Buried there at #37, probably a lot higher than he deserved, was Neil Young. I never thought he was a great singer, and I’m not sure why Rolling Stone magazine thought that, but he was and is a great and prolific songwriter, going back to the early days with the groups Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young.
It’s his solo stuff that most will remember, although it isn’t easy to remember everything given his nearly 50-year long solo career. Always pushing a message of social justice and change, one of his biggest hits was a song released in the late 1980’s, when he was already (incorrectly) considered to be in the late stages of his career…..
Called Rockin’ In The Free World, it was about a U.S. president whose policies he didn’t agree with at the time, Imagine what he thinks about the current president, given today’s low standards.
There's colors on the street
Red, white and blue
People shufflin' their feet
People sleepin' in their shoes
But there's a warnin' sign
On the road ahead
There's a lot of people sayin'
We'd be better off dead
Don't feel like Satan,
But I am to them
So I try to forget it,
Any way I can
Keep on rockin' in the free world,
Keep on rockin' in the free world
Keep on rockin' in the free world,
Keep on rockin' in the free world.
I see a woman in the night
With a baby in her hand
Under an old street light
Near a garbage can
Now she puts the kid away,
And she's gone to get a hit
She hates her life,
And what she's done to it
There's one more kid
That will never go to school
Never get to fall in love,
Never get to be cool
(Chorus)
We got a thousand points of light
For the homeless man
We got a kinder, gentler,
Machine gun hand
We got department stores
And toilet paper
Got styrofoam boxes
For the ozone layer
Got a man of the people,
Says keep hope alive
Got fuel to burn,
Got roads to drive
(Chorus)
