Of all the acts that were buried under the avalanche that was Punk and New Wave, it was old rocker Neil Young that came out fighting and won. By embracing the 'new music' Young was able to bridge the generation gap that was the divide between the old hippies and the young punks.
'Rust Never Sleeps' finds Young questioning his own role as a credible musician. The DIY ethics of Punk were never far from what Young and Crazy Horse had been doing for years. Young and The Horse had embraced musical ineptitude since day one, glorying in the title of 'worst band in the world'. If you were looking for finesse, then Young and Crazy Horse were the wrong place to look. They couldn't keep time and gloried in being out of tune, but that's exactly why we loved them.
'Rust Never Sleeps' is book-ended by Young's tribute to the punk generation, opening with the acoustic My My Hey Hey (Out of The Blue) and closing with the electric Hey Hey My My (Into The Black). In the song Young says goodbye to the old "The King is gone but not forgotten" (Elvis had died in 77), "Is this the story of Johnny Rotten?" (will the new kings of rock, the punks, follow the way of Elvis?). "It is better to burn out, than it is to rust" (echoing the 'die young and leave a good looking corpse' ethos of rock n roll). The title 'Rust Never Sleeps' stems from an old commercial for a brand of rust protector and was a quote that Young picked up from the band Devo, who had played as support for Young in a series of secret gigs.
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