Neil Young may have more than a few hits under his belt but he has defended one “idiotic” song more than most would. Young believes the song turned his career around, and to his credit, he isn’t wrong. The veteran songwriter who released outstanding albums like Harvest, American Stars ‘n’ Bars, and On the Beach through the 1970s hit a bit of a snag through the 1980s. While he fell out of favour with his record label and audiences across the globe, it would not be until the latter stages of the decade that he found common ground with his listeners again.
Young would then transition into some of his career-best work in the 1990s. But that wouldn’t have been possible without the 1988 release, This Note’s for You. The title track is where it all came together, according to Young, who says the song’s context makes it the “most idiotic” piece he ever wrote. Despite that, he remains fond of the song and hails it as the reason he still has a music career.
Young wrote This Note’s for You while on tour and recalls writing it during the late 1980s. He said: “I remember writing it in my bus, turning to my driver and saying, ‘Jesus Christ, this must be the most idiotic fucking song I’ve ever written.’ I still can’t believe that such a dumb little song could have helped resuscitate my career the way it did.”
The veteran songwriter would go on to say he was inspired by Men at Work of all bands and that it helped him realise he and the band “had a job to do” for the This Note’s for You record. He said: “I had this groove going through my head and I was playing it on my guitar, which is actually my wife’s guitar, which she’s had since she was just a little teenybopper, I guess. She took it everywhere with her. And it really feels like her, so I wrote every song on this album, except one, on that guitar.
“It’s an old Gibson, like a J-45 or something. It just feels so good. I’d be walking around the house playing. And I had this groove going, didn’t have any lyrics, but I don’t try and make up words. I figure something’ll happen and I’ll start singin’ the words. Until then, I don’t have any words. I never just try and think of something clever.
“So the way Ten Men Workin’ came to me was… one morning I was gettin’ ready to go into where we recorded the Bluenotes record, on Melrose Avenue across from the Hollywood Cemetery. One of the guys, the engineer of my boat, had a Men At Work T-shirt on. I just kept lookin’ at that T-shirt and started thinkin’, ‘Yeah, that’s me. I’m workin’ and we’re workin’.’ It’s like we were building something. We had this job to do. It’s like it was our mission to make people feel good and to make ’em dance.”
Young hasn’t performed This Note’s for You since 1997 and last played Ten Men Workin’ in 1988, the same year This Note’s for You released. Despite not featuring them in his setlist all that much, it’s clear the two songs had enough of an impact on Young to turn his career around in the 1990s.
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