One man against the world: Neil Young same title song contest

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by AveryKG, Jul 1, 2021.

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  1. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Well, this might not be the craziest idea I've ever had, but it has to be one of them…

    But to give credit where it’s due, I should say that the idea isn’t entirely mine; I shamelessly stole the basic concept from @Rockerman's Same song titles vs... thread where he asked people to briefly review two songs that are entirely different, but that have the same title.

    My first thought when I started to read the thread was that Neil Young has loads of examples of these – I seem to remember reading somewhere (Jimmy McDonough’s Shakey biography?) that one of Neil’s aborted projects was to write an album using the titles of well-known songs for that album’s new songs, which presumably accounts for tracks like ‘Little Wing’, ‘Sail Away’ and ‘Born to Run’, but the obvious reason there are so many is just that he’s been around for so long.*

    Anyway, after thinking I might contribute a couple or three of Neil’s to the thread, I began to wonder just how many of his duplicate titles I could actually find. So, after drawing up a list of all Neil’s songs from the interwebs, I trawled through allmusic.com for those that seemed likely candidates to have completely unrelated songs of the same title somewhere out there.

    But once I started, I pretty much couldn’t stop. I found 123 Neil Young cuts that have the same title as another song or songs. And those are just the ones I could realistically use; there are heaps more, but some of those that I thought might be candidates were by people or bands I’d never heard of, and I didn’t even try and find an equivalent for most of the more unusual of his song titles (though if anyone knows of any other artist with a completely different ‘Surfer Joe and Moe the Sleaze’ than Neil’s please don’t hesitate to shout out).

    So, rather than hijack Rockerman’s thread with 123 Neil Young/other artist songs, I thought it best to start a new dedicated thread. Then I thought “why not make it into a contest?” And that’s how I got to here. Beginning today, I’m going to post one pair of songs a day; review those songs and decide which one I like best. Like a baseball game, there will be no ties, and after 123 days, either Neil or the Rest of the World will win the contest overall. It could be 122-1 or it could be 62-61, though I guess both are unlikely. What it is going to be is a bit of an endurance test, as there’s exactly four months’ worth of paired songs, so if I manage to keep this up, it will come to an end on 31 October.

    The songs will be posted in alphabetical order by title. Those titles have to be an exact match, no instances where one has a ‘The’ or ‘A’ at the start and the other doesn’t, or one suddenly goes into brackets halfway through and the other doesn’t so, for example, no face-off between Neil’s ‘Words (Between the Lines of Age)’ and ‘Words’ by the Bee Gees (unfortunately for Neil because he would win that one). Since the forum only allows one embedded YouTube video to be included in each post, rather than favour one, instead I’ll just put YouTube links to each song in its title at the beginning of each post.

    Full disclosure: I guess you could call me a lapsed Neil Young fan. I think I have every UK label release of his up to Sleeps With Angels, but only (very) sporadic albums thereafter. Quite a few of these songs, both by Neil and the other artists, are old friends, but most I’ll be hearing for the first time.

    It’s all going to be served up with massive helpings of FWIW, IMHO and YMMV so your comments and observations are welcome, of course, even those calling me bad names when I choose some anonymous generic dance-pop banger over a clearly superior Neil offering. Oh yes, it will happen.

    Anyway, in the words of the immortal Blowfly, “On with the show!”…

    *As a footnote, you could probably do the same for any artist with a huge discography. Frank Zappa comes to mind, but whether there are many other artists who have a ‘This Town is a Sealed Tuna Sandwich’ or ‘Half a Dozen Provocative Squats’ in their repertoire to put up against his is unlikely.
     
  2. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    On with the show!...

    Day 1:
    Alabama by Neil Young (from Harvest (1972))
    versus

    Alabama by Frank Ocean (from Endless (2016))

    So, first to the plate, coming out swinging, is ‘Alabama’. Clocking in at just under two minutes, Frank’s track perhaps isn’t the best demonstration of his talents, the first 40 seconds or so seem to be one indistinct rap over another and the melody, when it does arrive, sounds recycled from ‘Pyramids’ or one of the tunes on Channel Orange. And after all that, it isn’t even about the cotton state at all!* Geez, Louise! What to say about Neil’s ‘Alabama’ though? I guess the vast majority of you know it, companion piece to ‘Southern Man’, winder-up of Lynyrd Skynyrd. The version in the link is the lesser known one from Journey Through the Past which breaks down to reveal the studio chatter of Young, David Crosby and Graham Nash culminating with the magic moment when they work out the harmony on the word ‘windows’. I like the Ocean cut, but hey, this is primo Neilo (I promise I won’t say that again). First blow to ‘old Neil’ as he puts this one down at a stroll. Neil Young 1, Rest of the World 0.

