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Old Man (song)

"Old Man" is a song written and performed by Canadian rock singer-songwriter and guitarist Neil Young from his 1972 album Harvest. "Old Man" was released as a single on Reprise Records in the spring of 1972, reaching number 4 in Canada,[2] and number 31 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart for the week ending June 3.

This article is about the Neil Young song. For the song of the same title by Love, see Forever Changes.

"Old Man"

"The Needle and the Damage Done"

April 17, 1972

February 6, 1971

Quadraphonic Sound Studio, Nashville TN

3:24

Reprise

Neil Young

Neil Young
Elliot Mazer[1]

In 2005, covered it on her live album Dreaming Wide Awake, recorded at Allaire, Shokan, New York the year before. It also appears in the film Lords of Dogtown.

Lizz Wright

In 2008, during the memorial service for , the song was chosen to be played with a slideshow of pictures from Ledger's life.[4]

Heath Ledger

Liam Finn ( son) & EJ Barnes (Jimmy Barnes's daughter) covered the song on the TV show RocKwiz.

Neil Finn's

In 2011, Dallas Green, of and Alexisonfire, covered the song at The 2011 Juno Awards, and post-grunge band Puddle of Mudd covered it on their covers album Re:(disc)overed. That same year Redlight King sampled "Old Man" on the album Something for the Pain. It was the first time Young had sanctioned a sample of this song.[5]

City and Colour

In 2015, Young appeared on and performed the song with Fallon as his Neil Young character.[6]

The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon

In 2022, covered Old Man to promote a Sunday Night Football match between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Kansas City Chiefs. The song is a nod to quarterback Tom Brady, the oldest active player in the NFL (in 2022) at 45 years old.[7] The line “24 and there’s so much more” refers to Brady and Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes winning Super Bowls when they were 24 years old.[8] After the commercial was released Neil Young posted a still image from the video for his 1988 anti-commercialization song This Note's for You in apparent protest of Beck's cover of Old Man being used in a commercial.[9][10] Beck's cover was nominated for Best Rock Performance for the 65th Grammy Awards later that year.[11]

Beck

— guitars, lead vocals

Neil Young

— pedal steel guitar

Ben Keith

James McMahon — piano

— banjo guitar, backing vocals

James Taylor

— backing vocals

Linda Ronstadt

— bass

Tim Drummond

— drums

Kenny Buttrey