Neil Young and Philosophy, edited by Douglas L. Berger, explores the meanings, importance, and philosophical dimensions of the music, career, and life of this prolific singer/songwriter over the past five decades. Neil Young’s music has touched on a broad range of cultural, political and personal issues, all of which have enormous ongoing relevance for our own times. In order to accommodate Young’s artistic breadth, contributions of scholars from a wide variety of fields-- American philosophy, ethics, American Indian philosophy, feminist philosophy, psychology, philosophy of mind and religious studies--are included in this collection. They examine everything from Young’s environmentalism, invocation of American Indian themes, images of women, and interpretations of human relationships to his confrontations with the music industry, his experiments with recording technologies, his approach to social change, and his methods of creativity. The book builds on the fundamental commitment of the Philosophy and Popular Culture series to see the artist as a philosopher.

Neil Young is a singular figure in the history of rock and pop culture generally in the last four decades. Reflective, insightful and disarmingly honest, in Waging Heavy Peacehe writes about his life and career. From his youth in Canada to his first band's travels across the US seeking fame and girls, 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. In the book 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. 'I think I will have to use my time wisely and keep my thoughts straight if I am to succeed and deliver the cargo I so carefully have carried thus far to the outer reaches. Not that it's my only job or task. I have others, too. Sacred things that I need to protect from pain and hardship, like careless remarks on an open mind.' Neil Young from Waging Heavy Peace

Explores philosophical ideas in the works of Neil Gaiman, including "American Gods," "Coraline," "The Graveyard Book," and "Neverwhere."

“This book uniquely and successfully sustains a cohesive analysis of the work, career, and reception of a single artist . . . Neil Young.” —Daniel Cavicchi, author of Tramps Like Us As a writer in Wired magazine puts it, Neil Young is a “folk-country-grunge dinosaur [who has been] reborn (again) as an Internet-friendly, biodiesel-driven, multimedia machine.” In Neil Young and the Poetics of Energy, William Echard stages an encounter between Young’s challenging and ever-changing work and current theories of musical meaning—an encounter from which both emerge transformed. Echard roots his discussion in an extensive review of writings from the rock press as well as his own engagement as a fan and critical theorist. How is it that Neil Young is both a perpetual outsider and critic of rock culture, and also one of its most central icons? And what are the unique properties that have lent his work such expressive force? Echard delves into concepts of musical persona, space, and energy, and in the process illuminates the complex interplay between experience, musical sound, social actors, genres, styles, and traditions. Readers interested primarily in Neil Young, or rock music in general, will find a new way to think and talk about the subject, and readers interested primarily in musical or cultural theory will find a new way to articulate and apply some of the most exciting current perspectives on meaning, music, and subjectivity. “A fascinating and unique reading of Neil Young’s music.” —Literary Review of Canada “[An] intriguing, elegantly written analysis of Young . . . Exemplifies the fruitful union of musicology and cultural studies.” —Cotten Seiler, Dickinson College

Neil Young is one of rock and roll’s most important and enigmatic figures, a legend from the sixties who is still hugely influential today. He has never granted a writer access to his inner life – until now. Based on six years of interviews with more than three hundred of Young’s associates, and on more than fifty hours of interviews with Young himself, Shakey is a fascinating, prodigious account of the singer’s life and career. Jimmy McDonough follows Young from his childhood in Canada to his cofounding of Buffalo Springfield to the huge success of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young to his comeback in the nineties. Filled with never-before-published words directly from the artist himself, Shakey is an essential addition to the top shelf of rock biographies.

Neil Sinhababu defends the Humean Theory of Motivation, according to which desire drives all human action and practical reasoning. Desire motivates us to pursue its object, makes thoughts of its object pleasant or unpleasant, focuses attention on its object, and is amplified by vivid representations of its object. These aspects of desire explain a vast range of psychological phenomena - why motivation often accompanies moral belief, how intentions shape our planning, how we exercise willpower, what it is to be a human self, how we express our emotions in action, why we procrastinate, and what we daydream about. Some philosophers regard such phenomena as troublesome for the Humean Theory, but the properties of desire help Humeans provide simpler and better explanations of these phenomena than their opponents can. The success of the Humean Theory in explaining a wide range of folk-psychological and experimental data, including those that its opponents cite in counterexamples, suggest that it is true. And the Humean Theory has revolutionary consequences for ethics, suggesting that moral judgments are beliefs about what feelings like guilt, admiration, and hope accurately represent in objective reality.

Quirky and wonderfully candid, Neil Young's second book of reminiscences is as compelling as his first book. He returns with more unforgettable stories about his six decades in the music business - but this is not your average rock biography. He centres this work on one of his life's passions, cars, using the framework of all the cars he's ever owned to construct a narrative of his life and career, exploring and demonstrating how memories are attached to objects. Young also expresses regret for the environmental impact of his past cars, and now passionately advocates the use of clean energy. 'Special Deluxe' is a mix of memoir and environmental politics by one of the most gifted and influential artists of our time.

Not only is Radiohead the most innovative and influential rock bandit's also the most philosophically and culturally relevant. Since the 1993 breakthrough hit ""Creep,"" the band keeps on making waves, with its view of the Bush presidency (Hail to the Thief), its anti-corporatism, its ecologically conscious road tours, its videos, and its decision to sell In Rainbows online at a 'pay whatever you want' price. Composed by a team of Radiohead fans who also think for a living, Radiohead and Philosophy is packet like a crushed tin box with insights into the meaning and implications of Radiohead's work. Paranoid or not, you'll understand Radiohead better than any android. ""Can a rock band still matter? Can it be a positive force in a postmodern world? For millions, Radiohead can, and these thought-provoking essays address how and why Radiohead makes a difference by working at the margins of popular culture.""

On his death in 2007, Richard Rorty was heralded by the New York Times as one of the world's most influential contemporary thinkers. Controversial on the left and the right for his critiques of objectivity and political radicalism, Rorty experienced a renown denied to all but a handful of living philosophers. In this masterly biography, Neil...

Tracing the interactions among evangelicals, Catholics, and Mormons from the 1950s to the present day, We Gather Together recasts the story of the emergence of the Religious Right, showing that it was not a brilliant political strategy of compromise and coalition-building hatched on the eve of a history-altering election. Rather, it was the latest iteration of a much-longer religious debate that had been going on for decades. Evangelicals, Catholics, and Mormons found common cause and pursued similar ends in debates about abortion, school prayer, the Equal Rights Amendment, and tax exemptions for religious schools, but they were far from a unified bloc, cracks in the alliance shaped the movement from the very beginning. This provocative book will reshape our understanding of the most important religious and political movement of the last 30 years.