    [​IMG]

    *And sometimes there are even quizzes too; here's the first question: the above picture has marginally more to do with Alabama than the Frank Ocean track in that the ‘Bama’ logo of the University sports teams appears on the restaurant signage. But where is this building, and what was it before it was a Dunkin’ Donuts?
     
  3. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    I'll guess this was the Muscle Shoals studio.
     
  4. jy3iix

    jy3iix Forum Resident

    Yes, Muscle Shoals I reckon too
     
  5. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Nope, sorry, it's way more mundane than that, I'm afraid. Clue: Randy Newman mentioned this town in 'Birmingham', and in many cases, it would have been the first place in that town you set foot on when you arrived there.
     
  6. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    Tuscaloosa Tire Repair (needed after driving in the ditch)?
     
  7. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
    Even by cheating and looking up the lyrics to the Randy song, I am little the wiser. Other than assuming it's in the town where (in the song) his father was born.

    EG.
     
  8. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Nice try both, and right town. Only if you arrived here, you wouldn't be the one doing the driving.
     
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  9. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    "Dunkin Donuts opened its first shop here in 2012 in the Lakeside Dining Hall on the University of Alabama campus, and last year it opened a shop on the site of the old Greyhound Bus Station on Stillman Boulevard."
     
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  10. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
    I'm also seeing some hospitals on the maps of the area...maybe it was one of the various buildings to do with a medical centre/center? So you'd arrive by ambulance?

    EG.
     
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  11. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Eric, see answer quoted below.
    Yep. When I did a west to east trip of the U.S. 32 years ago by Greyhound, I got off in Tuscaloosa, simply because of my Randy Newman fandom and the fact that he mentioned it in a song. Thing was it was about 4.30 in the morning and I just sort of wandered around for three hours until somewhere – as it happens a KFC – opened, and then wandered around for another couple of hours until the next bus came. So that gives you an idea, I guess, of just how obscure and preposterous and self-referential this whole shebang is going to be.

    Still, amazing what you can find on the old internet, although you can't, or at least I can't, find a picture of Tuscaloosa bus station as it used to be.
     
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  12. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
    It does look like a Bus Station type building. Or one that could have served as one.

    EG.
     
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  13. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    This looks like the same brickwork: Tuscaloosa, AL Greyhound Station
     
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  14. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
    Is this it?

    [​IMG]

    EG.
     
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  15. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
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  16. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    It's all those hours spent watching GeoWizard on YouTube finally paying off.
     
  17. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Wow! Thank you both. I was going to post a picture of the KFC I went in but that would have been going too far. Besides, all the ones I could find were round the back with all the skips and stuff. Not nice.
     
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  18. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Day 2:
    Albuquerque by Neil Young (from Tonight’s the Night (1975))
    versus

    Albuquerque by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis (from Carnage (2021))
    (score after Day 1: Neil 1, Rest of the World 0)

    I have to admit I’m not familiar with Nick Cave’s work. I know he’s somewhat of a cult figure, but the few things of his or his Bad Seeds I’ve heard have never really grabbed me and I’m afraid that this track isn’t going to change anything in that regard. ‘Dreary’ is probably about the best description I can muster, darling. Neil tends towards the drear here too, but it’s got a decent enough melody, endearingly ragged playing, and kicks off with an actual, checkable fact, which is always a good thing. Because, according to Google Maps, Santa Fe is actually only about 65 miles from Albuquerque, so yes, it’s quite a bit less than the reputed 90. Tempted to award Neil a bonus point for essential pre-internet highway advice, but better not get too far ahead of myself. So after day two, it’s two-nil to Neil.

    [​IMG]
    Only a couple more miles to go now.
     
