Weekly Neil: Little Wing
She flies rings around them all
“I heard there were three old ladies in the audience tonight, and we thought we’d do this one slow Ducks song for you who are here tonight. You know who you are.”
Ah man, The fuckin’ Ducks.
It’s well established that Neil hates to be tied down, right? Right. He famously bailed on a tour with Stephen Stills and his band just 19 dates in by sending a telegram: “Dear Stephen, funny how some things that start spontaneously end that way. Eat a peach.” He makes loud music and quiet music depending on whatever he’s feeling. He told Jim Jarmusch “I don’t make plans” but then recorded a soundtrack for his 1995 film Dead Man anyway. He yields his best work with Crazy Horse (and indeed most of the entries on this very platform are songs he did with them) but any records with them when he feels like it. He’s mercurial but also he follows the muse. Six of one, half-dozen of the other.
So, The Ducks. Santa Cruz, California, 1977. Neil’s got it in his contract that Crazy Horse is his touring band, but he’s got these other musician he’s been grooving with. Bob Mosley, Jeff Blackburn, and Johnny Craviotto. They link up and call themselves The Ducks and only play gigs in Santa Cruz so as not to technically “tour.” Twenty gigs in July, August, and September. And crucially, it’s not Neil Young & The Ducks. It’s just The Ducks.
They play rock and roll. It’s beer-drinkin’ music. It’s lawn-mowin’ music. (A fellow dad friend and I had a good text exchange about this last summer.) Neil sings sometimes but largely just plays guitar. Things get a bit choogly. They give “Are You Ready For The Country?” a fresh coat of paint and throw a spoiler on the tail. You can hear this all on their sole release, High Flyin’, a collection of live versions from that summer.
In the second half, they slow it down. Neil introduces a tune with the words above. And then the band strums into “Little Wing,” a song that would, three years later, open Neil’s Hawks & Doves album as a minimal acoustic number. In the Ducks arrangement — spacious, borderline dreamy — it becomes a stunning ballad that you can imagine hearing in a quieter moment on Tonight’s The Night or On The Beach. Like when you walk outside and get some air during a loud party. His guitar solo is bleary-eyed and mildly sludgy, unmistakable, quite lyrical. It’s a magnetic moment.
I don’t know who Neil wrote “Little Wing” about. But whoever it is, she sounds like a wonderful person in his own estimation. A person who will listen to children sing and protect them. Someone he wants to stay but is afraid will leave.
I feel that way when I hear the fragile acoustic version of the song. It’s skeletally quiet and over too soon. But listening to both I go back to something Dominic Angelella told me when I spoke to him in late 2022 about his own songwriting. “I’ve always wanted to make skronky noise-pop punk stuff, and then have also enjoyed playing the acoustic guitar,” he told me on a FaceTime audio call from Ireland. “This is why so many people become obsessed with Neil Young, because he is very good at both of these things.”
Even if The Ducks’ take on “Little Wing” isn’t quite skronky or punky, the point stands. It’s plugged-in, and Neil’s guitar Old Black carries a heavy bite. He’s my favorite guitarist of all time but it’s actually because his rhythmic acoustic playing is actually quite profound (to my heathen ears anyway). The picking on “Old Man” is simply spellbinding to me. “Little Wing,” via The Ducks, feels more like the path of a bumblebee than a bird. Not a duck. Not a hawk. Not even a dove. But a wing’s a wing.
“Little Wing,” written by Neil Young, from Hawks & Doves (1980), Homegrown (2020), and The Ducks’ High Flyin’ (2023)
Neil Young: vocals, guitar, harmonica (Hawks & Doves version)
Jeff Blackburn: guitar, vocals
Bob Mosley: bass, vocals
Johnny Craviotto: drums, vocals