Search and destroy: Neil Young

Destroy: the other half of DECADE.

Destroy : Time Fades Away, plus loads of records that I have no intention of buying to make sure they stink more.

Better than you'd think : Re-ac-tor, Trans.

DESTROY: A lot of his later stuff probably. "Arc Weld" sounded like a self-indulgent rockfest to me, however much John Peel adored it.

search: everyone knows this is nowhere, after the gold rush

i probably dunno enough about neil to suggest what to destroy without being crass and just saying "everything." though, hey, how about destroying that grunge thing?

Destroy: Sleeps with Angels, and most of the CSN&Y wank, except Our House of course ;)

Destroy: his 80s stuff/Harvest

Would he be better if he didn't sing like a constipated eunuch? Or is that part of the charm?

If you like Harvest, you might also want to check out Comes a Time, which is also country- and folk-flavored. Kinda gets lost because it was released in between Zuma and Rust Never Sleeps, but it's pretty good & a genuine sleeper.

I've been on a big Neil kick lately, one which will probably reach it's apex when I manage to get my grubby paws on a copy of "On the Beach", one of the only Neil albums I haven't heard (the others being "Everybody's Rockin" and "Landing on Water").

However, "After The Goldrush", "Harvest" and "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" are great. Out of his later material, "Harvest Moon" is the one sounding more like Young at his best than any of the others.
"On The Beach" is also great, but that one you will have to seek using Kazaa, as all searching for it in CD shops will be in vain.

Destroy: "Everybody's Rockin'", "This Note's For You" and the overrated "Tonight's The Night"

What's a "CD"? I've been using these flat black round things that make noise when you put a needle on them.

I'm not really a fan. But those are all good albums, I mean I don't see how he ever much improved on "Cinnamon Girl," what an ace riff. As usual, I have to roundly disagree w/Geir: CSNY is an abomination unto the Lord. Buffalo S. is good.

In which case, you may find "On The Beach" in some used store, only it will costs you for sure. :-)

Why isn't "On The Beach" available on high quality bootlegs like the stereo versions of the first Beatles albums are?

this is very not actually true. just like it seem geir likes to be. I found a CD! bootleg copy in atomic records in milwaukee and it wasn't too expensive. allyC has a proper looking [covers, disc printed on, etc.] copy from some german label.

I alternate between Tonight's the Night and On the Beach being my favourite--they are both incredible.

Rust Never Sleeps, too. Zuma in parts. Everybody Knows This is Nowhere is very good, also.

I have yet to pay enough attention to the buffalo springfield album allyC insisted I buy.

Honegro, will you please shut up. Your a parasite sucking the life out of any conversation.

the one and only best thing Neil Young has ever done

I paid $7 Canadian for mine (the dollar was worth a little more then, but not much), and that was the most I ever saw it go for. The only "proper" album I've ever bought that has artwork on the interior of the jacket.

I'd like to throw in a good word for one of the sides of Hawks & Doves (the "Folk" side, not the awful "Country" side), cuz no one else will.

destroy: harvest (exc. 'a man needs a maid') and after the goldrush (exc. actually listening to it.)

has anyone ever notcied how much wany coyne sounds like teh neil jong?

Destroy: Nothing. Though I wouldn't recommend stuff like Everybody's Rockin', Are You Passionate?, Old Ways and Long May You Run ... they stand as fascinating miscalculations.

hrm.

to know Neil is to abide his creative floundering. To love him is to know the burn. The $16.99 burn. He is all and everything else is small. There is no one greater than Neil and there probably won't ever be.

Certainly OTM regarding the last sentence.

This might've been acceptable when the guy still cared, but I think it's a bunch of bullshit now. Young hasn't made even close to a solid album in over a decade now. It's all been half-baked, half-finished and even--dare I say it?--half-hearted. This whole 'the-song-comes-to-me-and-I-write-it-down-in-five-seconds' approach has (with very few notable exceptions, say, Bandit) has led to a very barren prairie. How interesting that he's chosen fading away over...well, you know the other one.

I don't think I'd destroy any of it. Certainly "Everybody's Rockin" and "This Note's For You" you should get LAST, but you should still get 'em.

