have so much of that that we don't need it so it's it's abundant but but finding a way forward where we're And it's not just this country and not worried about just this country.
[85] The same feelings are going to happen around the world as it becomes more apparent what's going on.
[86] You can see it more every year.
[87] And when people, you know, first of all, it helps if you've been around for a long time.
[88] Because then you know the difference.
[89] If you haven't been around for very long, this has been going on pretty quickly for the last 20 years.
[90] Yeah.
[91] You know, so.
[92] Yeah, you have the.
[93] experience in your bone marrow of being alive in Canada in the 50s, 60s, experiencing, you know, long before we had gotten to this level of emissions in the environment.
[94] So seeing things grow, seeing seasons change in a intense, huge way, like so grand, piles of leaves that are like four or five feet high that you're moving around and it's incredible.
[95] When fall comes and it really is fall, I mean, what it really happens.
[96] So these beautiful natural things, like the changing of the colors of the leaves in the fall and spring rains and things like that.
[97] When you've been living with them in a cycle as I have for 77 years, then it becomes something you feel.
[98] And a good feeling about protecting that, you know, people feel good about trying to do things to make the air cleaner and stuff like that.
[99] And that's great.
[100] That's the whole thing, you know.
[101] But doing it together, doing it together by habit, by something that you've picked up on, whether you might not be able to drive an electric car.
[102] You can't afford it.
[103] but it doesn't matter electric cars aren't going to take over the world anyway and it's not the answer electric car is not the answer because that energy is coming from somewhere it's a step but it's not the answer it's not the only answer it's one little answer you can do that and you take a chance with where the power comes from but it's it can be fixed because now if the power source is good it works okay so that's that's great.
[104] And the same thing with the cars is if we used biofuels and we could still use the infrastructure.
[105] And it may sound strange to hear this now, but in a few years it's going to be very important.
[106] Yeah.
[107] To we have fuel to get around with.
[108] And it's also important that we get back to the ground and that the earth is like the carbon comes back into the earth out of the sky.
[109] These things have to happen and they happen through farming and doing things correctly so that we can have all the food and all the fuel that we need.
[110] So while we're replacing the bad with good natural things, we're actually helping the earth at the same time to recover from what's happened.
[111] And there's a feeling to doing that.
[112] When a few people get the vibe that they're doing something like that, and there's a movement towards that, that's a powerful thing.
[113] And it doesn't matter what country you're in, because it's going to happen everywhere.
[114] People are, you know.
[115] There's a track on world record that grabbed my attention because I was thinking a lot about this.
[116] You've explored so many, like, you have, you know, there's classic themes in rock and roll, and I think with Chuck Barry, Chuck Barry is the one I think of who he had an obsession with the American, car and then there's so many songs you know Eddie Cochran I'm going to get that car this car is going to make all the difference and you see it this obsession with cars and you've always loved these old cars and you love them and you wrote this song that really speaks to me because it's it's called Chevrolet and you're talking about you still have you say this car is talking to me You see this car.
[117] It's got like the, it's got the pearl gloss on the old steering wheel.
[118] And it's, God, this car looks good.
[119] And I love the line.
[120] It's really talking to me, this car.
[121] And then you start thinking, huh, that's going to burn a lot of fuel.
[122] And it's the first time that this old, really one of the age -old obsessions in rock and roll.
[123] And Chevrolet is a rock and crunchy song.
[124] You're plugged in.
[125] but you're talking about this dilemma now and you're not being negative you're just saying huh well this is interesting what do I do about this I've converted my Buick I have a Buick it's being converted right now to run on E100 ethanol so I can run the same car and the conversion is not ridiculously expensive I can have a car like that that and a clean conscience about what I'm burning.
[126] So the ethanol is, it's natural.
[127] Yeah.
[128] And does it have a, there have been times where people have told me you can drive a car and, you know, I once heard that, I don't know if it's true, but the Willie Nelson had a tour bus or something that ran on, you know, biofuel, some kind of biodiesel, but that if you were behind it, along with the other fumes that follow Willie's bus, you would smell, You could smell like freshly cooked popcorn because that was the scent that was in the air.
[129] And I thought, that's kind of nice.
[130] Yeah, that's where they got it.
[131] But it's a good thing.
[132] But the real good thing is, unlike electricity, there's an infrastructure in place everywhere that can distribute this.
[133] And the cars are there.
[134] And some of the old cars are capable of becoming this.
[135] So it's not like something that can't happen.
[136] It's something that can happen.
[137] And will happen more frequently, I think.
[138] Yeah, I think so.
[139] People doing it together, though, as soon as other people realize that this is a good thing, and it's not this is a good thing, oh, look at me, I'm good.
[140] No, it's like, look what we're up against.
[141] Yep.
[142] We are up against it, you know, and we don't get that feeling yet because our leaders have not all gotten on the same station at the same time and stood together and told us.
[143] Yeah.
[144] They may never, actually.
[145] They may never.
[146] That may not be part of the modern, that may not be the job description.
[147] No, that's not what's happening.
[148] So far.
[149] Yeah.
[150] I don't count anybody out.
