Waging Heavy Peace

Waging Heavy Peace is the remarkable memoir of rock icon Neil Young

Neil Young is a singular figure in the history of rock and pop culture in the last four decades, inducted not once but twice into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Reflective, insightful and disarmingly honest, Waging Heavy Peace is his long-awaited memoir. From his youth in Canada to his crazy journey out to California, through Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills & Nash, to his massively successful solo career and his re-emergence as the patron saint of grunge on to his role today as one of the last uncompromised and uncompromising survivors of rock ‘n’ roll – this is Neil’s story told in his own words.

Young presents a kaleidoscopic view of personal life and musical creativity; it’s a journey that spans the snows of Ontario to the LSD-laden boulevards of 1966 Los Angeles to the contemplative paradise of Hawaii today. Along the way he writes about the music, the victims, the girls and the drugs; about his happy family life but also about the health problems he and his children have experienced; about guitars, cars and sound systems; about Canada and California and Hawaii. Candid, witty and revealing, this book takes its place beside the classic memoirs of Bob Dylan and Keith Richards.

‘Wryly funny, deeply moving, painfully honest’ Guardian

‘He’s talking to you, not at you, unravelling himself as well, and you don’t want it to end . . . You see rock and roll history from the inside out, and in the present tense’ Independent

‘Young appears bounteous and joyful, a genuinely happy hippy . . . Unusually for a rock memoir, this one is almost completely angst-free’ Sunday Times

‘Dryly hilarious . . . poignant . . . Waging Heavy Peace shows that Young is still in full possession of that stubborn, brilliant, one-of-a-kind instrument’ Rolling Stone

‘A real treat . . . he writes openly and movingly abut the key figures in his life…you feel you know Young better for reading it’ Metro