"Old man, look at my life. I'm a lot like you were"

The other day my friend Miguel and I were listening to the radio (which we rarely do, we tend to keep it Pandora or Zune) and this song, a cover of Neil Young's "Old Man" came on. The music of Neil Young is sacred to me. To me he is an amazing poet no doubt in the ranks with Bob Dylan, Paul Simon and John Lennon. So this is serious stuff to me.

I got upset and said "What the fuck is this!? They are ripping off Neil Young!"
My friend Miguel followed that up with "I think it will be a whole new generation getting exposed to Neil Young."

Ever say something and they moment you do you realize it's wrong? Then Miguel put it so well...and he was right. If rock and roll were dead and so damn uncool, why would artists be using it? Obviously they thought it was good enough to have in their song, and it helped influence the song itself. Also when the new generation of fans go to look for the song on Google they will find Neil Young first. It comes up first and has way more hits.

Neil Young's beautiful and original version is still the most popular.

Ladies and gentlemen, I submit this is further proof rock and roll is not dead.

Comments

Ashley said…

That's so very true.

June 16, 2011 at 7:43 PM

Anonymous said…

I would be wrong not to note that even the originals may have also have deeper roots in older songs.
I would be mistaken to say 'older music' because music doesn't age, it takes on the contemporary culture.
The song remains the same...
...mad mig

June 16, 2011 at 9:12 PM

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