[151] I think there are our possibility of great leaders.
[152] Yeah, I do too.
[153] They tend to come along when we need the most.
[154] I hope so.
[155] And I'm just thinking through history and wait a minute.
[156] No, they don't.
[157] Forget what I said.
[158] That was screwy.
[159] You know, I've been thinking a way.
[160] lot and it's not just not just me but my my good friend and associate jim pitt who's been working with me since the beginning we started with me in 93 working on um what kind of music we wanted to explore and what we wanted the philosophy our philosophy to be of of putting new stuff out there and taking chances and we were talking a lot about your work and one of the things that was coming to mind so much is there's a lot of yearning, a lot of looking back in your work from the very beginning, and it's been a theme of getting back to someplace, getting to something that evokes strong feelings for you, whether it's a place that you, you know, in helpless, whether it's a, whether it's a time in your life, it feels like it's a theme you've been working through.
[161] So we had the notion that maybe would ask you, if you go back to your youth, are there a couple of songs that spoke to you, that were evocative of something, and you gave us a couple.
[162] Yeah, I gave you a few.
[163] Yeah, and if you're cool with it, I'd love to play them right now.
[164] We'll take you down.
[165] We should play them.
[166] Memory Lane.
[167] The first one is Four Strong Winds by Ian and Sylvia.
[168] Do you remember where you were when you heard this song for the first time?
[169] No, but I loved it so much that I would, you know, put nickels and dimes in the jukebox to play it over and over and over again until I didn't have any change.
[170] I would just stand there in front of it and listen to it.
[171] It was a beautiful song.
[172] For some reason, it really, really got to me. All right.
[173] And I could feel the magic of the music.
[174] What's take you back?
[175] You're a kid at this point when you're hearing this song?
[176] I guess I'm probably 11.
[177] 11.
[178] Okay, there's an 11 -year -old.
[179] that maybe a little older I'm not sure but let's say you're 12 I'm just gonna throw that out there because we're gonna pick a date and you're 12 years old and where are you living in Winnipeg you're living in Winnipeg and I and I was I heard the song before but I was at Falcon Lake a place that's near Winnipeg that's kind of a just a lake with you can pitch tents around it sure so we had our tent to my friend Jack and I who play drums in the squires my first band and we were we were out there and I would find I found this thing on the jukebox in the restaurant let's give it a list just played it that's a beautiful song that's quite a song yeah would it uh that's not the original version that I heard them do though because it's stereo right okay that was mono when I was listening to right listen to it in a jukebox mix and a jukebox yeah so it was more jangly guitars and what do you think uh when you hear it now does it take you right back there eventually it at first it disturbed me a little because it was stereo and it wasn't where i had gone in my head when i was talking about it so but because i have a memory of it that's so strong but the music is there and it's uh it's that's it's it's it got there and i can hear her singing and him singing and the whole thing.
[180] I'm still, it seems a little, I don't know if this is the version.
[181] They may have even re -recorded it for stereo because they may have sang it all on one mic and done everything together in mono the first time.
[182] So when that song came out and you heard, and it's a popular song and it's a hit, and it's a hit, and And he's saying, I'm going to Alberta.
[183] Was there some part of you that was like this, this resonates.
[184] He's talking about where I'm from.
[185] He's talking about my country, and this is a hit on the radio.
[186] That must have been powerful.
[187] It was great.
[188] You know, it's nice to hear one of the other provinces.
[189] You know, could easily have been Manitoba or Saskatchewan.
[190] Nothing rhymes with Manitoba.
[191] Manitoba or Saskatchewan.
[192] Alberta wins again.
[193] No, wait, Saskatchewan moving on.
[194] We got that.
[195] Yeah.
[196] So, you know.
[197] So there's another song you gave us, which is by someone, I didn't, wasn't familiar with Gogh Grant.
[198] Oh, yeah.
[199] I just wasn't, I didn't know of her.
[200] This is a song I used to hear when I was going to school.
[201] I think I was in grade three or grade four.
[202] It couldn't be more than grade four.
[203] I think it was grade four.
[204] And so I heard this song, and for some reason I associate it with the school and the highway and the railroad tracks going behind the school.
[205] Yeah.
[206] And the whole thing.
[207] Again, it's something I heard on the radio when I was, I never had a record of it or anything.
[208] Right.
[209] So you just had to wait.
[210] Yeah, you just wait for it to come around and then it would play and you'd hear it.
[211] I remember those days well.
[212] I remember hoping a song I liked would come on the radio and sometimes catching it halfway through.
[213] Yeah, right.
[214] And very hard to explain that to my son and my daughter now.
[215] Right, they don't understand.
[216] You used to have to hope that you would catch something rather than I can have it instantly.
[217] You have it instantly, but it's not the same as the one that you had to wait for because it was all there.
[218] Yes.
[219] And the way it was coming through the air and the radio was all there.
[220] Everything was there sonically, much different from today.
[221] The song, the wayward wind, you covered this.
[222] Yeah, I think I did.
[223] I covered, I might have, I don't know if I covered that.
[224] I love that you said I think I did.
