Neil Young’s 25 greatest songs

Neil Young was born in Toronto on Nov. 12, 1945. Over his career, he has been known as a lot of things: a folk hero; a rock icon; an innovative guitarist; a filmmaker; a political and environmental activist; as well as one of Canada’s most beloved songwriters.

Young has been a member of many groups, including Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, but he is most well known as a solo artist. Often backed up by his band Crazy Horse, whom he has worked closely with since 1969, Young has put out more than 50 studio albums spanning over 60 years and counting.

Young’s career has also featured a continual and uncompromising exploration of musical styles. While one album would see him experimenting with overdubbing, the next would be entirely acoustic. During the '80s, he went through an experimental phase, using vocoders and electronic beats, only to return to blistering rock performances by the turn of the decade, helping to lay the groundwork for what would later become known as grunge. 

Young was asked to share some advice to younger musicians in a 2019 interview with CBC’s Q: “Be true to yourself. Just do what you want to do. The last thing you want to do is please anybody else,” he said. “It's the most useless pastime you could ever have.”

For his work, he’s won nine Junos and two Grammys, was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame twice (once as a solo artist, and once as a member of Buffalo Springfield) and is an officer of the order of Canada.

In honour of Young's 80th birthday, CBC Music has ranked his 25 best songs below. 

CBC Radio will also be celebrating Young’s 80th birthday on a special edition of Drive. You can hear the three-hour show, hosted by Rich Terfry, on Nov. 12 from 3 to 6 p.m. local (3:30 NL).

25. Expecting to Fly, 1967

When talking about Buffalo Springfield, the '60s group that launched the careers of both Stephen Stills and Neil Young, Ahmet M. Ertegun, then president of Atlantic Records, said that “the very power of the individual writing and performing talents of the members was also the reason for the breakup of the original group.”

By the end of the band's two-year run, the members started producing songs for Buffalo Springfield separately. Expecting to Fly ended up on the group's final album, but could be considered Young’s first solo single, as it didn't feature any other members of Buffalo Springfield despite being credited to the band. 

It was created with legendary producer Jack Nitzsche and recorded using session musicians from the famous Wrecking Crew, including Jim Gordon, Carol Kaye and Merry Clayton on backing vocals. The track is a spacious, layered piece of prophecy. Young was clearly ready to evolve beyond Buffalo Springfield, spreading his songwriting wings shortly after this with his 1968 self-titled debut. — Pete Morey

24. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, 1969

One of the constants throughout Young's life is the band he has played with most, Crazy Horse. Their first album together, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, dates back to 1969. The album's short and bittersweet title track is about heading home and leaving the “nowhereness” of Los Angeles life behind. 

The song owes a lot of its swagger to Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten. Young and Whitten trade twanging guitar lines throughout the track, battling back and forth like a pair of old friends sparring in the ring. You can imagine them smiling as they recorded this, pushing each other harder and further in a battle for country-rock-riff supremacy. — PM

23. Sugar Mountain, 1968

In 1964, on Young’s 19th birthday, he sat on his bed at the Fort William Hotel in Thunder Bay, Ont., picked up his guitar and wrote Sugar Mountain. 

That same year, a 21-year-old Joni Mitchell quit art school in Saskatoon, hit the road and spent time playing her music in clubs across Canada and the U.S. In 1965, Mitchell and Young’s paths finally crossed at a folk club in Winnipeg. Young played Sugar Mountain for Mitchell, the song he’d been holding onto. It was a bittersweet tune about the end of childhood and the challenges of growing up. Mitchell was so moved by it, she wrote her own song in response: The Circle Game. Sugar Mountain would go on to become one of Young’s signature songs. — PM

22. Don't Let it Bring You Down, 1970

Young debuted this song while on tour with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young in the summer of 1970. When he wrote Don’t Let it Bring You Down, Young was going through a period of depression about the state of the world. Surprisingly, he found respite from that depression in other people. “The presence of another human being can be so strong that it’ll change your whole outlook," he told Spin magazine. Look no further than the lyrics of the finished song, released in 1970 on his third album, After the Goldrush: “Don't let it bring you down/ it's only castles burning/ find someone who's turning/ and you will come around.” — PM