About 9 or 10 years ago I saw him play with Crazy Horse, and the first note he played blew my god damned mind to bits. It was (and remains) the hugest, warmest, and intensely all encompassing sound I have ever heard. There is no possible way I could ever explain it, and none of the many live recordings I've listened to even come close to capturing it. Additionally, I would pit the slow-motion, stretched out feedback finale notes they dropped at the end of each song against any Sunn 0)) gig in a contest of sublime amplifer worship. The shit was massive indeed, and over-joyed to hear he's still doing it. This is why the fellow remains relevant, or at least the only living purveyor of 'Neil Young's guitar sound' - which is something you must hear live, not on a live album, in your lifetime.

Search -

Buffalo Springfield - Mr. Soul, Expecting to Fly, Broken Arrow, Nowadays Clancy...
Neil Young - The Loner, Emporer Of Wyoming, The Old Laughing Lady
- every beautiful note of-
Everybody Knows This is Nowhere
After the Goldrush
Harvest
Tonight's the Night
On the Beach
Rust Never Sleeps (although I'm not as into this one as everyone else in the world)

Once you're in deep I'd recommend appreciating some of his weirder shit -

Trans - where Neil Young combines his own bad self, some synths he had his roadies steal from Rush, and Bruce Haack's futuristic prairie soul into an unparrelled mess of weird and wonderful.
Freedom - his most linear 'story telling' with some harsh 80's bad vibes.

and the song 'Touch the Night' from Landing on Water.

Once you've read Shakey you can appreciate '...and the Shocking Pinks'

On Film - Rust Never Sleeps 'A Concert Fantasy'

Destroy -

Most of his shit in the last 15 or so years. It's really 'law of diminishing returns' at this point, but if you really dig there's a few quality songs.

i don't particularly care for harvest moon or zuma. even some of harvest is worthless.

Yes. I'm The Ocean is the best Neil Young song in probably 20 years. It's a towering achievement and should be searched. Also search Fallen Angel from the same record, which is I'm The Ocean's coda.

Other great, somewhat obscure Neil songs: Big Time and Music Arcade from Broken Arrow.

Don't Be Denied & Last Dance from Time Fades Away

also Yonder Stands the Sinner!!!

I heard a live version of "Hello Cowgirl in the Sand" yesterday when I was shopping in an Italian gourmet food store, and I thought: this is really a depressing song, and no wonder I don't listen to Neil Young more, as good as he is. And I thought they really shouldn't be playing that song. I was tired and my allergies were bothering me, which was making me extremely emotionally hyper-sensitive. Let's all think about loss and disappointment and raw pain while we are trying to find something nice to carry home and eat.

I need someone to defend Landing on Water.

I've heard a total of 5 Neil Young records, over and over: Everyone knows this is nowhere, After the Goldrush, Harvest, On the Beach, Zuma, and Trans.

Out of those, I would say Harvest and On the Beach are mindblowingly good. Zuma I've only had for a few weeks, but I love. I've listened to Cortez the Killer over and over, never gets old. Tonight's the Night, I feel it overrated, at least at this point of my life. Maybe I haven't been shitfaced enough. It seems like a record that's more interesting if you know the backstory of the artist.

hmmm 'tonight's the night' is one headfuck of a phenomenon. somehow just so consistently good, despite the lurking threat that the whole thing's about to collapse any second under the weight of its own shaky, volatile foundations. sloppy, flippant at times, and infinitely better for it. then again, maybe it's just a fantastic set of songs, regardless of the delivery, level of tangible emotion, and drunkenness of it all!

and i'm sorry, what the hell is 'a man needs a maid' about? sure it alludes to loneliness, but where does the maid thing factor in?

Neil Young does a shitty job of keeping his house clean.

Is 'Man Needs a Maid' ridiculous?

Live at Massey Hall is what you want. Relaxed, in great form, playing the best songs he ever wrote.

hahah ilm. a thread for every purpose! cheers, stormy

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/primrosehill/lolsobadatyoutube.jpg

they love music

I think Stars & Bars gets a bad rap. there's some crapola (like all of Neil's records) but on balance I would def say 'search'

dumbfucks! AMERICA did "No Rain."

anybody who has the reservoir dogs soundtrack knows that.

Can anyone recommend a couple of artists that made/makes music that sounds similar to Cowgirl in the sand, Down by the River and Like a Hurricane?

Also, were there artists that before Neil Young made that kind of duelling guitar thing that's going in these songs? A few years back I thought Television were the first ones to do that!