[225] No, because I know I did four strong winds.
[226] I don't think I did the wayward wind, but I almost did it on old ways.
[227] Okay.
[228] But I don't think I did it.
[229] I'd have to go back and check.
[230] Well, if you'd like to do it, I'll split the publishing with you.
[231] We can do that for sure.
[232] That'll be great.
[233] I can't wait to hear that.
[234] Can I say something?
[235] That's an oral contract.
[236] And that's going to hold up in court.
[237] It will.
[238] I love you, you're just laughing through this.
[239] Oh, yeah.
[240] Bring it on, Irish.
[241] You try that.
[242] All right, let's check it out.
[243] The Wayward Win by Gogie Grant.
[244] That's a beautiful song.
[245] She's got an amazing voice.
[246] Yes.
[247] She's something else.
[248] Yeah.
[249] Was she from Philly?
[250] Philadelphia, yeah.
[251] Philadelphia, yeah.
[252] There you go.
[253] See, something good came out of Philadelphia.
[254] Yeah, that was good.
[255] That in the Constitution.
[256] Yeah.
[257] That's right.
[258] You know, it's funny because you talk about a thinking about your in the time that I've known you it was such a big deal to me when you when you came on my program you did a residency there for a week and it just meant the world to all of us and was very important and one of the things that was so cool is that you weren't someone who did a lot of things like that so it had a lot of meaning you weren't someone that was always out there on television, so it really had a great weight for me and for you, Jim, and for everybody at the show, and it was a big deal.
[259] And then I find out that you had done some television back in the 60s, and some of it may be against your will, because you're with Buffalo Springfield, was pretty wild.
[260] You're in an episode of Manix.
[261] That's right.
[262] It is one of the craziest things.
[263] Manick's a detective show with Mike Connors, and he comes into a bar to check out the scene.
[264] And in the background is Buffalo Springfield.
[265] You guys are playing, but the camera doesn't even focus on you guys.
[266] And this, pardon, I'm sorry if I'm going to anger any Manix fans out there, but this kind of run -of -the -mill 60s, show is going on that no one watches anymore, and the real story is in the background.
[267] Do you remember that at all?
[268] Do you remember how that happened?
[269] Yeah, there were a couple of those we did.
[270] I remember that one.
[271] Whose idea was, let's get Buffalo Springfield on Manix?
[272] Oh, I don't know.
[273] Yeah.
[274] I don't know, but I know that our managers thought this was a great opportunity.
[275] Right.
[276] To move into television.
[277] Did you ever notice that, you know, we're kind of.
[278] far back all the actions happening up front we are 50 feet away from the cameras you know i don't think we even looked at it that's the thing is we just kept going right it's like because we don't watch you know i didn't watch manix right i was not a manix uh fan okay well we're breaking but i do know what manics looked like yes i can picture the show i've seen it yeah you know he had uh yeah he was oh he was always jumping out of his car just before it crashed I think that was his move.
[279] He was, I think, in a Mustang, and it was always, he would always, it was about to go off the clip because they had, you know, fixed his brakes or something.
[280] I think, I don't know how he got reinsured after the 35th crash.
[281] But I was watching and there's, and it's funny because the 60s in particular is a time, I'm fascinated by it because there's such a culture clash.
[282] TV's been pretty much more or less the same for a long time just an extension of radio same old guys writing it cranking it out and then suddenly the world changes 63, 64, 65 everything's changing and I love watching there was a show that you did was it the...
[283] What's the Hollywood Palace?
[284] The Hollywood Palace.
[285] Oh yeah.
[286] The Hollywood Palace and you guys are great, right?
[287] I mean, you guys are, I can't remember what they played on the Hollywood Palace, was it?
[288] We did Mr. Soul.
[289] Mr. Soul.
[290] Yeah, yeah.
[291] That's right.
[292] You didn't.
[293] Started with for what it's worth.
[294] Yeah, for what it's worth, and Mr. Soul.
[295] And then you switched in, and it's a, it's cool.
[296] Yeah, well, the tape switched in.
[297] They taped this whole thing, you know.
[298] Oh, yeah.
[299] It was the record.
[300] And so you were playing along to the record, but was there any live aspect to it?
[301] There might have been some live singing.
[302] Yeah.
[303] I, I feel like your vocals and your solo were live.
[304] Well, they were live.
[305] I watched it, and your solo feels live.
[306] Ah, well, good.
[307] And the bass player was...
[308] Looking the other way.
[309] Yeah.
[310] Yeah, that's because he wasn't there.
[311] So he had to use our road manager looking the other way.
[312] So there's a guy who's the MC.
[313] And this is the part I love.
[314] And he comes out and he's, it's very, what, kind of Borchelt, old school show business.
[315] I'm not sure who it is.
[316] But he comes out and he goes, next we got Buffalo Springfield.
[317] these guys these guys have made so many hits in the last year made so much money they could buy Buffalo and Springfield and you're like what you guys have to just all right and you can just think there's like some 55 year old writers in the back that were told give us a joke for Buffalo Springfield yeah what the fuck is that that's right they had to have it but you know we didn't again Conan, we didn't even notice.
