Steve Jobs didn’t like Neil Young.
That much is evident from an excerpt from Becoming Steve Jobs, a highly anticipated book on the late Apple co-founder that comes out Tuesday. Jobs’ hatred for Young was so strong that he even refused a peace offering from the multi-Grammy-winner.
Neil Young has been very publicly against the MP3 and digital music market for years. The singer-songwriter’s crusade to get the music industry back to the olden days, when people cared about sound fidelity and record labels controlled an artist’s future, has altogether failed. His mission ultimately culminated with the PonoPlayer, an expensive and poorly reviewed music player for audiophiles that finally came out earlier this year.
“Steve Jobs as a pioneer of digital music, and his legacy is tremendous,” Young said in an early 2012 interview a few months after Jobs died. “But when he went home, he listened to vinyl. And you’ve got to believe that if he’d lived long enough, he would have done what I’m trying to do.”
Although Young had claimed that he Jobs were working on a high-quality iPod, Jobs apparently thought very little of Young.
In Becoming Steve Jobs, it’s revealed that Young offered Jobs a remastered vinyl set of all his albums to make amends for any negative things he had said about the iTunes business. Here’s what Jobs said when he was told over the phone about the grand gesture:
“Fuck Neil Young,” he snapped, “and fuck his records. You keep them.”
To quote a Neil Young song, “Doesn’t mean that much to me to mean that much to you.”
Alex Heath is a journalist who works for Tech Insider. He’s the former co-host of The CultCast. He has been quoted by the likes of the BBC, KRON 4 News, and books like “ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.” He lives in Lexington, Kentucky. If you want to pitch a story, share a tip, or just get in touch, additional contact information is available on his personal site. Follow him on Twitter.
28 responses to “Steve Jobs rudely snubbed Neil Young’s peace offering”
thats one thing i loved about SJ. He didnt fuck around lol
It’s one thing to be a sound purist, but playing vinyl records all the time, the sound eventually degrades to pops and scratches where they are rendered useless. Digital, when recorded correctly, sampled correctly, is virtually indestructible over time. Young has it right, Job’s had it right. But they both have the same temperament and they would never would have gotten along even though they agree on sound quality. MP3 definitely sucks as a standard, but played in a iPod, you’re not listening to Stradivarius live.
AAC audio at 256 kilobits data rate is indistinguishable from uncompressed CD audio. With the new digital mastering tools and techniques, music sounds better now than it ever has. Recent iTunes remasters are utterly incredible.
Maybe on earbuds, or a little Bluetooth speaker, but if you play it through some even reasonable quality (let alone high quality) audio equipment and speakers then the differences between low-compressed AAC and uncompressed CD (or Apple Lossless) are hugely apparent.
Another one who can see the emperor’s new clothes! The fact is that high bit rate AAC is indistinguishable from uncompressed digital audio. The mastering process is much more important. “Mastered for iTunes” tracks are superior to vinyl and CD remasters from just a few years ago, even in audiophile equipment.
You’re a perfect Pono Player customer. Have fun wasting your money on imaginary audio quality.
Talk about drinking the Kool-Aid one’s self, yeah yeah buy into Apple’s marketing yourself.
I have a Mac plugged into decent audio equipment and you can easily hear the difference between same track in Apple Lossless from a CD vs 256-bit AAC … especially if you play loud.
It’s cheaper for Apple to store 256-bit files and costs them less bandwidth to deliver — and it’s ‘good enough’ quality — that’s why they don’t offer CD quality.
You’re imagining the quality difference.
If you want to know for sure. Have someone help you do a blind test. You’ll be shocked at how much your biases influence your perceptions.
As I wrote above, on headphones or laptop or small speakers or most of the time in most cases I agree with you.
However, I don’t think it’s always the case.
I’ve had fun with blind testing before — a friend who insisted his expensive power cable makes things sound better — it’s actually almost impossible with audio to ‘remember’ what sounds better, it’s errors rather than improvements you hear if you know what to look out for. Bit like looking at JPEGs when there’s too much compression; but most people wouldn’t be able to distinguish one of those from a RAW photo unless they knew what they were looking for.
