Neil Young hasn't dipped much into the old-time kiddie songs from this year's Americana in his latest Crazy Horse shows. Instead, he's using this tour to blow minds with intense new tunes that come on like pieces of an in-progress autobiographical song cycle. "Twisted Road" is an acoustic beauty; Young reminisces about hearing Dylan and the Dead on the radio. But "Walk Like a Giant" (also presumably from Young's next album, due this fall) is the mind-blower: an epic feedback monster, stretching to the 20-minute mark. It tackles familiar Young themes – the passing of time, the death of the hippie dream – with furious guitar noise and a whistle-along chorus. "Walk Like a Giant" is a fearsome sound: The old man takes a look at his life, and gets righteously pissed off at what he sees.

“The Pretender”

This song wasn't part of the planned track listing for 2007's Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, and was put together in a day. "It happened after we recorded a lot of stuff," said Dave Grohl. Yet it ended up as the album opener and the lead single. Grohl called it "a stomping Foo Fighters uptempo song with a little bit of Chuck Berry in it." The singer hinted at the lyrics' political overtones: "Everyone's been f---ed over before and I think a lot of people feel f---ed over right now and they're not getting what they were promised."