[318] Yeah, yeah.
[319] We didn't, that stuff never even had never even got on our screen.
[320] Right.
[321] Because we were just, we did a TV show.
[322] It's like we went to Mars.
[323] Exactly.
[324] And then we left Mars.
[325] That's what it looks like.
[326] And I think it's, it looks like, okay, we've entered this world that you kind of have to show up at, you know.
[327] And so we're going to.
[328] As yourself.
[329] Yeah, we're going to show up and we're going to do this.
[330] But we're entering a world that's, I mean, I remember watching you guys on the Buffalo Springfield on the Smothers Brothers.
[331] And again, it was great.
[332] It was an amazing performance you guys gave.
[333] But they kept doing cutaways to Tommy Smothers doing bits while you're doing for what it's worth.
[334] And I thought, huh, I don't know about that.
[335] That's television.
[336] Yeah, that's a pretty heavy song.
[337] Yeah.
[338] I don't think you should be.
[339] Well, they don't want to teach people to think about that.
[340] I don't know.
[341] But he says like, when Steven says like there's a man with a gun over there, they cut to Tommy Smothers holding a gun.
[342] And the audience laughs.
[343] And I'm thinking, eh, I don't know.
[344] I don't know if this is.
[345] It wasn't genius, Conan.
[346] It wasn't genius.
[347] Really?
[348] I thought all television comedy was genius.
[349] Oh, God.
[350] You know, you did.
[351] You know, one of the things I, you did the Johnny Cash show and, um, that was cool.
[352] And I would imagine that, I mean, there's a guy.
[353] That's a very different situation where you're being invited on of this massive American stars TV show, but also he's someone who you would really respect.
[354] Yeah.
[355] Yeah.
[356] No, I really liked Johnny Cash.
[357] Was he nice to you?
[358] Was there, you know, hardly, even.
[359] got to speak to him.
[360] But that's okay.
[361] He was busy.
[362] Yeah.
[363] It was the Johnny Cash show.
[364] Yeah.
[365] You've got to realize, in our eyes doing this, I'm, what, 23 years old?
[366] Right.
[367] I'm going on a television show.
[368] I was petrified.
[369] Yeah.
[370] So I was going to, thinking about the song I was going to sing.
[371] Was I going to screw it up or not?
[372] And that's all I thought about.
[373] Yeah.
[374] So I really don't remember much else about it.
[375] Right.
[376] Well, it's funny because one of the songs, you picked is a Johnny Cash song.
[377] Oh, yeah.
[378] And again, this is a ballot of a teenage queen.
[379] What did this song mean to you?
[380] When does this enter your radar?
[381] Oh, right in the 50s there, about the same time as I was talking about the wayward wind and the other song, Four Strong Winds.
[382] Four Strong Winds was after.
[383] The wayward wind was sooner, and this song was sooner than the wayward wind.
[384] He's back farther in my life.
[385] I've been maybe grade two, grade three.
[386] And this is what I was thinking about is that you are a storyteller.
[387] You like, I think better than just about anybody, you tell a great story when you're in your songs.
[388] And this is the classic story song.
[389] This is Johnny Cash telling us the tale of the teenage beauty queen.
[390] So let's give it a listen See where it takes you Ballad of a Teenage Queen by the great Johnny Cash What do you think?
[391] That's it.
[392] Hold up for you?
[393] Oh yeah.
[394] Yeah.
[395] Definitely.
[396] Man, I got to I mean, there's a couple of things I need to say about that song.
[397] I love that song.
[398] It's so great.
[399] When has that happened that a woman's left town made it big in Hollywood and then said, I'm going to give up all my money and go back to the boy who works at the candy store.
[400] Three on, three on.
[401] Show me one example of that happening in history and I'll back off.
[402] Yeah, I just, I had heard that song before, but when you mentioned it, I went back and was listening to it.
[403] And those back, I don't know, we don't know who's doing the backup vocals.
[404] I don't know if it sounds like it, could it be the Jordanaires?
[405] I think it's the, I think it's the, well, I always thought it was the Tennessee too.
[406] Yeah.
[407] They sound good.
[408] Yeah, they do sound good.
[409] But there might have been someone else singing with them too.
[410] Yeah.
[411] He's had the girl singing, the high voice going through the whole thing.
[412] Yeah.
[413] Yeah, that's, but that's such a, I mean.
[414] That sounded like the record that I was remembering when I wrote it down.
[415] Right.
[416] That's what the sound is.
[417] And the other two songs sounded kind of like that.
[418] That one was an original, I think.
[419] Right.
[420] Close, anyway.
[421] Same vibe.
[422] I feel like it would be a blessing and a curse to have your ear because I don't pick that stuff apart necessarily.
[423] But you hear it, and if it's in stereo or it's been remixed, you're like, I'm out.
[424] Well, I'm different.
[425] I'm going, when they did that, what else did they do?
[426] Things are different.
[427] They have more room for the bass.
[428] more of them spread things around.
[429] So it's not, for me, it's the, it's the feeling of the mix, the feeling of the song.
[430] The more immediate it was, the closer to the original one.
