Neil Young & Crazy Horse, New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, May 4, 2024
It was also this moment of, I know the words to this, I know this, it is in my bones, it is my history.
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I thought we were about halfway through Neil Young & Crazy Horse’s set at Jazz Fest when he sent the Horse offstage and switched guitars. Oh, I thought, some kind of solo acoustic thing.
It was solo but it wasn’t acoustic, and unlike the numbers that had preceded it which were a glorious melange of shimmer and crunch that were not always immediately recognizable there was no mistaking these chords, There was no mistaking them.
A deep intake of breath and then you emotionally shudder into the moment. There was a subdued murmur of recognition; not everyone in a crowd can identify a song from the first few notes, but the people who did signaled that they got it. It wasn’t any kind of declaration of superiority, it was a simple we know what this is.
Tin soldiers and Nixon’s coming
We’re finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
He emphasized the “this.” He did it twice, I know it wasn’t in my head.
And then:
Four dead in Ohio
The crowd sang it back, with emphasis. It was loud, it was loud and definitive. There was frustration, but there was also a sense of relief to be surrounded by other people who get it. It wasn't a mindless repetition of the chorus.
It was also this moment of, I know the words to this, I know this, it is in my bones, it is my history. It is my past. But it is also that I am singing this with the artist who wrote it in a crowd of people at a time where it is happening again and I cannot believe that it is happening again, that I wake up every morning with Tin soldiers and Nixon’s coming in my head because I wake up every morning wondering if today is the day that it happens again.
I would be crying in both sadness and frustration but I do not because I am too angry.
A local NOLA arts writer covering Neil’s performance wrote that Neil Young performed “Ohio” but that “he offered no commentary on it.”
The shooting happened May 4th, 1970. It is May 4, 2024.
Neil Young wrote “Ohio” a few weeks after it happened, after seeing that famous AP wire photo of Mary Anne Vecchio kneeling over the dead body of Jeffrey Miller. According to David Crosby, Neil saw the photograph on the cover of a magazine, got out his guitar, “...and wrote the song right there in front of me. On the porch in the sunlight.” Crosby, Stills and Nash recorded it almost immediately. Ahmet Ertegun happened to be in town and flew it to the pressing plant. It was released in June. It got on the radio as soon as it was released.
THAT IS COMMENTARY, MOTHERFUCKER.
I also want to note that months ago, after this booking was announced, a fan wrote into Neil’s website to ask him about the fact that the official name of the event is “The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Sponsored by Shell” and that there would be giant Shell logos on either side of the band when they were onstage. Neil said that it would not happen. It was a big deal that the staging for the Stones had no corporate brands and very subtle Jazz Fest branding. I thought “there is no way this is going to happen, Neil” but yet we arrived at the Festival Stage and there were no Shell logos anywhere.
He didn’t make any commentary about that, either. He just fucking did it.
Neil and the Horse appeared on the same stage as the Rolling Stones, the larger of Jazz Fest’s two main stages, the Festival Stage. The set was scheduled to begin at 5:30pm but it was somewhere around 5:22pm and I was sitting on my collapsible stool when guitar notes started floating out of the PA that were definitely “Cortez the Killer” and I at first thought it was still the road crew setting up but when it continued I stood up and saw Neil Young onstage with Billy Talbot, Ralph Molina, and Micah Nelson.
“No, that is Crazy Horse.”
He wasn’t announced, he didn’t announce himself. He just walked onstage and started playing, which is definitely the most Neil Young thing ever.
Neil’s guitar was held up by a relic of a guitar strap, the one with the peace sign and the doves that I always refer to as his Comes A Time guitar strap because the guitar he’s holding on the cover of that record has that strap on it. By the looks of it, it’s the same one, which is also the Neil Young-iest of things. Ralph Molina’s drum kit is flying his pirate flag. Micah Nelson has taken the place of Nils Lofgren (who had other commitments) who had stepped in after Poncho Sampedro retired, but he looks and feels like he’s been there for a while. It’s one of those decisions that makes perfect sense once it happens, although I am personally sorry I won’t get to see Nils as part of the Horse.
(I am one of those people who says “Oh, right” when I read something like “The E Street Band’s Nils Lofrgren” because to me he is just Nils, because I had a relationship with his music before he joined and was delighted when he got that call because it was Nils “and not some session guy,” which is what we had feared after Steve Van Zandt’s departure.)
It has been a while since I have seen Neil and I am overwhelmed with this feeling of warm and affectionate familiarity and also it is so good to see him play and hear him play and get to hear these songs. He could play anything and it would be interesting.
The woman next to me says “Well, we’re gonna be here for about 27 minutes” when he began “Down By The River.” In response, I hold up my phone where I had started a timer just out of idle curiosity; it lasted a little over 12 minutes. (I am not a super-Neil Young fan but I am not a non-fan.)
This is probably why it only felt like halfway through the show by the time we got to “Ohio.” This is a set that also contained “Powderfinger” and an 11 minute “Love and Only Love.” It’s not like the Ramones who could fit 20 songs into half an hour.
I think it is important to note that he followed “Ohio” with “Fuckin’ Up,” which is, you know, also commentary. The last song of the set was “Hey Hey My My,” and it was unexpectedly sweet and endearing and wonderful to be in a Jazz Fest crowd singing “Rock and roll will never die.” Jazz Fest people are music people. It is why you go to Jazz Fest.
I shouldn't have to do this but to try to head off the worst: I hold both an American passport and an Israeli passport. I do not agree with every position held by every student protest but I absolutely uphold their right to protest. The protests do not make me, as a Jewish person, feel unsafe. The over-the-top responses to the protest do. The protests are not inherently anti-semitic.
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