Controlled testing has shown that 256 kilobit AAC is virtually indistinguishable from CD audio.
More important by far, is proper mastering for whichever audio format is used. This is the rationale behind “Mastered for iTunes”. I defy you to choose CD audio over a Mastered for iTunes track regardless of the sound system used. I’ve done tests using fairly expensive audio gear and reference headphones, and the Mastered for iTunes tracks win hands down.
I agree with you on the quality issue on ACC lossless, but the one issue that bugs me is sound compression that studios play around with at the production end, and what this does to the finished product. It screws with volume levels and on top end audio equipment, you inevitably have to alter settings to counteract the difference, regardless of it being CD or 256kb ACC. This is where I think the other guy says he can distinguish between quality. A 20 year old vinyl master wouldn’t have the sound compression you find on CD or ACC.
This is one benefit of Mastered for iTunes: restored dynamic range.
I’ve discovered this is more dependent on the source material. A well recorded album with dynamic range (think Rumors by fleetwood mac) Sounds indistinguishable as an m4a from the uncompressed version. I’ve heard other albums in the studio using top of the line hd meyer speakers (not audiophile speakers but high end studio monitors) and you can def hear the difference if the album has little to no dynamic range and is filled with bright instruments such as metal guitar. Even then, it’s pretty subjective. Hell, one could argue that vinyl masks the imperfections of a recording. With digital, you have to come correct.
Over compressed material that is mastered too hot doesn’t respond well to data compression. Songs that have been properly mastered sound great in AAC format.
This is what the Mastered for iTunes initiative is all about.
And now he’s dead, If I was Neil I’d be laughing about that.
LOL CANCER IS HILARIOUS BRO
I believe for at least 30 years all recordings are done by digital equipment, so claiming vinyl sounds better is BS for anything that came out after 1985 or so.
Looks like Neil Young gets the last laugh. Steve Jobs died because he put his ego before his health. All the money he had couldn’t save him from himself.
Wow! What an asinine comment.
Neil Young is a fucking moron of the first order.
One of the best Job’s stories I have heard. All recording technologies have flaws. Vinyl started out at 78rpm, and during the 70’s the oil embargo made the vinyl in most records substandard as well. Indeed early MP3 was often very poorly converted, but people do it much better today.
Bottom line is also quality vs cost and access. Yes, vinyl sounds better if all our records are 1/2 speed masters and we have a $2000 Bang Olufsen Turntable with a $1000 Cartridge, McIntosh Amplifiers and Klipsch speakers. But that setup is a little hard to take jogging or in your car.
Sounds like a man devoid of any humanity.
“Audiophiles” are some of the most insufferable smug-holes on the planet. The “warmth” they claim is so indispensable is low end distortion. I grew up with vinyl and decent equipment, and took excellent care of my collection, but digital has gradually become vastly superior in every facet. This whole debate is ridiculous. Young is a great songwriter, but his preoccupation with analog sound is delusional.
Anyone commenting in this thread is a wanker sound snob. Including me.
I care a great deal about sound fidelity, and I don’t know a single person in my life that cares at all about it. Just because you have a gift, doesn’t mean the rest of the world wants it. Jobs may have not known everything, but he knew when something would fail, and that would be the PornoPlayer.
I don’t understand why people think Jobs was Gandhi. Jobs was the opposite of him.
iPOD HD, Walkman Vinyl Digital Analog – it all sounds like $hit with $10.00 earbuds from China
Steve Jobs was a genius but a verifiable a-hole & nutjob
I love that! I wish Jobs was around to confirm. Neil thinks he’s some kind of a God, because others have spent their entire lives worshipping him.
Neil Young is a great artist, and not a hypocrite like Jobs and his yacht. Jobs sold out more than any other hippie ever. He was hanging around Rupert Murdoch at the end of his life.