[431] Yeah.
[432] And then you feel the song and the essence of it.
[433] And then as things get modified and changed, you get farther away from that.
[434] So that's, that's all I'm missing.
[435] It's not so much the mix or one thing or another, but it's the essence of the song that comes from the original.
[436] Yeah.
[437] It's funny, when I hear songs from that period of my life that are evocative to me and actually some of them yours, it's like I go right to, I'm usually hearing it through, you know, our Pontiac Station Wagon, you know, system, analog radio.
[438] That's how I heard 99 % of our music.
[439] We weren't allowed to mess with my dad's record player because he had like a nice record player.
[440] so I mean we could some but mostly I'm hearing stuff on the radio and that was how I experienced everything and so I associate a lot of these songs now with being in a car and moving yeah and it's interesting how that affects how you then later on hear the song yeah it because when it's way back there in your life and you have this memory it's vivid and who knows what you do with it in all those years.
[441] You may have enhanced it.
[442] You may have, it may be exactly the way it was, or it may, maybe, you know, it just may be different in some way.
[443] Because when you have a thought for so long, you remember a memory, it becomes more than just that over time.
[444] So that's why when you go back, sometimes it's not like you thought it was going to be.
[445] Right.
[446] I, um, is that great, no, I was listening, did I scare you with my glasses?
[447] No, they don't know.
[448] That's good.
[449] It's a bold statement, my glasses.
[450] Yeah, it is.
[451] It's a kind of a Clark can't look.
[452] Can you see through those?
[453] Absolutely not.
[454] I didn't think so.
[455] You're gone now.
[456] You're just a, you're a smear.
[457] I see a smear and a floating hat.
[458] Radio has saved us again.
[459] I know.
[460] There's a big business for radio in the future.
[461] Trust me. It's not lost on me that people are very happy that I got off TV and into radio.
[462] Radio is happening.
[463] I know, it is happening, but also there's an implied insult there, which is it's so nice to hear you and not see your goddamn face.
[464] It's the future.
[465] Radio's the future.
[466] That's where we're going to hear what music is.
[467] Yeah.
[468] Because you can broadcast what people love about vinyl over the radio, and the transmitters are still in the top of all the old buildings around different towns.
[469] So a new radio station can come along and broadcast in analog.
[470] so everybody got vinyl quality.
[471] All you need is the right radio to pick it up with.
[472] Which is?
[473] A fortune -making thing that any investment gets right into.
[474] It'd be great if you busted out your product right now.
[475] He started hawking it.
[476] Yeah, the analog radio.
[477] You know, it's so funny because thinking about your work and all of it, with the new record, with World Record, and I know that now it's the harvest 50th and just everything going back to the beginning, there's that great Walt Whitman line where he says, I contain multitudes, and that comes to mind when I think about your music because you do soft, acoustic, so well that when I'm listening to that, I forget about your other side.
[478] It pulls me in so much.
[479] I think, you know, this is, is Neil Young, but then you go over to, hey, hey, my, my, rocking on the free world, like a hurricane, you just, this stuff that makes me forget about the other genre, and to be able to do both with that kind of intensity blows my mind.
[480] It really does.
[481] And I was thinking, you know, when I was listening to your other selections, I was thinking, okay, I can see the softer Neil here and then you gave us baby what you want me to do and I thought here we're seeing the other side of you a little bit when did you first this is Jimmy Reed and when are you hearing this song boy this had to be right around when he wrote it put the 50s early 60s and it's very I mean I mean, it is so simple, blues.
[482] Great.
[483] And what's so great about it?
[484] I don't know.
[485] It's simple and real.
[486] Yeah.
[487] And it's honest, and it is what it is.
[488] Mm -hmm.
[489] He's not trying to impress anybody.
[490] That's not there.
[491] Yeah.
[492] That's cool.
[493] And it's been covered by everybody.
[494] I mean, it's a rite of passage.
[495] Yeah, it's a great song.
[496] Great song.
[497] Let's explore the burblings of this other side of Neil.
[498] Baby, what you want me to do by Jimmy Reed.
[499] Holding up for you?
[500] Yeah.
[501] Oh, yeah.
[502] That's a classic.
[503] It's so funny because I was thinking that he's doing yeah, yeah, yeah.
[504] And this is a song that was huge for any British invasion band.
[505] Rolling Stones cover it.
[506] And you know everybody knows it.
[507] But I know when the Beatles show up in 64 and they're saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, everyone's saying, what the hell is that?
[508] It's Jimmy Reed, I think, unless it's someone else that I'm not thinking of.
[509] I don't know.
[510] But it's just when he goes, yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't know if that's happened before.
[511] Maybe it has.
[512] A smarter person than I will figure it out.
[513] Well, if such a person exists.
[514] There's no proof.
[515] They sent out some people looking, but they never came back.
[516] Yeah, I don't know what happened to him.
[517] You know, this is one of the, you did a concert for the BBC and I think it was 71.
[518] And it's great.
[519] But you said something off the cuff.
[520] It's terrific.
[521] You can see it.
[522] And I think it's part of a Harvest 50th catalog.
