On October 16, 1992, Bobfest, a tribute concert held at Madison Square Garden in New York City, commemorated the 30th anniversary of Bob Dylan‘s career as a recording artist. That night, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, Stevie Wonder, Johnny Cash, June Carter Cash, Neil Young, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Willie Nelson, John Cougar Mellencamp, Sinéad O’Connor, Pearl Jam‘s Eddie Vedder, and Mike McCready, and others filled the lineup that paid tribute to Dylan throughout the long evening.
Though Harrison and Young were friendly at the time—even sharing the stage with everyone for a rendition of Dylan’s “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door“—that same year, the former Beatle had a few choice words about one of Young’s songs from the late’-80s.
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“Around the World”
Life, Young’s 1987 live album was a bit of a mishmash of songs, some in the vein of the “typical” Crazy Horse sound, while others featured some over-the-top production, including the more abstract, synth, and clang of “Around the World,” a song swaying around the slow deterioration of the American Dream when war is involved.
Boy and girl fall in love
Dreamin’ under stars above
Meanwhile push comes to shove
Around the world
Leaders fall, leaders rise
Terror wears a thin disguise
Not much room for compromise
Around the world
Surfers from seven seas
Sharing with the submarines
Experts count war machines
Around the world
People sweat in planted fields
Students study what is real
Someone builds a laser shield
Around the world
Young’s Label Issues in the ’80s
At the time, Young was on the outs with Geffen, which had sued him four years earlier for veering away from his more “traditional” sound, following the release of the rockabilly-bent Everybody’s Rockin’. After the release of Everybody’s Rockin’. When the album failed to break the top 40, Geffen filed a $3.3 million lawsuit against Young, claiming he had violated his contract, and that the albums he recorded were “musically uncharacteristic of [his] previous recordings.” In other words, Neil Young wasn’t making “Neil Young” music.
The suit was eventually settled and Young released three more albums with the label: Old Ways (1985), Landing on Water (1986), and Life with Crazy Horse in 1987.
Though the message around Young’s “Around the World” was sincere, sonically, it may have been part of his defying Geffen’s boundaries while mocking the “noise” in music during the 1980s. Whatever Young’s purpose was with the track, it was a song Harrison didn’t like.
“I Can’t Stand It”
In 1992, While Harrison was in the studio working on a recording of his 1975 song “This Guitar (Can’t Keep from Crying)” from Extra Texture with Eurythmics‘ Dave Stewart, Bob Geldof was in the studio and brought up Young and “Around the World,” which Harrison shot down.
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When Geldof asked Harrison if he heard the live version of “Around The World,” Harrison said “I’m not a Neil Young fan. “I hate it. Yeah, I can’t stand it.” Geldof mentioned that he liked Young’s 1979 album Rust Never Sleeps, and Harrison added, “It’s mainly his [Young’s] voice. I liked some of his songs but I hated the sound of his voice, his singing is even worse than me.”
Harrison then imitated Young’s guitar style and added, “It’s good for a laugh,” then referenced his 1992 Bobfest performance with Young, Clapton, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, and the Byrds’ Roger McGuinn on Dylan’s 1964 “My Back Pages.”
“We did this show with him [Young],” said Harrison. “I saw it from the other side of the stage and looked around, I looked at Eric and said ‘What’s going on?’ He did the solo in the middle then he kind of looked at me like – ‘Don’t look at me. It’s not me.'”
Photo: Chapman/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
