Pay it Forward: Kurt Vile on Neil Young

For Philly psych-folk wanderer Kurt Vile, no one does both in-the-moment rock ’n’ roll glory and pin-drop intimacy quite like Neil Young.

Neil Young is, in some ways, obvious. Like, you could nerd out on his albums and all his peaks and valleys and relative changing of styles, the cool versions and maybe the controversial ones – pretty much all of which I love. But the number one reason why it’s him is because if you see him anywhere live, he’s just the most in-the-moment person. He means it in his heart. He’s an activist for justice, and all those real things are encapsulated in the energy of a live performance where he sounds just like he did in the 70s, but with everything he has carried with him up to now.

The second-to-last time I saw him was with Crazy Horse. I saw him in Philly, the day I got home from tour, and it was incredible. I got to go back and meet Billy Talbot, which was like meeting a real-life hippy from the time. I was so addicted I had to finagle a reason to get up to see Crazy Horse again in Massachusetts a few days later. I made it just in time. I got in my seat at this beautiful foresty arena, had a half a hit of weed and I was like, this sound is unbelievable. It was like you could hear harmonics and synthesisers and an orchestra just in his guitar and the band alone, and then I realised what I was hearing was everybody connecting with Neil. I just saw that Brian Eno documentary, and he was talking about that too: the experience of people all there for the same cause, and becoming part of that.

I’ve been with my wife since I was a teenager, and I remember her hippie aunt and uncle liked me, so they gave me their copy of Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere and Harvest. I connected with them right away. Neil, he kept creeping in, but it was in my early 20s that he really hit. It’s like when I’ve read a certain book: it’s like virtual reality when you listen, and I understand every nook and cranny of his style. 

In my early 20s, I lived up in Boston and had these cool record-head friends who were in college while I was driving a forklift. Everybody was trying to get On the Beach on vinyl, which was rare. So when I got back to Philly, I was into the intrigue of those undeniably cooler albums, like Zuma, with Danger Bird and Cortez the Killer. You can’t fuck with that, and then you get all beautiful in between. And that’s what I do – I play rock ’n’ roll with The Violators, then I play acoustic. It’s not like Neil invented that, but I can’t think of anybody who does it better.

Neil leans into the fuck-ups too, you know? One of my favourite times is when he’s filming that documentary, Muddy Track. He’s got a headband on, he’s in his forties – this is literally 1987. He’s yelling at his bandmates and, early on, he’s talking to whoever is on the cameras, like, “You see something going wrong? Shoot that.” He’s arguing with his band, threatening them with, “Shall we review the tapes?” I love that he’s human and larger than life at the same time.

His songs are all relatively simple but he’s not afraid to take them to outer space. I just think he’s completely in the moment – that’s why every performance feels fresh. That’s the secret to my ideal live performance. And in the studio, he’s not about overdubbing; he’s about capturing a moment. That’s the main reason he’s always my godhead.