[523] But it's just, you just say it off, but it struck me because it's very you.
[524] You're playing these songs that are all going to become classics, but this audience hasn't heard them before.
[525] Yeah.
[526] And you're in London and you're playing.
[527] And they're a nice crowd, but at one point you say, how you all doing?
[528] And they go, they don't go, ah, they go like, yeah, yeah, good, you know, good.
[529] They're polite English people listening to new songs from this man, Neely.
[530] And they're like, yeah, yeah, it's good, yeah, good.
[531] And you went, yeah, I can tell that you're sensing that they're fine, but they're not.
[532] And you go, yeah, yeah, well, must be that they're new songs.
[533] And then you say, but that's what's happening.
[534] And I love that because that really, and you're not trying to be funny.
[535] You just say, yeah, but that's what's happening.
[536] And then you proceed to, you know, play a song that will become.
[537] a classic but they don't know it yet and what struck me about that is that to me that's the philosophy you have to have whether it's in music or comedy which is your job is not to try and figure out what they want and make them happy you've got to do what you're going to do that and this is what's happening yeah and then uh on the on the new record on world record there's a clip of you and someone is talking to you, I don't know if it's Rick Rubin or someone's talking to you and says, man, this one, you got a lyric here about every, you know, I take every breath and I feel like I'm doing a dance, a dance with death, it's about COVID.
[538] And he says, man, that's really dark.
[539] And you go, fuck them, they don't have to buy it.
[540] And I was like, that has to be the way it is.
[541] You know what I mean?
[542] That has to.
[543] to be you're echoing what you're saying in 71 in London now with world record you're saying I think that song has Break the Chain you're saying I'm driving this bus you might not like where we're going you're welcome to get off if you don't like where we're going and I believe in that philosophy I think that's the way it has to be if you're trying to be it sounds highfalutin but if you're trying to be an artist, that's what you have to do.
[544] Yeah, it's easy.
[545] I mean, as long as you do that, and then you feel good about it, too.
[546] No matter what you're doing, you feel good about it because you're doing the way you want to do it.
[547] Right.
[548] And that's a good thing.
[549] Yeah.
[550] It's good.
[551] And it feels like you've had times, too, where you've had this enormous success and people really love the music, and then there's part of you that's like, how do I crank the wheel here and get them off my trail?
[552] So I really got to, all right, you follow me this far.
[553] I'm going to go, I'm going to take this thing, this old jalopy up the side of this muddy hill.
[554] And challenge them a little bit.
[555] Yeah.
[556] Well, every once in a while, they all go the other way.
[557] Yeah.
[558] And that's a good thing.
[559] You like that.
[560] That's fine.
[561] Yeah.
[562] Because, you know, it's just that I went somewhere.
[563] I'll come back probably.
[564] Yeah.
[565] It doesn't matter.
[566] The thing is, did we do what we wanted to do?
[567] Yes.
[568] Because that's what we're supposed.
[569] supposed to be doing.
[570] Yes.
[571] Yeah.
[572] You know, we don't want to do what they want us to do.
[573] That's not what they're looking for, really.
[574] Right, right.
[575] No, they don't know what they want.
[576] That's the other thing.
[577] So I think that's kind of the magic of it.
[578] There's this last song, which we have to get to because, I don't know if you, I'm, rockabilly is, I don't know why, because I'm a suburban Irish Catholic kid from Boston but rockabilly is in my DNA Jim you've seen it oh yeah all I wanted to ever do was grow my hair up it's where the pompadour came from grow my sideburns out and play train kept a roll in or any rockabilly song if I could do that for a living you'd never see me in comedy again and that's a promise to people out there if I could make one dime doing that I would do it I thought I knew every Rockabilly great classic and then you come up with this rockabilly song I've never heard of before by a guy I had heard of I had heard of Ronnie Self because he's kind of a legend in England not from England but they just they care the British care more about our really good roots music I think often or for a period anyway more than we did they value it they value it and um and rockabilly i so i didn't know about ronny's self who i guess had kind of a it never came together for him and he died i think it like 40 or 41 so it never quite happened but this song blows my mind yeah it's great i used to hear it when i was 11 years old or 10 or 9 or something in my bedroom at night from wLS in chicago on the on the on the on the transmitter from Chicago to Winnipeg or to where I know to Toronto that's right close to Toronto a place called Pickering I was living there in this house and it was the same place where I all the other songs that I've told you about came from except for the wayward the wayward wind or the four strong winds the Ian and Sylvia song that came from later in life but all these four songs came from that one area and and and and And this one, I couldn't believe it.
[579] I could pick it up.
[580] But they seemed to play at the same time almost every night.
[581] So I would be in bed and I have my little transistor radio tuned into this.
[582] And I'd hear this thing.
[583] And I got, God, that is insane.
[584] No, it's nuts.
[585] Also, I can't imagine hearing this song and then trying to go to sleep.
[586] I know.
[587] It's great.
[588] And especially the last verse.
[589] Yeah.
[590] Of this, it's insanely great.
[591] He just, you can tell, you know, he's totally got it.
