Anthony Crawford says Neil Young did nothing for me
Anthony Crawford, veteran singer/songwriter and guitarist a half the duo Sugarcane Jane says Neil Young’s control issues took the fun out of playing with him.
“He’s a fantastic musician,” Crawford says of Young, “but for the most part he’s a hard guy to belly up to. He doesn’t have that many true friends, but that’s his choice. I was a servant to him. That’s probably where I went wrong,” Crawford says in a lengthy interview with NoDepression, a publication about “Roots Music.”
Crawford played with Young back in the 1980’s when he was in the band International Harvesters as well as the Shocking Pinks.
“I started my career late. I gave my career, my life, to Neil Young. Pretty much. That didn’t do anything for me other than make me some temporary really good money,” Crawford says in the interview. “Something about Neil’s changed. His policies have changed. He’s doing things to me that… I’ve seen him not compromise his art — or following his muse he puts it — for anybody or anything.”
Crawford said in the 80s Neil was still a young guy and it was fun. Years later, touring in 2007/08/09/10 all over Europe and the United States it was “all just so controlling and no fun.”
Crawford says: “I was out making these little vignette movies called On the Road with a Rock Star, and so I put them out on my YouTube channel. Very few of them had him in it at all. It was mainly what I do on my time off on the road with a rock star…. Well, he emailed me one day and said, ‘In my circles you’re not very popular for having those blogs,’ as he called it, ‘your rock-star blogs. You should take those down.’ I wrote back and I said, “Wow, coming from the guy that never does anything anybody ever suggests — and you’ve taught me one thing and one thing only, to never compromise your art for anybody — that is surprising to me.”
Read more at : http://nodepression.com/interview/singersongwriter-and-guitarist-anthony-crawford-neil-youngs-band-sugarcane-jane
Thanks to Andrew at Global Neil Young Professional Society
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hm to me, who had never a chance to meet neil personally, is no surprise how neil feels about anthony’s blog. at those times , euro tours 2008, 09 i saw some of the blogs from him and i wondered that neil is making no troubles about that. neil as a famous musician is often in the media but he wants to have control of what is published. and so it is no surprise that neil wanted the blogs of anthony stopped. when i had the chance to play with neil and take photos and all that i would ask neil if it would be ok, putting this on blogs in the www. cause those information is internas!
This is why most people do not tell their true feelings to interviewers. Of course Neil was a big part of Anthony’s life and career, he had performed on stage with the guy more than most. What he said was taken out of context to try to get more views. It’s no secret that Neil can be controlling and a hard ass. Btw Neil knew Anthony was filming during that tour. He has lots of footage where Neil joined along in the videos and was clearly enjoying being a part of that. Neil more than likely had never even seen his otrwars videos because if he had he would see that he is rarely in them and not at all compromised in any way. He was just giving him a hard time because that’s what he wanted to do that day. Artists are moody and weird and brilliant at the same time. Remember that Neil was happy Anthony had his camera back at the ranch when he took the album cover shot for Chrome Dreams II. Anthony is a gifted vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and contributer to Neil’s sound and that deserves respect. Stop being so judgemental and be appreciative of hearing from someone first hand what it’s like to be in Neil’s world. He could have just said everything was all peachy, but then you probably wouldn’t have read the article.