I woke up this morning with Rock Star Bucks a Coffee Shop, by Neil Young, playing in my mind. I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since I first heard it on Steve Lamacq’s Roundtable show on 6 Music last Thursday, when I watched my son bob along happily in his high chair to the catchy chorus, ‘Monsanto, let the farmers grow.’

Neil Young sings about Monsanto bringing a lawsuit after ‘the People of Vermont voted to label food with GMOs’. He criticises both Monsanto and Starbucks for lobbying against a landmark law due to be introduced by the state next year which requires all GMO food products to be labelled.

After the song had played in my head for a couple of days, I was struck by Neil Young’s genius (once again!). It doesn’t matter whether you like the tune or not – you can’t stop humming it. If everyone listening to it keeps singing ‘Monsanto, let the farmers grow,’ more and more people will stop and think about those lines. And the humorous title is brilliant.

I listened to it again, and I watched the video and I noticed how much fun the musicians are having, tossing away Starbucks cups and fooling around. Above all, I realised how poignant the song is. The line ‘Mothers want to know, what they feed their children’ brought tears to my eyes because that is exactly how I feel. It is a tongue-in-cheek rock song but it has a deeply serious message.

So I agree with Tom Robinson, one of the judges on Radio 6 Music last week and I rate it 10/10. This is the first release from the album The Monsanto Years and I look forward to hearing the others.

On the campaign side, I’m supporting this great petition against Monsanto from Avaaz – https://secure.avaaz.org/en/monsanto_dont_silence_science_loc/?slideshow