[592] He's possessed, and he's amazing, and this track blows my mind, and I'm so happy that you brought this to my attention.
[593] I played this earlier today.
[594] I came in, and I said to Eduardo, give me Bapalina, loud, and we were in this room, and he turned it up all the way, and I stood there, and I was shaken like a leaf on a tree, as they say.
[595] I just was doing the St. Vitus dance.
[596] I couldn't believe.
[597] it so let's listen to uh and you got to turn up the volume on this one please let's do it yeah all right bapalina ronnie self man god god damn it if they asked for a take after that i'd have killed everybody can you imagine that was pretty good uh Ronnie let's have one more let's have one more yeah that um you first of all I think that comes out in 56 is that before a little Richard?
[598] I mean, it's totally...
[599] Right around the same time.
[600] Right around the same time, totally channeling that energy.
[601] And it is, it's absolute abandoned and madness and also impossible to fake.
[602] You can't fake that.
[603] You've got to be there for that.
[604] He's so there.
[605] And then in the end of that, he's totally just goes, you know.
[606] He is taken over by the devil in the end.
[607] I one of my favorites of all time is Ronnie Hawkins' version of 40 days and I just always grabbed me I used to play that a lot with my guys because it's so fast and then I ran into Robbie Robertson somewhere and I'm like you know I play 40 days it's so man it's so fast and he was like yeah we were all on a lot of pills I'm like oh okay well at least I know what the prescription is if I want to replicate that yeah I don't know what was in this guy Ronnie Self but God bless him that was amazing and the background vocalists they were crazy yeah so when you hear this music we've listened to these tunes now I think one of the things that inspires me most about you is that you keep you keep re I don't want to say reinventing your but you keep coming back with, like, new growth on the tree.
[608] You keep coming back with something else to offer.
[609] And that's very inspiring to me. And I'm wondering if, like, hearing these old songs, does that inspire you in any way?
[610] Well, these songs got to me when I first heard him when I was just a kid.
[611] So I never forgot Boppelina.
[612] I never forgot that.
[613] I was just going, okay, that's out there.
[614] That exists.
[615] And you can go there any time that you're ready.
[616] to.
[617] Yes.
[618] And you've got to be with the right people and everything's got to be right.
[619] Then you can get there.
[620] And I just love that kind of music.
[621] But it's so radically different from my other music that I'm, sometimes people can't go, they can't go both places.
[622] Right.
[623] And that's, you know, well, you've done, you know, it's like we talked about this once before, but it bears repeating that I was I was in Studio 8 -H when you did keep on rocking in the free world, as was Jim.
[624] And I tell anybody, tell me anybody, because Lauren Michaels, as is saying, television is the worst way to experience music.
[625] And I think he's usually right, except you and the guys did something happen that night.
[626] Something was good, yeah.
[627] Something was not just good, was transcendent and punched through the television.
[628] And I thought, well, okay, I'm on the floor at 8 -H.
[629] I'm a kid.
[630] I'm in my 20s.
[631] I'm watching you do that and the place you just melted it.
[632] I think there was structural damage to 30 rough.
[633] And it's never been quite repaired.
[634] And I was blown away by that performance.
[635] And then go online and find out that people who weren't there who just saw it on TV feel the same way.
[636] So when it did punch through, it did punch through.
[637] I remembered that.
[638] You can't tell when that's going to happen, but it was very focused.
[639] The band was very good, and everyone was establishing themselves in a relationship with each other.
[640] There was four guys who've never played together.
[641] I played with poncho and Crazy Horse, but Steve and Charlie had never played with.
[642] They played with each other, but they never played with us.
[643] And to God, it was just so good.
[644] And then we got in the studio, we played a couple of times.
[645] Then when we went, somehow when we got to Broadway video and we had our own dressing room, then they completely dismantled the dressing room between Poncho and Steve and Charlie.
[646] It completely, it was, you know, and then the staff came in and they looked at it and it was like, what the hell is going?
[647] I mean, they couldn't believe it.
[648] But to these, it was like a rock and roll myth.
[649] You know, you trash your dressing room.
[650] Yeah, okay.
[651] Yeah, it's the key school.
[652] So these guys trashed this dressing room.
[653] Yeah.
[654] And I'm going, okay, well, that's a rock and roll.
[655] That's a moment.
[656] But it seemed to be establishing itself.
[657] And no matter where we went, those kind of things kept happening.
[658] Like we were supposed to run down rocking in the free world for the run through.
[659] and we did fucking up instead.
[660] Yeah.
[661] And didn't tell anybody we just did that.
[662] Because you didn't want to spend that coin on the rehearsal show.
[663] No. But the fucking up that we did is really good too.
[664] Yeah.
[665] That was a good one.
[666] I think we have that.
[667] But I mean, I don't think you, that's interesting because I don't think you, that, to do keep on rocking at the dress rehearsal, you might not have been able to get there for air.
[668] There is no rehearsal, you know, so we threw a song away that wasn't going to be in the studio and didn't tell them what's going to be.
[669] So we didn't, we didn't sacrifice it.
[670] Yeah.
[671] Just, uh...