21. Like a Hurricane, 1977

This Young and Crazy Horse staple starts with a sudden burst — a screeching solo from Young on “Old Black,” his signature Gibson Les Paul guitar — before descending into an almost eight-and-a-half-minute all-out jam. Unable to sing after having an operation on his vocal cords, Young poured himself into writing and playing guitar at his Broken Arrow Ranch. Like a Hurricane came together after about 10 days of the band trying to nail it (Young would record his voice later). The version that we hear, and that sudden start, is the result of the engineer turning the recording on in the middle of Young running through the song, as he writes in his autobiography, Waging Heavy Peace. They ended up capturing a magic that could never be repeated: “The cherry, the original expression of the song, the essence. We just kept wailing on those changes until we couldn’t move anymore,” Young wrote. —Jesse Kinos-Goodin

20. Tonight’s the Night, 1973

On Tonight’s the Night, we find ourselves at the end of the “Ditch Trilogy,” where drugs have ravaged Young's life and caused terrible personal loss. But the lore that goes along with this one is so good it bears a retelling. After completing the Tonight's the Night album in 1973, Young and his band booked themselves in at the Roxy in L.A. to celebrate. They played the unreleased material front to back, starting with the title track. The crowd was clearly upset by the lack of any familiar Young classics. So, at the end of the set, Young stepped to the mic and said “All right, here’s a song you’ve all heard before.” The crowd cheered and the band played Tonight’s the Night for a second time. Even if it is only lore, it’s truly Neil Young. — Nathan Gill

19. Cortez the Killer, 1975

Over the span of more than seven minutes, Young mines the tragedy of life under conquistador Hernán Cortés on this sprawling musical epic. Beginning with a lengthy, sweeping guitar solo, he successfully sets the song up to exhume the force behind the fall of the Aztec empire, conjuring up sharp visions of Cortés arriving with galleons and guns. 

It’s an incisive portrayal that smashes any rose-coloured notions of imperialism, while also cleverly dipping into the personal: “And I know she's living there/ and she loves me to this day/ I still can't remember when/ or how I lost my way,” Young sings, likening his own missteps in love to the flaws of his unsavoury subject. — Natalie Harmsen

18. Cowgirl in the Sand, 1969

Young was battling a 103-degree fever when he wrote this hypnotic rock anthem off his sophomore album, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere — the very same day he wrote Down by the River and Cinnamon Girl. In the Decade compilation album liner notes, he recalls “lying in bed sweating with scraps of paper covering the bed.” The lyrics are famously obscure, evoking an idealized woman and a dream of Spanish beaches, even though Young had never actually visited Spain. 

At the time, Crazy Horse had only been working with Young for two weeks, but this song quickly became a live staple. The studio version is over 10 minutes, but live versions could stretch out to be as long as 16 minutes or more. At its core are four blazing Young guitar solos, each one loud, chaotic and filled with distortion. — JK-G

17. Walk On, 1974

This first track from Young’s On the Beach kicked open the album with just the right amount of swagger. “I hear some people been talkin' me down/ bring up my name, pass it 'round/ they don't mention happy times/ they do their thing, I'll do mine,” Young sings, upbeat, primed to take the song’s title as advice in the chorus. Young wrote Walk On as a reflection on leaving Buffalo Springfield, according to Shakey: Neil Young's Biography by Jimmy McDonough. It was an era of change and turmoil, both politically and personally for Young, but Walk On’s assertive lyrics and groovy guitar riffs assured that he was going to be just fine while doing exactly what he thought was best for himself — a talk he has walked his entire life. — Holly Gordon

16. Powderfinger, 1979

The thrilling number that kicks off the electric Side 2 of Rust Never Sleeps, Powderfinger packs a Western epic into a five-and-a-half-minute song. A tale that came to Young in a dream, the details feel vivid and urgent. With a boat approaching a family, a young man must face the dangers ahead because “daddy’s gone, my brother’s out huntin’ in the mountains/ Big John’s been drinkin’ since the river took Emmy Lou.” There’s a gruesome conclusion, and wild guitar solos in between. While fans have long debated the song’s true meaning, one thing is clear: Powderfinger shows Young at his storytelling best. — Melody Lau

