There's nothing like the sheer entertainment of a Springsteen concert. The best live act.
I must say I prefer Young's songwriting though.:)

Bruce is a great live performer, but I do not like his records that much. But e really knows how to affect people and I give him props for that.
But Neil is so much better as a songwriter. Also I have been lately thinking that he has to have one of the most beautiful singing voice ever. It is whiny and shaky but it is also extremely touching and beautiful. I know some of you nay disagree with me on that, but still.
The biggest problem with Neil are his lyrics that suck ass all over the place usually.

Neil's latest tour was pretty rad, he puts on a great show, I know Bruce is a legend in his way as well so I won't debate the point, but if you like Neil slightly you'll probably love his show.

Taxman I mainly disagree that his lyrics suck all over the place. I will grant you that his later day lyrics don't quite touch the consistency and impact of older material, but pretty much all of his albums up until the 80s have some fantastic lyrics.

Well... Maybe I was a little bit too nasty, but still,I think his main weakness is his lyrics. I don't find them to be that much meaningful or even very interesting.
'I have a friend I've ever seen/lives in his head, behind a dream'.

As a Finn bad lyrics do not annoy me that much but still, considering that Neil has been doing a lot of folksy stuff one could expect better lyrics from him.

Anyway, his lyrics are definitely a lot of better than those awful street stories Bruce use to write. I'd rather take Neil's meaningless cliched stories about making rearrangements with yourself than Bruce's embarrassing crowd-pleasers about how were were born to run or how we all have hungry hearts.
I mean, he has got a point, but it is not what I want from rock music.

I think Young goes for a more abstract/impressionistic style, the kind you see in Elliott Smith or Radiohead (who take it to an even further extreme), maybe it's just not your style, or maybe you do find it cliched. Even though his style is folksy, I think he likes to bring more of a psychedelic edge to most of his songs, maybe barring his straight up protests. It may not entirely mesh with the folk background but i think it makes for an interesting union.

I agree a lot of Young's lyrics are a bit awkward, though that never bothered me since I always considered lyrics to be secondary to the music.

My favorite Young song, for instance: Tell Me Why. Do these lyrics really make much sense?

Sailing heart-ships
thru broken harbors
Out on the waves in the night
Still the searcher
must ride the dark horse
Racing alone in his fright.
Tell me why, tell me why

Is it hard to make
arrangements with yourself,
When you're old enough to repay
but young enough to sell? ...

The verse, by itself, seems to kinda-sorta make sense. Maybe. And the refrain, by itself, kinda-sorta seems to make sense, but I really have a hard time connecting the two together into a coherent message.

Perhaps if I sat there and pondered it for a good half hour I could figure it out. :)

Not all Young songs are like that, but a fair amount of them seem to be.

I often wonder, in threads like these, how much everyone's heard from both catalogs. This discussion has become all Neil Young - it makes me think you only know his stuff.

True. It's how I debate the negatives. It's also why I'm not casting a vote.

I'm very familiar with both artist's 70's stuff, and some of their early 80's stuff. But I've tended to like Young better so that's why I'm focusing on his music.

But there's also a good deal of Springsteen stuff I think is spectacular.

It was more to point out that we have a Neil Young thread.

Anyway, I used to hate Springsteen. He sounded boring (I thought then) and wrote songs about boring things. Not but 5 years ago I'd have said he sucked. But the truth is, Springsteen seems to do two things, I've learned from my experiences:

1. Speak to Americans
2. Speak to American's who've been kicked in the mouth by life a few times.

I don't know why my Global brothers don't get him. But it seems to me that by and large, the Euro's I speak to don't seem to get why he's popular. Its like Radiohead with me, and I try to keep in mind that he doesn't sound the same to everyone. Having said that, when I was a young, angry person, I didn't get the appeal either.

Glory Days? Hungry Heart? What is this ****? It sounded like a combo of Zappa and Christmas music.

As cliche it is, Springsteen seems to me to be beyond music. His live act is brutal - probably the best live show I've ever seen. But he's an author. He can make standard lyrics - through affectation alone - devastating. But because he's a musician, he doesn't do it as an author would. He just has an ability beyond description (for me, in this moment anyway). I still believe the lyrics below are nothing until he sings them:

"You know that tilt-a-whirl down on the east side, I got on it last night and my shirt got caught, but Joey kept me spinning, didn't think I'd ever get off."

You need to get the live version.

I don't think Neil Young is bad by any stretch. But he's a different beast. Young, to me, deals better in the ethereal, the vague atmosphere that appeals to more people because there is so much room for interpretation. If you've never raced cars in the street that you built from scratch then maybe Springsteen's "Racing in the Street" doesn't immediately appeal to you (though I haven't, and it does to me). But After the Gold Rush and I'm the Ocean have a scope that's beyond a person. It can talk to everyone at once in an immediately apparent fashion.

I think Springsteen does the same thing, but ostensibly he's for townies and rednecks. I once thought that, but then it soaked in. I can't say enough good things.