Heinz Rudolf Kunze meets Neil Young: For Young’s 80th birthday, we brought out this conversation from the December 1992 issue of ME. A deep talk about music, instinct and attitude.
Back to 1992, when Heinz Rudolf Kunze wrote the following text for us…
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Neil Young, 47 years old, unshaven, enters the ELBE EINS conference room at Hamburg’s Atlantic Hotel with a swaying trapper gait. Wearing faded jeans, a black T-shirt and a soft, light brown fringed leather jacket, he shakes my hand and grins over the top of his sunglasses: “Hi, Heinz! How are you doin’?” What followed was one of the most pleasant conversations of my professional life – with a relaxed, mischievous warrior and hero who had grown up in a dignified way.
Heinz Rudolf Kunze: The experienced Neil Young listener knows that there are breaks, contradictions and irritating changes of course in your work. In the last few years, however, you have released four albums that have a lot in common: “Eldorado,” “Freedom,” “Ragged Glory” and “Arc Weld.” It seems to me that with “Harvest Moon” you are making the most drastic turnaround of your entire career. How did this come about? Have you reached the end of a particular development line with “Weld”?
Neil Young: I’ve pushed the electric side of my music to a certain end point. The Ragged Glory tour of the United States took place during the Gulf War. It was a bombastic show with violent overtones; the energy of the people and our own pushed each other up to the limit of what was bearable. I decided not to pursue this type of music any further, it didn’t seem to me worth improving. I also needed rest; I could no longer physically endure this type of music practice. Sometimes the volume was so overwhelming that I was afraid I would hyperventilate and pass out. Long after the tour, all the noises around me seemed terribly loud.
HRK: Will we ever be able to see this thunderous “Weld” concept live in this country?
Young: That could certainly be the case. I don’t know exactly what I’ll do next: whether I’ll come over with the “Harvest Moon” program and the Stray Gators or with another new idea.
HRK: Isn’t the title “Harvest Moon”, with its reference to your most commercially successful album, quite a burden?
Young: No, the record is a continuation, a new examination of the themes of “Harvest”, with the experiences of 20 previous years. Plus they are the same musicians. It all started with a song I started in 1975; It was only finished in 1991. The other songs suited him well, and when I asked myself who I wanted to record the record with, I thought of the same people as back then. We felt comfortable together after a 20 year break. “Harvest Moon” was just a song title at first, but then I realized: This is the record that audiences have been expecting from me for 20 years. This is how “Harvest Moon” became the main idea: I wanted to depict how I feel today.
HRK: So you feel more relaxed and balanced at the moment?
Young: Yes.
HRK: For a long time, especially during the ’80s, you were unwilling to meet your audience’s expectations. Why? Did you feel misunderstood, loved for the wrong reasons?
Young: I never believed I could give people what they expected from me. If I had tried it, it wouldn’t have worked.
HRK: Did you perhaps even have in mind to educate the audience by giving them an example of stubbornness and indomitability?
Young: I’m educating myself. I’m learning to follow my instincts. I wouldn’t have been able to do my job otherwise. I don’t have a plan. I have no idea what I’ll do next. I don’t have any new songs in mind at the moment – a very refreshing situation.
HRK: Doesn’t your “haphazard” approach sometimes scare you?
Young: Not at all. It’s very satisfying. At some point I’ll sit down again and start writing, I know that.
HRK: I once talked to Randy Newman about this artist problem. He said that sometimes he would rather be a car mechanic or a master butcher because they have learned something that they can use day in and day out – there is none of the ruleless uncertainty that defines the life of an artist.
Young (grins meaningfully): Well, there’s usually something floating around in the back of your head. But at the moment I actually have nothing planned. The album is finished and that’s it. So I can finally work on my archives again…