...

duelling guitar solos wasn't really common pre-late 60s

You should check out Captain Beefheart's Mirror Man LP.

Search mainly what he did up to and including "Harvest". Destroy his 80s output in particular, but also some of the stuff from 1995 onwards.

Can anyone recommend a couple of artists that made/makes music that sounds similar to Cowgirl in the sand, Down by the River and Like a Hurricane?

search: arboretum, black mountain, stephen malkmus, sun kil moon, songs:ohia, uncle tupelo

Don't destroy re-act-or, coz it's the crankinest, and don't destroy Trans, if you are at all interested in music that sounds like nothing else you've ever heard. Don't destroy Living With War.

Do destroy Broken Arrow, do destroy Chrome Dreams II. Destroy Landing On Water

x-post

The first Help Yourself LP

Can anyone recommend a couple of artists that made/makes music that sounds similar to Cowgirl in the sand, Down by the River and Like a Hurricane?

The entire alt.country scene to thread then.

uh, thin lizzy?
or like, the grateful dead?

The Dead didn't really have a duelling lead guitar thing like Whitten and Young. Garcia handled the vast majority of the leads, if not all of them.

Lizzy's a great call, especially the Gorham/Robertson duo. God were those guys good.

The entire alt.country scene to thread then.

eh, not really.

Duane and Dicky

some early floyd, too, like "fat old sun" off atom heart mother. at the end dave could pass for neil

oh, and dueling guitars -- one of the best early dual solos is at the end of "starship trooper"

Plus, any live recordings featuring both Stills and Young. In fact, after the Whitten/Young tandem, that's what I would search out. They were really awesome together.

UNDER-APPRECIATED:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/30/Neil_Young_%28album%29.jpg

On The Beach deserves all the praise it gets. Young practically hemorrhages emotion on some of these songs, especially See The Sky About To Rain, which also has one of the loveliest, druggy-sounding, West Coast-ish melodies you'll hear.

you're preaching to the choir friend.

i'm gonna listen to 'rust never sleeps' after this awesome faces album is done. the 'dead man' soundtrack is some of the best guitar work young has done for my money. i still haven't heard 'trans,' but i'd like to. 'chrome dreams II' was pretty great. i'm also in complete love with two bootlegs, 'lonely weekend' and 'chrome dreams' (thx ian and leo thread).

so many good songs on rust never sleeps. where the eagle glides ascending there's an ancient river bending

yes!! i was ehh about the lyrics until it occurred to me that i was the problem. 12-string never sounded so good.

and fuck me but as heavy and head-caving as the last half is, i still dig the first half more

total 4th music too, this is about as patriotic as i get

'ride my llama' and 'pocohantas' are the shit.

I need someone to defend Landing on Water.

-- Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Sunday, 1 July 2007 01:32 (1 year ago)

There are some great songs on this LP. "pressure",
"I gotta problem"

well they say that santa fe is less than 90 miles (per gallon) away. . . .
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/neil-young/perfect-storm-for-innovat_b_155148.html

<quote>This board continually surprises me (guess that's why I'm here.) I was worried Elvis would get a right old slagging, but no, on the whole all v. respectful, whereas I thought pretty much everybody liked at least one alb by N. Young and would be rushing in to sing his praises, esp. as his vocal style has inspired loads of other whining indie boys (Mascis, Malkmus, Mercury Rev, etc.) But how wrong I was! Anyway, James, if you like 'Harvest' you'll probably dig the following just as much: Search: 'On the Beach', 'Tonight's the Night', 'Zuma', 'After the Gold Rush', 'Rust Never Sleeps', 'Decade' (one of the best 'Greatest Hits' sets ever released, imho.) Destroy: Anything with a 'tribute' to K. Cobain on it; CSNY.</quote>

Never underestimate the contrarian impulse of the modern lamebrain hipster...

