This was probably due to the lingering popularity of Hawaiian music after the second World War, but as far as Young's parents were concerned, playing country music was the goal for their son. He started playing guitar when he was six years old, and has recalled that guitar students in the area all started out on the lap steel guitar, advancing to the regular six-string after six months. Young was born in California in the mid-'40s and moved to Colorado soon after. The success of the band as a soft rock venture led to the formation of outfits such as Loggins & Messina and the Eagles, and he built a reputation for his wild pedal steel showmanship, which included playing through a swirling Leslie rotating speaker cabinet, coming up with unusual instruments such as the Melobar and the Mosrite electric Dobro, and hobbling on-stage with a broken leg and proceeding to play his axe with his cast. He worked and recorded with Buffalo Springfield and eventually co-founded the popular country-rock band Poco with ex- Springfield members Richie Furay and Jim Messina. It was actually something of a rootsy move, since Young's background included playing guitar in psychedelic bands such as Denver's Boenzee Cryque. Rusty Young rose to prominence in the late 1960s and '70s as one of a handful of pedal steel guitarists moving their instrument out of the country barn and into the rock garage, so to speak.
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