On this day, March 12, 1970,
March 12 1970 After the Goldrush recorded by Neil Young
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly xxxppm. As of 2026 it is 428ppm, but
check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that the 60s had happened. Everyone was questioning, well, everyone, a few of the young, were questioning the myths that they’d been brought up on. One of those myths was of painless economic progress that would not damage the planet. By the late 60s, air pollution was getting so bad that this was mocked, and also oil pollution, for example, well, the Torrey Canyon, but also the more consequential Santa Barbara oil spill of January, 1969. LINK
The specific context was that people like Neil Young were just tapping into that sense of menace and danger.
Songs on the album were inspired by a screenplay written by Dean Stockwell and Herb Bermann also titled After the Gold Rush. The screenplay’s plot involves an apocalyptic ecological disaster that washes away the Topanga Canyon hippie community. Stockwell, a lifelong friend of Young, was also part of the Topanga Canyon artist culture of the time. Mutual friend Dennis Hopper encouraged Stockwell to write his own screenplay in wake of Hopper’s success with Easy Rider. Stockwell recalls writing the script:
Dennis very strongly urged me to write a screenplay, and he would get it produced. I came back home to Topanga Canyon and wrote After The Gold Rush. Neil was living in Topanga then too, and a copy of it somehow got to him. He had had writer’s block for months, and his record company was after him. And after he read this
screenplay, he wrote the After the Gold Rush album in three weeks.[10]
Young recalls coming in contact with the script in his 2012 memoir Waging Heavy
Peace:
When I returned to Topanga, Dean Stockwell came by the house with a screenplay called After the Gold Rush. He had co-written it with Herb Bermann and wanted to know if I could do the music for it. I read the screenplay and kept it around for a while. I was writing a lot of songs at the time, and some of them seemed like they would fit right in with this story. The song “After the Gold Rush” was written to go along with the story’s main character as he carried the tree of life through Topanga Canyon to the ocean. One day Dean brought an executive from Universal Studios to my house to meet me. It looked like the project was going to happen, and I thought it would really be a good movie. It was a little off-the-wall and not a normal type of Hollywood story. I was really into it. Apparently the studio wasn’t, because nothing
more ever happened.[11] After the Gold Rush – Wikipedia
In his 2012 biography Young reportedly gave a different explanation of the song’s origin and meaning, describing the inspiration provided by a screenplay of the same name (never produced), which apocalyptically described the last days of California in a catastrophic flood. The screenplay and song’s title referred to what happened in California, a place that took shape due to the Gold Rush. Young eventually concluded that:
After The Gold Rush is an environmental song… I recognize in it now this thread that goes through a lotta my songs that’s this time-travel thing… When I look out the window, the first thing that comes to my mind is the way this place looked a hundred
years ago.[4]
After the Gold Rush (song) – Wikipedia
What I think we can learn from this is that this song is an absolute banger. I listen to it all the time
What happened next Neil Young is still around! Neil Young – Wikipedia
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
References
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Also on this day:
March 12, 1974 – Clean Coal advert in the Wall Street Journal
March 12, 1963 – first scientific meeting about C02 build-up
March 12, 2023 – the opera ain’t over, but the fat lady is warming up
Title: On this Day March 13: UK disses the future (1989), Aussie climate advocates try (and fail) (1992), Bush breaks CO2 prime (2001), UNEP minds the Gap (2010 and ACTU talks clean coal (2007)
In 1988 scientists had said a global 20% cut in emissions was needed by 2005. The UK government, on this day, said “yeah, nah”.
March 12, 1984 – A Conservative MP worries about carbon dioxide
build-up
March 13, 1989 – UK Energy Department shits all over everyone’s future by dissing Toronto Target
In Australia climate activists tried to get the Labor government to be less shit. They failed.
March 13, 1992 – Australian climate advocates try to get government to see sense… (fail, obvs).
Candidate Bush had made promises on the campaign trail. 25 years ago today Vice-President Bush, under President Cheney, broke those promises.
March 13, 2001 – Bush breaks election promise to regulate C02 emissions…
19 years ago, the unions (especially the coal-miners) were talking up “clean coal”, as was Labor leader Kevin Rudd. Happy times.
March 13, 2007 – ACTU talks up “clean coal”
Sixteen years ago, the United Nations Environment Program releases a report on the gap between the promises and what is happening/what is needed. They’re still producing these reports. The gap ain’t getting any smaller.
March 13, 2010 – first UNEP Emissions Gap report
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