[672] You didn't think NBC would be okay with fucking up?
[673] You sort of knew they wouldn't.
[674] So...
[675] We figured it wasn't going to be something in the years.
[676] It's a good thing you had that in your back pocket.
[677] Yeah, yeah.
[678] Yeah, that's a good one for that.
[679] I always think whenever, uh, if someone ever puts a video camera in my feet, face if I'm on the street and starts to ask me a question I don't want to answer, I'll just start singing an unclearable song by Led Zeppelin.
[680] Oh, yeah.
[681] And be like, look, if you guys can clear that, you can go ahead and hear my comments.
[682] But I might do that if I'm ever forced to testify in front of the Senate.
[683] There is so much goodness, you've brought so much more goodness into the world.
[684] World Record is the new album, and I do love it, and I do love how optimistic it is.
[685] Who is this on the cover?
[686] That's my dad.
[687] Is that your dad?
[688] Yeah.
[689] That's my dad.
[690] That's a good -looking, serious man. It's a serious, good -looking dad.
[691] It was a writer, and he was writing for the Toronto Globe and Mail at that time.
[692] Wow.
[693] Did he approve of your musical aspirations?
[694] Not quite as much as my mom did My mom was totally supportive And got me everything I would go to the wall To get anything that I needed And so I was able to Make enough money playing And then getting help from her To get amplifiers and stuff like that Right, right I remember the big thing between my mom and dad About who's going to pay for this amp You know you know he's got to have the amp my mom said your mom's like wow you cannot not not have an amp you have to have you know so i was looking at this i haven't paid echo twin and another fender tremolox or something anyway ultimately we got the amps i feel like you would have gotten them one way or the other we were we we and i knew where they were You would case the joint.
[695] And Harvest's 50th anniversary edition, if you don't have this, all I can say is you're a fool.
[696] It is brilliantly done.
[697] It's a beautiful job.
[698] Thank you.
[699] You know, it's a moment in time.
[700] So we just happen to have footage of all of it and recordings of the outtakes and all that stuff.
[701] You know, we put it all in there.
[702] And I also, before we wrap up, I just want to, I'm excited that Barn, the film has been nominated for a Grammy.
[703] Isn't that interesting?
[704] And that happened now and this thing comes out and we're playing in a barn and it's 50 years ago.
[705] Yeah.
[706] There's almost the same shots.
[707] You can see the camera comes in through the barn door and the band is playing and there's so many similarities.
[708] And then scenery shots of outside both places and it's a 50 year difference.
[709] It's kind of interesting.
[710] It's funny.
[711] I was watching Barn and I was thinking it's beautiful.
[712] done and and I'm glad that it's been recognized.
[713] One of the things that just to me is you know, seems counterintuitive is you can see daylight coming through the slats in the barn.
[714] Yeah.
[715] And I'm thinking is this a good place to record?
[716] Is this?
[717] It looks cool.
[718] It had great air.
[719] The air was coming through.
[720] Well, you know what you should do?
[721] and if we can entice you to come back sometime for the next project, you'll see that this room will be made of old cedar, and there'll be a lot of wind blowing through, a lot of manure on the floor.
[722] Yeah.
[723] Yeah, we're going to go the Neil Young route.
[724] Good, good.
[725] Yeah, and it's just going to be a horrible...
[726] Edwardo, get on this.
[727] Get those fans out there.
[728] I'm on it.
[729] Blowing the air through here.
[730] Neil, it is one of the great privileges of my life, and I've had a lucky life, so that is really saying something, but to get to hang with you any time is magical for me. And I appreciate your positive, cool, courageous spirit.
[731] Thank you so much for doing this.
[732] It really means a lot.
[733] Thank you, man. I appreciate it.
[734] I'm glad that you got this record and I hope people get to hear it.
[735] It's so much, I put out too much stuff, you know, I put out harvest at almost the same time as I put this out.
[736] Right.
[737] So it's like to the record people ever say, no, no, no, no, come on, hold on, Hold on, hold on.
[738] This and then let's wait six months and then that.
[739] Yeah, yeah.
[740] Well, I just have a lot of stuff.
[741] To quote you in 1971, this is what's happening.
[742] Yeah, that's right.
[743] So, all right, God bless.
[744] Thanks, man. Thank everybody.
[745] Thank you so much.
[746] Conan O 'Brien needs a friend.
[747] With Conan O 'Brien, Sonam of Sessian, and Matt Goreley.
[748] Produced by me, Matt Goreley.
[749] Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solitaroff, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson, Cody Fisher at Earwolf.
[750] Theme song by The White Stripes.
[751] Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino.
[752] Take it away, Jimmy.
[753] Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples.
[754] Engineering by Eduardo Perez.
[755] Additional production support by Mars Melnik.
[756] Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Brick Kahn.
[757] You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, and you might find your review read on a future episode.
[758] Got a question for Conan?
[759] Call the Team Coco hotline at 323 -4 -5.
[760] 151 -2821 and leave a message.
[761] It too could be featured on a future episode.
[762] And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O 'Brien needs a friend on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.
[763] This has been a team Coco production in association with Earwolf.