I turned twelve in 1968.\u00a0\u00a0My first record was a \u201c45\u201d by James Taylor,\u00a0Fire and Rain\u00a0<\/em>on the \u201cA\u201d side, and \u201cAnywhere Like Heaven\u201d\u00a0<\/em>on the \u201cB\u201d side.\u00a0\u00a0(So fifty-four years later, a \u201c45\u201d was a small vinyl record, with a single song on each side, played at forty-five RPM on the record player, versus the multiple song \u201calbums\u201d played at thirty-three).\u00a0\u00a0I wish I could say I still had that record, but I wore it out before the seventies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve gone to see James Taylor live several times over the years, the last time this past December.\u00a0\u00a0He does\u00a0Fire and Rain<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>at every concert.\u00a0\u00a0Where ever in the show his \u201cmasterpiece\u201d is placed \u2013 it\u2019s always done with a blackout \u2013 a pause \u2013 then James alone in the spotlight.\u00a0\u00a0It\u2019s almost like a prayer, a tunnel through time as the audience goes back to that first time, the record spinning fast on the turntable, an era when everything was possible. We could get Civil Rights, we could end a War, we could change the World.\u00a0\u00a0It was \u201c\u2026just yesterday morning\u2026\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fire and Rain\u00a0<\/em>isn\u2019t a protest song.\u00a0\u00a0It\u2019s about personal loss.\u00a0\u00a0But it introduced an entire genre of music to my young ears.\u00a0\u00a0Soon I was listening to Carole King, Bob Dylan, and Simon and Garfunkel.\u00a0\u00a0As I progressed in my teens, I wanted something more \u201caggressive\u201d, more electric.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And I found a \u201csuper group\u201d called Crosby-Stills-Nash and Young.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n My first introduction to CSNY was soon after the shooting of student protestors at Kent State in May of 1970.\u00a0\u00a0We got most of our \u201cnew\u201d music on the car radio, and I was a fourteen year-old getting shuttled around Cincinnati in the back seat, usually by one of my older sisters, and far from the radio controls.\u00a0\u00a0We heard about a song that was supposedly \u201cbanned\u201d in the state of Ohio, a song with the refrain \u201c\u2026Four dead in Ohio\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0Rumor had it that Ohio\u2019s Governor, James Rhoades, threatened the broadcast license of any station that played it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was also in the early days of FM Radio (music was on AM then \u2013 mostly talk and sports now).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0There were small \u201cpirate\u201d FM stations, that played the cutting edge music we were looking for.\u00a0\u00a0The signals weren\u2019t very strong and you had to be relatively close to the broadcast tower to hear them. Their channel numbers were passed around almost like a secret code (\u201ctry 102.7, Jelly Pudding Radio\u201d).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It seemed like listening to Radio Free Europe or the BBC during World War II.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But if you could \u201ccatch\u201d the station, you could hear CSNY\u2019s grinding protest of the Kent State shootings \u2013 \u201cOhio<\/a>\u201d by Neil Young. I was hooked, and I\u2019m still hooked today. <\/p>\n\n\n\n By the time I was a senior in high school, my friends and I had become CSNY aficionados. I was more towards the acoustic David Crosby and Stephen Stills side, while others were definitely Neil Young fans. We all liked them all, and we all had their albums, both as a group and individually. But I didn\u2019t get around to getting the \u201clive\u201d CSNY album, 4 Way Street<\/a>, <\/em>until my freshman year of college.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1974, a college dorm room in Crawford Hall at Denison University was a just a single room, maybe sixteen by sixteen, with two beds, two desks with chairs, two chests of drawers, one window and one hard \u201clounge\u201d chair. The bathroom was down the hall, just past the \u201cgrand stairs\u201d to the front lobby. My roommate Charlie was a veteran of dorm life, having gone to prep school at the famous Deerfield Academy. But it was all new to me. We shared my record player, a combination of turntable and speaker. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Charlie was in love with a group called\u00a0Bread<\/a><\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0Hearing their songs today brings back good memories, but at the time he played it so much that I threatened to spin the record out of our second floor window into the Quad.\u00a0 Charlie had the answer \u2013 Bread<\/em> goes, then so goes\u00a04 Way Street<\/em>.\u00a0\u00a0I played that album so often that I literally wore it out, and had to buy a second copy.\u00a0\u00a0I dubbed it for my tape cassette in my Volkswagen Squareback, and it was always the go to, middle of the night on a long journey, play.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n CSNY was the last, great musical voices of Vietnam protest.\u00a0\u00a0By 1974 the war was almost over, Nixon resigned, and Denison students’ music turned to some guy from New Jersey singing about love and motorcycles \u2013\u00a0Born to Run<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>by Bruce Springsteen.\u00a0\u00a0But I was still steeped in the music of political change, of an era now past.\u00a0\u00a0I hoped I could make a difference, first in politics, and then through teaching.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n CSNY are old men now. They toured together on and off until a decade ago. While their incredible harmonies still resonated, their personalities clashed to the point that they can hardly speak to each other today. But their influence still is powerful, particularly among those of us who grew up on their harmonies. They collectively and individually have weighed in on almost every major issue of their time, from wars to saving the environment to the failures of a materialistic world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So it shouldn\u2019t be a surprise that Neil Young has taken a stand in the current Covid information crisis. He is incredibly aware of the influence of communication, whether it\u2019s a song about campus protests, or a podcast featuring Covid deniers. And Young has always been divergent, even from his bandmates. He sees Joe Rogan influencing younger people to ignore science, and risk both their own health, and the health of those around them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Neil Young is willing to lose 60% of his current revenue by pulling his music from the digital music and podcast giant, Spotify, unless they control Rogan.\u00a0\u00a0He has determined not to associate himself with the same service Rogan uses, and he\u2019s encouraging others to do the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some of Young\u2019s old friends have followed his lead, like\u00a0\u00a0Joni Mitchell and Nils Lofgren.\u00a0\u00a0Others no longer control their own music, David Crosby for example, sold his entire catalog.\u00a0\u00a0But Crosby\u00a0voiced his support for Young\u2019s action.\u00a0\u00a0And Spotify says it will \u201cwarn\u201d folks who listen to Rogan of unfounded or inaccurate information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Neil Young is seventy-seven years old. His generation is most at risk from Covid denial. He\u2019s always been irascible, and he\u2019s never backed away from a fight, even with his friends. So it\u2019s no surprise to me that he\u2019s made a very public stand. The man who wrote Needle and the Damage Done<\/a><\/em> , about the loss of friends to drug abuse, would certainly stand up against those who are killing folks by spewing falsehoods. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are already more than 33,000 dead in Ohio. Just like in 1970, Neil Young doesn\u2019t want there to be more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pirate Radio <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Four Way Street<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Old Man (I\u2019m a lot like you are)<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Damage Done<\/h3>\n\n\n\n