Neil Young Plays Music For Love Alone

Talking to Howard Stern, iconoclast musician Neil Young had to talk about his fallout with David Crosby. He didn’t want to–hell, it mostly seemed like he didn’t want to talk about anything. But the reluctant media partaker has a new album to pitch, a book to promote and a tech company to talk about (Pono). And the normally risible Stern promised to be docile in the presence of rock royalty like Shakey. Stern had never interviewed Young before, and the musician has long topped his list of hoped-for guests.

So the rift with Crosby can’t ever be repaired, Stern wanted to know? “It was fixable but it didn’t get fixed… I did everything I could,” Young told Stern. The reason they’ll never play together again is because there is no love there. And that’s a requirement for Young. You don’t play music for money, he said. It’s not even for the audience. “When you play music, you have to come from a certain place to do it and everything has to be clear.” Young explained, “and you don’t want to disturb that. I like to keep the love there, and if the love isn’t there, you don’t want to do it.”