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Bob Dylan and Neil Young have been great friends for a long time. For the first time as a duo together in the mid-1970s, the duo often covered each other’s songs and shared many good times on stage. It’s a friendship built on mutual respect and craftsmanship, both upholding a folk-rock style that has seen them excel as the voices of their generations. But there is a song by Neil Young that Dylan always hated.
Bob Dylan is without a doubt one of the most influential musicians in history. The freewheeling troubadour broke new ground with his folk style and narrative writing and quickly gained fame, fortune and widespread notoriety. He finally threw it all away when he went electric. The problem with plotting the path to success for yourself is that more often than not, using your blueprints, many will find a similar path to the holy grail. Of course, there were singer-songwriters before Dylan, but none drew attention like Mr. Zimmerman, and that encouraged many more to take center stage as well.
This meant that a sudden influx of folk-rock acts was taken up by record companies across the country, offering Dylan ample competition for his folk-rock crown. Overall, the singer took it in his stride, but soon enough he grew impatient with what he saw as a deliberate copy of his work and style. During the Sixties, many people followed Dylan’s road map to success, not only in their style, but also in their composition, with The Beatles being the most famous adopters of his personal narrative structure for the songs – what the group was happy to recognize.
As the Seventies erupted and Dylan’s initial impact sank into the collective consciousness, Dylan grew a little more anxious to see his influence not be as widely recognized as it should be. One song, in particular, pushed Dylan overboard: “The only time it bothered me that someone sounded like me was when I was living in Phoenix, Arizona, around 1972 and the great song back then was ‘Heart of Gold,’ the singer told SPIN.
The song is one of Young’s greatest hits, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard 100 and making Neil Young the first Canadian to do so. But for Dylan, the song’s closeness to his own style, now a little less sophisticated than before, was too similar: “I hated it when it was on the radio. I’ve always loved Neil Young, but it bothered me every time I listened to “Heart of Gold”. I think he was number one for a long time, and I would say, ‘Damn, it’s me. If that sounds like me, it should be me too, ”he added.
Vocally, of course, Young’s tone is a far cry from Dylan’s varying output, but the style similarities are there for all to see and hear. It may have something to do with the song’s design because, in fact, Young was never really a fan of the song either – despite its success or maybe because of it. “This song put me in the middle of the road,” Young wrote in the understudy notes for Decades. Referring to the “ditch trilogy” of albums that followed, he said, “Traveling there quickly became boring, so I headed for the ditch. A harder ride but saw more interesting people there.
‘Heart of Gold’ has a habit of dividing Neil Young fans in the middle. Either it’s a song built on a deeply rich sentiment and the simplicity of its metaphor (extracting a heart of gold), or a Hallmark card-like commercial platitude. Whichever side you choose, know that not only does Bob Dylan hate the greatest song of Young’s career, but Neil Young too.
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