15. Long May You Run, 1976

The nostalgic pull of a harmonica begins this Stills-Young collaboration, but it’s not an ode to a beloved: it’s a love song for Young’s first car, a 1948 Buick Roadmaster Hearse named Mortimer Hearseburg (Mort for short). The title track off the 1976 — and only — Stills-Young album, Long May You Run could’ve been the reunion of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, but the four musicians couldn’t pull it together. “The Stills-Young band was a sort of attempt to wrap up something that we had started a long time ago,” Young said in a 1981 interview. “It really wasn't as hot as the early stuff we did." The languid pace of Long May You Run serves its character, though, as you imagine Young meandering along stretches of highway with his best friend. The Stills-Young harmonies and that subtle conga make it a memorable addition to the Young canon. — HG

14. After the Gold Rush, 1970

The climate crisis has been integral to Young’s life and music for decades. He has loudly protested issues ranging from the development of the oil sands to corporate agriculture. On After the Gold Rush, we have the crown jewel in that body of work. Sung in what would become his signature falsetto, the sci-fi musings and dream visions sound almost biblical here. And, of course, the longer Mother Nature stays “on the run,” the more resonant this song becomes. — NG

13. Mr. Soul, 1967

This psychedelic rocker came about soon after Young made his famous — and permanent — move to California in the mid-1960s. Shortly after arrival, Young discovered that he had epilepsy (hence the longtime nickname “Shakey”). Once, while playing with the band Buffalo Springfield in 1966, he had an attack onstage and was rushed to hospital. He wrote this swirling, riff-heavy tune while recovering at the UCLA Medical Center. It remains a set staple to this day. — Grant Lawrence 

12. Down by the River, 1969

Hazy, psychedelic guitar dominates the majority of Down by the River, dropping listeners into a fiery session with Crazy Horse. Young wrestles with screwing up and subsequently losing a love interest, and that ache reverberates across each verse: “She could drag me over the rainbow/ and send me away, yeah,” he sings on the pre-chorus before a sea of voices crashes in, echoing, “Down by the river/ I shot my baby.”

But it’s the moments in between the singing where he plays like he’s having a conversation, speaking through each note as the pain rings out. Around the four-minute mark there’s a magnificent rally with Crazy Horse — Young jams untethered, the music flowing through him as it builds to an intense, emotional peak and he squeezes the passion out of every note. — NH

11. Cinnamon Girl, 1969

Young is a man who has produced some legendary guitar riffs, but Cinnamon Girl might contain his most iconic. It was written in a fever, literally: Young was sick and stuck in his Topanga Canyon home with a high fever when this song came pouring out. The sports fans among us might call this Young’s Flu Game. But the legacy of this track reverberates in ’90s grunge, 2000s garage rock or with anyone who has ever wanted to wield a guitar like a musical sledgehammer. — NG

10. Southern Man, 1970

Never one to shy away from political or social issues in his music, Young reflected the times in his 1970 track Southern Man. Following a decade filled with civil unrest and the fight for civil rights in the United States, Young wrote a song rife with evocative imagery about the stain of slavery and segregation in the South. "I saw cotton and I saw black/ tall white mansions and little shacks/ Southern man, when will you pay them back?/ I heard screamin' and bullwhips cracking," Young wails in the second verse over searing guitar riffs.

Although it's incisive in its lyricism, Southern Man is meant to be more a "warning" than a moral screed against white Southerners, as Young reminds them to not "forget what your good book says." The song inspired Lynyrd Skynyrd to respond with 1974's Sweet Home Alabama, which calls out Young by name: "Well, I hope Neil Young will remember/ a Southern man don't need him around, anyhow."

In McDonough's aforementioned biography of Young, the musician told the author that he didn't believe Southern Man was still relevant, because its scope wasn't broad enough: "I don’t sing it anymore. I don’t feel like it’s particularly relevant. It’s not 'Southern Man' — it’s 'White Man.' Heh heh. It’s much bigger than 'Southern Man.'" — Kelsey Adams

9. Rockin’ in the Free World, 1989

Guitar rips through the air from the very first second of Rockin’ in the Free World, a propulsive political anthem that only Young could write. Equal parts boisterous and blistering, Young candidly portrays the shuffle and slump of the post-Cold War days during the Bush Sr. era: “We got a kinder, gentler machine gun hand,” he scoffs, delivering an eloquent diss to the former president. 

