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 Be The Rain: Last night was the second time I was actually in tears during a live concert. Of course the circumstances and reasons are very different for each but I don't think I'll ever forget the way I felt at either of these shows. I was a little kid when I saw The Bay City Rollers (christ, how embarrassing to admit that!) in 1976, they had been my heroes and it was the first live concert I'd ever seen, which made it very emotional for me. I've got a new hero now and his name is Neil Young. I saw Neil at the Air Canada Centre last night and I can honestly say I have never been so moved at a concert in my entire life. The first two hours were songs from a new musical he has written called Greendale. The whole thing was staged with actors and dancers and props much like a live theatre production. It focused on a family in a small American town called Greendale, brought up issues like The Patriot Act (from, Leave the Driving: And we'll be watching you - No matter what you do - And you can do your part - By watchin' others too), polluting the environment and unjust wars and included montages of John Ashcroft and Donald Rumsfeld and a street sign that proclaimed "Support Our War" on a screen behind the stage. It was like a travelling peace protest. I was lucky enough to have had a preview of Greendale a week before the show. A friend who I went with had downloaded a bootleg copy and mailed me one so I did get a chance to hear the songs in advance. I was a little wary going into the show because I was thinking I'd really like to hear a lot of classic hits. I'm sure a lot of people were surprised and others disappointed - one idiot sitting behind us yelled "What does this have to do with Canada?" which was responded to by fans with "Shut the fuck up!" Neil did do a couple of classic tunes for his five encore songs, including Hey, Hey, My, My which was very cool, but by then I was still so blown away by Greendale and its messages that it didn't matter what he played at that point. During the final Greendale song, Be The Rain, all the teenage actors in the show were lined up around him singing and dancing "We got a job to do - We got to save Mother Earth" (one of them was waving a huge Canadian flag) and I started crying. I have never been so moved by anything I've seen live like I was last night. It's even difficult for me to write about how powerful Greendale is without tears coming to my eyes right at this moment. It was incredibly inspiring. Thanks Neil. Save the planet for another day Attention shoppers. Buy with a conscience and save. Save the planet for another day Save Alaska! Let the caribou stay. Don't care what the governments say They're all bought and paid for anyway. Save the planet for another day Hey Big Oil! What do you say? We were runnin' through the night Never knowin' if we would see the light Paranoid schizophrenic visions Livin in fear of the wrong decisions We got to wake up We got to keep goin' If they follow us There's no way of knowin' We got a job to do We got to save Mother Earth Be the ocean when it meets the sky You can make a difference. If you really try. Be the magic in the Northern lights Six Days... Six nights. Be the river as it rolls along It has three-eyed fish. And it's smellin' strong. Be the rain you remember fallin' Be the rain. Be the rain. Yeah, rain was fallin' and we're soakin' wet Hail is beatin' down on our heads The wind is blowin' through our hair Faces frozen in the frigid air We got to get there Alaska We got to be there Before the big machines We got a job to do We got to save Mother Earth Dream the hunter on the western plain The birds are all gone. Where did they go? Dream the fisherman in his boat He's comin' home empty. He's barely afloat. Dream the logger in the great northwest They're runnin' out of trees. They got to give it a rest. (There's no other way to cut it) Dream the farmer in the old heartland Corporate greed and chemicals are killin' the land. Next mornin' Sun was up at dawn She looked around and Earth was gone Dark visions he had last night He needed peace, he needed light. He heard the rumble and He saw the big machines The green army rose It was a bad dream He had a job to do He had to save Mother Earth Be the ocean when it meets the sky Greek freighters are dumping crap somewhere right now. Be the magic in the northern lights (The ice is melting!) Be the river as it rolls along Toxic waste dumpin' from corporate farms. Be the rain you remember fallin' Be the rain. Be the rain. Save the Planet for another day Be the rain. Be the rain. Be the river as it rolls along Be the rain. Be the rain. Be the rain, be the rain
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