by Gary Pig Gold
Although it's already spent a good two years here in the ol' sty, I'm hardly surprised to find I'm still discovering, hearing, and even seeing fresh goodies galore buried within that great big Neil Young Archives box of mine. Yet it is something else entirely which has me going Metric today about The Greatest Living Canucklehead This Side of Dr. Stompin' Tom Connors.
Now, while some may take offense a mere three-minutes-twelve into the show at the comment Toronto, Canada is, and I quote, "a city not noted for its musical invention" (plus, if you look real close, note photos of Buddy Holly and Sonny & Cher appearing later are actually of impersonators, NOT the real deals), Sexy Intellectual's Here We Are In The Years: Neil Young's Music Box does present quite the journey through the past. And, as The Man himself would approve, this is one documentary which seldom finds itself in the middle of the cinematic road; it does indeed prefer a somewhat rougher ride, and we sure do see more interesting people there as a result.
For example, young Neil's original drummist Ken Smyth of The Squires, who right off the bat drives clear home that all-important point of how Elvis Presley especially shook to its very foundation the hitherto genteel teenaged population of Winnipeg circa 1956 (and, putting our eyes where Ken's mouth is, we're treated to a vintage clip of Elvis, Scotty, DJ and Bill mauling Little Richard's "Tutti Frutti" all across the Dorsey Brothers' televised Stage Show: One can't help but draw the obvious socio-musical connections with those Shocking Pinks to come …to say nothing of Live Rust). Similarly, footage of a live "Birds," complete with its "over, it's over"s, draw undeniable parallels with and to another unmistakable early influence: That "fucking opera singer with a backbeat" (as Neil once called him) Roy Orbison.