First released as a live acoustic opener to Freedom, the electric version of the track is even bolder than the original. Young rides a thundering drum beat and the guitar is dialled up to 11, especially on the exhilarating, grunge-y solo following the second chorus. The verses do the illustrative heavy lifting, but as well-written as they are, it’s the simplicity of the chorus that makes everything stick: “Keep on rockin' in the free world,” he sings over and over, trumpeting his message of defiance. — NH

8. The Needle and the Damage Done, 1972

Young wrote this stark, acoustic dirge about the damning effects of drug use while seeing some of his friends, particularly Crazy Horse bandmate Danny Whitten, sink deeper into heroin addictions. “I sing the song, because I love the man/ I know that some of you don't understand,” Young sings, the song tragically becoming a presage of what was to come: “I hit the city and I lost my band/ I watched the needle take another man.” Unable to perform at rehearsals, Whitten would eventually be fired from the band, only to die of a drug overdose less than a year after this song was released.

Originally released on Harvest, an acoustic version of The Needle and the Damage Done was included on Young's 1977 Decade compilation, where he included handwritten liner notes for each song. Of The Needle and the Damage Done, all he wrote was: “I am not a preacher but drugs killed a lot of great men.” — JK-G

7. My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)/(Into the Black), 1979

Two versions of this enduring Young track bookend his 1979 album, Rust Never Sleeps. The opener, (Out of the Blue), is subdued and acoustic, just Young with a guitar, harmonica and his gentle, pleading vocals. The closer, (Into the Black), is brash and bold, a collaboration with art-punk band Devo, that includes guitar, bass and drums. Influenced by the rise of punk throughout the '70s, Young was grappling with his own presumed rock irrelevancy, as sounds were shifting towards the harder and edgier. Of course, now we know Young had nothing to worry about, considering he's still touring as an octogenarian.

Over four decades later and My My, Hey Hey has become known as one of the tracks that defines the genre, and has been covered countless times by the likes of Oasis, System of a Down, Dave Matthews Band and many more. The lyric, "It's better to burn out, than to fade away," was cemented in rock history when Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain used it in his suicide note.

As Young proclaims, with quiet confidence or fiery defiance depending on the version: "rock and roll will never die," it just reinvents itself into new forms. — KA

6. Only Love Can Break Your Heart, 1970

“When you were young and on your own/ how did it feel to be alone?” Young muses in the opening moments of Only Love Can Break Your Heart. It takes you back to a more innocent time, before the experience of romantic heartbreak redefined loneliness. The song is so simple in nature: the same melody in the verse and the chorus, merrily dancing around a steady 3/4 time signature. But it essentially illustrates the crushing cycle of falling in love over and over again, and every time landing on the same revelation or warning: “But only love can break your heart/ try to be sure right from the start.” Young poses the question: “What if your world should fall apart?” Love is a risk worth taking, but the aftermath will always hit like a ton of bricks. — ML

5. Ohio, 1970

Young wrote Ohio in the wake of the Kent State shootings that occurred on May 4, 1970, during a student demonstration protesting the Vietnam War and the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. Four unarmed students were shot and killed by the Ohio National Guard, which had been sent to Kent after the mayor declared a state of emergency a couple days earlier amid the protests.

The song begins with a spiraling, angular guitar solo over chugging chords, followed by an opening line that makes Young sound more like a war correspondent than a rock star. “Tin Soldiers and Nixon coming/ we’re finally on our own/ this summer I hear the drumming/ four dead in Ohio.”

Ohio was hastily recorded on May 21 with Young and his bandmates, Crosby, Stills and Nash. The record label rush-released the single in a matter of weeks. Despite many A.M. radio stations banning the song countrywide, Ohio landed on the U.S. Billboard charts at No. 14 in early June, while the Kent State killings were still fresh in America’s collective consciousness. 

