joe bloggs

Over and Over
From Ragged Glory, 1990.

Two Neil Young tracks in the top ten. And he can't even sing.

But they are two very different songs. Over and Over, with that trademark Crazy Horse barrage of electric guitars, is to the acoustic Music Arcade as an Ilyushin is to this.

There is no doubt that Ragged Glory, released back in 1990 - right at the beginning of the decade of grunge - influenced many grunge acts throughout the decade.

So - Over and Over:

After an opening guitar salvo that sounds like it wants to go on forever, Young's declamatory whine cuts in:

At night when the sky is clear
and the moon is shining down
My heart goes running back to you
I love the way
you open up and let me in
So I go running back to you,
Over and over again.

The song is really a sad nostalgia trip tinged with regret and the guitars are just an attempt to deafen the pain. It works. They deafen the listener too.

Remember the nights of love
and that moment on the beach
That wasn't really too long ago
But we paid the price of time,
and now it's out of reach
And so the broken circle goes,
Over and over again

What happens next? Another endless guitar break, making loop-the-loops and generally having a rollicking good time. Deaden that pain, Old Black!

Somewhere in a fire of love,
our dreams went up in smoke
We danced beneath silver rain
Upon the fields of green,
where time was just a joke
And now the feeling's
just the same,
Over and over again.

And then the guitars fuzz out to one long, sustained, distorted note - finally dying away like the embers of love's fire.

Over and over again my love
Over and over again with you
Over and over again my love
Over and over again with you.

If you are lucky enough to have a good sound system, there is only one way to play this track. Loud.






is it time for a nap yet? i think so