  19. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Day 3:
    American Dream by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young (from American Dream (1988))
    versus

    American Dream by Lucinda Williams (from World Without Tears (2003))
    (score after Day 2: Neil 2, RotW 0)

    American Dream? I think it’s generally held that CSNY’s 1988 album was actually a bit of a nightmare – it certainly remains one of the worst albums I’ve ever heard. So I needed to refamiliarise myself with this track, and listening now, it’s not as bad as I remembered, but it’s still not that good either. Even the rip of Hall and Oates’ ‘Maneater’ bassline sounds a bit half-assed. As for Lucinda, well, if you didn’t listen past the intro, you could easily mistake her song for one of Neil’s with that laidback Stray Gators-style rhythm, but yes, her ‘Dream’ is really rather a nice one to have. Lucinda gets the World off the mark. Neil 2, RotW 1.

    [​IMG]
    Another ‘where in the US of A’ quiz question already: what is this and where is it? Perhaps more pertinently, why is it? (you don't have to answer that one).
     
  20. Patanoia

    Patanoia Third Ear Centre

    Location:
    Grapevine, TX
    My first thought was the Mall of America in Minnesota, and I see they have a Nickelodeon Universe as part of it. Why? Why not? Regarding the CSNY track, despite being a big Neil fan, I have avoided that particular supergroup like the plague. Can't stand their harmonies, for some reason. I still resent "Through My Sails" as the fly in the ointment on "Zuma". Probably an unpopular opinion.
     
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  21. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    I like 'Through My Sails'. There aren't any particular flies in the ointment on Zuma for me, I don't think.

    Good guess re the mall. In the right ballpark, the clue is in the title.

    As for the "why?" that could be from what I read about it when I looked up the picture (doubts about its location and a seemingly flawed projection of the number of visitors it's likely to attract even before it had the misfortune to open just before the pandemic). Or it might just be my natural antipathy to indoor malls. Near where I live is the largest shopping mall in Europe, and though it's nowhere near as OTT as the one in the picture appears to be, it's somewhere I try and avoid unless I really need to go there.
     
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  22. Eric_Generic

    Eric_Generic Enigma

    Location:
    Berkshire
    I bought American Dream at the end of 1988. What a mistake that was!

    (Of course, I ended up re-buying it very cheaply a few years ago just for completism's sake).

    EG.
     
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  23. Vinyl Socks

    Vinyl Socks The Buzz Driver

    Location:
    DuBois, PA
    Which part? The part about heroin & Vietnam, or Black Lung, or not having hot water or food? Or...is it the part about being kicked off Navajo land and placed on a reservation?
    Just checking...though she does deliver it rather sensuously. A much better song a similar message as Neil's, but with more gripping lyrics.
     
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  24. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Um, yes, good point. :( Honestly, that was a last minute edit ‘cos I thought “rather a nice one to have” read better than “good” without even thinking about the lyrics. That’ll teach me not to tinker.
     
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  25. AveryKG

    AveryKG Sultan of snacks Thread Starter

    Location:
    west London
    Day 4:
    Around the World by Neil Young and Crazy Horse (from Life (1987))
    versus

    Around the World by Daft Punk (from Homework (1997))
    (score after Day 3: Neil 2, RotW 1)

    [​IMG]

    Day four: lots more dancing about architecture* to go. Landing on Water is often held to be the nadir of Neil’s 1980s albums, but for me that title has always been held by Life, from which this song is taken. The verse melody is pretty basic, but it has a decent chorus and the guitar is engagingly crunchy. But is that enough to see off Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter? Well, actually yes. I do like Daft Punk, but the repeated lyric gets real irritating real fast for me on this one, giving a surprising win perhaps for Neil to restore his two-point margin at 3-1.

    *So, will there ever be a definitive attribution for whoever first remarked that writing (or talking) about music is like dancing about architecture? People I have seen this quote attributed to are: Frank Zappa, Elvis Costello, Martin Mull, David Bowie, David Byrne, Brian Eno, Thelonius Monk, Laurie Anderson, Steve Martin, Clara Schumann, Miles Davis, George Carlin and however many men there were until you got bored with singing about them who went to mow a meadow, the first man’s dog (Spot), a bottle of pop, a lollipop, and Old Mother Riley and her cow. My money’s on Spot.
     
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