For a time in the ’80s, Young stopped performing the song, feeling that it was dated. But in 1989, following the Tiananmen Square massacre, Young revived the song in concert, often dedicating it to the Chinese students who were killed. Ohio has since been described by both Rolling Stone and the Guardian as one of the greatest protest songs of all time. — PM

4. Helpless, 1970

Nostalgia is a tricky thing to wrap your head around, so leave it to Young to perfectly capture its complicated feelings on Helpless. At first, the song sounds like a direct ballad to his youth, which he sets up with one of his most straightforward Canadian lines: “There is a town in North Ontario,” he sings over a simple three-chord structure on acoustic guitar and piano. Young has admitted that the town he grew up in — Omemee, Ont. (population as of 2021: 1,060) — among other places, inspired the track, but as the song unfolds, it’s clear that it’s about a feeling more than a particular location. Just as quickly as he sets the scene, Young moves on to the idea that longing for the past is a trap: memories are as fleeting as “birds flying across the sky,” but you can never fully recapture them. As he sings on the chorus, “the chains are locked and tied across the door,” and you're left feeling helpless. 

While Helpless was included on CSNY’s album Deja Vu, it is a Young song first and foremost, and he’s performed it more than 400 times around the world, including in Omemee. One of the most iconic performances came during The Last Waltz, the Band’s final concert in 1976. Young was joined by the group along with Joni Mitchell, who remained out of sight backstage while delivering a beautifully ethereal vocal accompaniment. — JK-G

3. Old Man, 1972

Listening to Old Man feels akin to pulling on a snug wool sweater: the instrumentation is immediately cozy and evokes familiarity. James Taylor plays a sticky banjo riff while soft pedal steel guitar drifts in, and Young’s vocals climb toward the soaring chorus: “Old man, take a look at my life, I'm a lot like you/ I need someone to love me the whole day through,” he sings, his voice rattling against the percussive banjo plucking.

Young penned the track as a tribute to Louis Avila, the groundskeeper for Young’s Broken Arrow Ranch in Redwood City, Calif. As Young was only in his 20s when he bought the ranch, Avila questioned how a young man like him could afford it. Thus, the song plays out as a thoughtful conversation between friends on age and time.

Time is presented as the ultimate equalizer, with Young’s observations on love nestled just beneath the surface. “I've been first and last/ look at how the time goes past,” Young sings, delivering a song that’s equally wistful and perceptive. — NH

2. Harvest Moon, 1992

On Harvest Moon, Young imagines an idyllic night, spent dancing and embracing his love under the glow of the moon. The song may be Young at his most loved-up, oozing with sweet gentleness: "Come a little bit closer/ hear what I have to say/ just like children sleepin'/ we could dream this night away." It's the titular track from his 1992 album, and was a return to the simple folk melodies that he explored on 1972's Harvest, 20 years before.

Linda Ronstadt provides backing vocals, her resplendent oohs adding even more tenderness, as Young's guitar rocks back and forth like a lullaby. The harmonica comes in like a third voice, harmonizing with Young and Ronstadt in the song's final act. It's a stunning ode to love, one that feels uncomplicated, and not bogged down by feelings of self-doubt like other Young tracks. Harvest Moon is a crowd pleaser, and a song that transcends time. — KA

1. Heart of Gold, 1972

There are few songs that tug on our heartstrings more, or can get the entire circle at the campfire singing along faster, than Heart of Gold. “I want to live, I want to give/ I’ve been a miner for a heart of gold,” Young sings on the song’s opening lines. The folky, harmonica-driven song was recorded in Nashville in 1971, and features backup singing by Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor. It was released more than 50 years ago and, to date, remains Young’s only No. 1 single.

And if peer admiration is a mark of great art, Heart of Gold is truly that, having been covered over the decades by some of the biggest names in music: Johnny Cash, Fiona Apple, Willie Nelson, Tori Amos, Boney M., Roxette have all covered the song, as well as fellow Canadians Diana Krall, Ruth B. and Midnight Shine (complete with a verse in Mushkegowuk Cree). You could even call it the Canadian Stairway to Heaven, since there is a strong chance that Heart of Gold is the first song that countless Canadian guitarists learn to strum. 

“Keep me searching for a heart of gold/ and I'm getting old,” he sings. Aren’t we all? — GL