YOUNG AND STILL RESTLESS ROCK LEGEND KEEPS STIRRING THINGS UP WITH AMBITIOUS 'GREENDALE' PROJECT, INCLUDING DIRECTING A NEW MOVIE.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Film Writer

Neil Young has never exactly cared what anybody thinks. He's going to do what he's going to do, and if you like it, fine, if not ... well, he's going to do it all the same.

That kind of obstinacy has made him - along with contemporary Bob Dylan - one of rock music's most unpredictable, frustrating and essential artists. After all, Young once said of his biggest hit, ``Heart of Gold'': ``That song put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore; so I headed for a ditch. A rougher ride, but I saw more interesting people there.''

So when Young brought his longtime backing band, Crazy Horse, to the Greek Theatre last summer and started the show by playing 10 songs from a concept album called ``Greendale,'' a record that hadn't even been released yet, that was just Neil being Neil. None of his hard-core fans were surprised, although there was that guy in the fifth row who kept screaming, ``SOUTHERN MAN! SOUTHERN MAN!''

He'll just have to keep screaming. Young isn't done with ``Greendale.'' The album is a song cycle about a fictional family named the Greens, who live in a California coastal town and must deal with death, despair and invasive television news crews. The set ends on a hopeful note, though, with the teenager, Sun Green, taking an activist stand for Mother Earth, a cause long dear to Young's heart.

``Greendale'' has revitalized the 58-year-old Young and spawned something of a cottage industry. The album, in its first incarnation, came with a DVD of Young performing ``Greendale'' in a solo, acoustic setting, elaborating, between songs, on the characters and events. The stage show has Young and Crazy Horse sharing the stage with actors in a minimalist ``Our Town'' staging of the story. The actors do their thing while the band plays the music.

Now comes ``Greendale'' the movie. It's the same story and the same songs, but seen from yet another angle, with a new set of actors (mostly Young's family and friends) lip-syncing to the tracks. Young calls it a ``song you can look at.''

And, if that isn't enough, the ``Greendale'' CD has just been issued in a second edition that features a different DVD, this time showing Young and Crazy Horse recording the music with images of the ``Greendale'' film in the background.

``It's insane,'' says Larry Johnson, a longtime collaborator who produced both the album and the movie. ``We all moved to Greendale. We've lived there for the past year. When this tour ends, I'm going to get my first and last month's rent back along with my cleaning deposit.''

Guitarist Ben Keith, who first worked with Young recording his 1972 classic, ``Harvest,'' says it's just business as usual with his longtime friend.

``It's off-the-wall, but that's Neil,'' says Keith, who plays Grandpa, the Green family's elder statesman, in the film. ``It's something that no one has really done before, but that's what Neil does best.''

Here, we talk with Young, who was in Los Angeles at the Shrine Auditorium with the ``Greendale'' show Tuesday night, about the delights that come with dumbfounding people, his favorite movies and whether we'll be hearing from the Greens any time in the near future.

Q: You're back on the road with ``Greendale.'' Now that people know the songs, are you getting a different vibe from the audience?

A: It's great that people know the songs, although it was really exciting when they didn't know anything. That was fantastic. They didn't know what to expect. And the crowd would be totally dumbfounded at first and then, after about three or four songs, you could tell people were getting into it.

Q: You love to dumbfound people, don't you?

A: I like to see what you can do and give people things where they don't know what's going on. And that upsets some people. Early on when we were doing ``Greendale,'' some people were saying this is worse than ``Trans'' (Young's 1983 album that featured him singing through a vocal-effects machine). And they didn't mean that in a good way.

Q: But aren't folks used to this from you by now?

A: There's a real clash of the cultures now of what music is really about and what performing is really about and what people expect in this entertainment era. They really think you need to do certain things, like all your hits. And people have gotten so lulled into this feeling of knowing what to expect and believing that's what they're supposed to get. For me, it's just a great feeling to do something different and have it work.

Q: You seem more excited about ``Greendale'' than anything you've done in a long time.

A: I'm living what I'm doing right now. I wouldn't trade it for anything. It's such a good feeling.

Q: There aren't many other musicians your age living off what they're doing right now.

A: I just felt like I needed to re-establish what I do. If you've got a lot of hits and been around for a lot of time, you've got to overcome that. You can't just go out like you did the first time and play your songs and just rock and play whatever came to mind because they were all new and only your fans knew what was going on. It's like a huge overcoat I've had to drag around. And I'm getting rid of it now. I can't worry about it anymore.

Q: The ``Greendale'' movie is very much in sync with the music. It's not polished, but there's a real beauty at its center, a continuity to the story and a power to its message.

A: It looks like it sounds. It's got that distorted and fuzzy look, but it's got nice colors and nice movement. I don't care much about technology, but I like a good frame. Knowing the music as well as I know it gave me a huge advantage.

Q: And it gave you a foundation that you didn't have with your other movies like ``Human Highway.''

A: That was the gift. This time I had the key. The other times I was just banging on the building, trying to get through the window. ``Human Highway'' ... that was about a bunch of dorks. And the world ends. And that was the script. (Laughs)

Now I know if I do this again, if I give myself enough room to write all the songs and record them, I'll be able to make another movie. Because I cannot sit and write down dialogue that people are going to say and scenes and stories like that. For me, it has to unfold through the music.

Q: Larry Johnson says you might be revisiting the Green family in the future.

A: We may go on. I haven't decided yet. I need to get some room in front of me. There's a lot of things that people want me to do, and I've said no to everything and I'm just going to wait. I've got to get a breath of air and see what's happening.

Q: People actually think they can tell you what to do?

A: (Laughs) They suggest strongly.

Q: What about that ``Archives'' box-set project that's been in the works for, like, forever?

A: We've got the first part of that done. It's a matter of release time, it's a matter of technology changing. We figured out all the content and then the DVD-Audio thing came along and now there's just many other ways to go with it. Now we're thinking about just putting it out as a DVD set and not CDs. That's an idea. It's probably a bad idea, but you'd have the DVD-Audio sound.

Q: You say you love to shoot movies. Do you like to go to them?

A: Oh, yeah. The last one I saw I really liked was ``In This World'' (Michael Winterbottom's film about two Afghan refugees trying to escape to Great Britain). What a film! Very powerful story.

Q: What about rock movies?

A: ``The Kids Are Alright'' is my favorite. It's so real. And the Who is great.

Q: What about ``This Is Spinal Tap''?

A: That's funnier than hell. That's my life! I like ``A Mighty Wind,'' too. That's hilarious. And the dog one (``Best in Show''). Christopher Guest is a genius.

Q: Maybe you can turn the ``Greendale'' cast into your own Guest-like troupe.

A: I might. I'm just glad people are into what it's about. It's not like it's easy for me to do that with my records now. It's not like it was before. It's a whole new culture and it's not what I'm doing. I'm not a part of it, but with film, I've found I can express myself and people will actually understand what I'm trying to say. And they want to talk about that instead of what it's like to be 58 years old and rocking. You know what I mean? It's a lot of fun.

Glenn Whipp, [phone]

glenn.whipp(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

3 photos

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) YOUNG'S TOWN

Neil Young trades guitar for a camera to film his musical world of `Greendale'

(2) Neil Young, right, shoots a scene for ``Greendale'' (with Ben Keith, left, and Eric Johnson), a movie based on his song cycle about a family in a California coastal town.

(3) no caption (Neil Young)