This Fork in the Road sounds like it might be okay:

http://www.myspace.com/neilyoung

THIS is freaking great. especially because i knew so little of the 'story': http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00f815m/Neil_Young_Dont_Be_Denied/

you basically don't want to listen to early ilm on this thread imo, everything is worth something up to the early '80s i think. there are some more dud than classic albums in there but they're still worth hearing. so yeah, search buffalo springfield, csny, all the solo shit up to and including trans.

i know this doesn't really make sense, but i wouldn't destroy anything that neil's done, i would only search it...like for some reason with him more than anyone else i think the bad albums make who he is for me as much as the great ones.....(or almost so)

like "t-bone" off re-ac-tor must be the laziest dumbest song ever "written" but i'm glad it exists.

you know what I would destroy? "Homegrown." Not the proposed album or bootleg, the song. And I say this loving both "T-Bone" and Landing On Water. Fuck "Homegrown."

Since "star of bethelem" and "hurricane" are on decade I'd say destroy American Stars'n'Bars entirely if it wasn't for the seven minute song about being a fish. Gotta search that.

"homegrown" brings up some good points about pot

I rocked out to Year of the Horse yesterday for the first time since I bought it, and LOVED it (even, maybe especially, the Broken Arrow songs). I'm as into Neil now as I've been since high school, probably. So yeah, search it all---though maybe I'll change my mind when I put on Are You Passionate? a little later today.

maybe to be a little more precise: search the performance of "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" on the Dylan 30th anniversary show.

"like "t-bone" off re-ac-tor must be the laziest dumbest song ever "written" but i'm glad it exists"

I LOVE T-Bone (and Homegrown too!)

T-Bone is great! It's so dumb it's genius.

Harvest is not a big favourite of mine. It has one great song (Out On The Weekend), a few nice ones, but also some dull ones, like Heart of Gold and Words, and some out and out stinkers (Man Needs A Maid). Harvest Moon is better. The title track is one of Neil's sweetest, most touching songs, and Dreaming Man is a sweet sigh.

Search (top rank) Everybody Knows, Tonight's The Night, On The Beach, Zuma, Rust Never Sleeps
Also great: Ragged Glory, Time Fades Away, Goldrush, Sleeps With Angels, Trans!

Disappointed to see so much hate for Sleeps With Angels. It's one of his boldest records, with all that spooky stuff like Safeway Cart (there's nothing else like this in his ouvre), some heavy (emotionally as well as in terms of density) sludge, the beautiful tack piano ballads, and weird songs like the title track. He pushes Crazy Horse to be subtle throughout much of this album, resulting in some slightly clumsy, and all the more effective and characterful, arrangements and moods. Best out of tune flute solo ever from Neil on Change Your Mind. I think it's a brilliant album.
Year Of The Horse live album deserves more love. It's sludgy as hell, but if you're a fan of The Melvins or Harvey Milk then that's a positive. The version of Danger Bird is so heavy on here, the lumbering chord changes verge on doom metal territory. Some incredible leads from Neil too. Also, a couple of slightly underwhelming songs from Broken Arrow are gloriously realised.

Sorry, flute solo is on Proof Of Life. Both great songs, with the Horse playing almost jazzy chords, like a grizzly bear trying to do melancholy.

For what's worth, I totally love Sleeps With Angels too: it may be flawed, but most of it has the harrowing tone of some of his best stuff.
Safeway Cart and Trans Am are top notch depressed Neil and I also quite like the eerie blues of Blue Eden.

The BBC doc. was pretty interesting, thanks for the link.

Since "star of bethelem" and "hurricane" are on decade I'd say destroy American Stars'n'Bars entirely if it wasn't for the seven minute song about being a fish. Gotta search that.

'will to love' is killer though.

I dunno if you read my post as being sarcastic or if you don't realize "will to love" is the seven minute song about being a fish, but that's exactly what I said.

i did not realise it was about a fish!

Are You Passionate? is pretty great! I'm not sure I'd listened all the way through before, but I really dig the kinda spare groove throughout, almost Aja-like; and there's a nice separation of instruments, very clear sounding. I'm not sure if it's Neil on guitar on "She's a Healer", but the tone is really distinctive for a Neil album. And it starts very strongly: "Mr. Disappointment" and "Differently" are highlights, I think. I thought it let up a little on the second half, but probably I'll hear more goodness there as I listen more.

Anyway, this is a good reason for me not to get caught up in hype or backlash of new albums from old artists that I like, and just to wait a few years when I can hear it clearly. I remember the reviews being harsh for this one, but in 2009 that doesn't matter at all.

Will To Love is one of Neil's best songs of the 70s, and yeah, it is about being a fish, among other things:
And now my fins are in the air
And my belly's scraping on the rocks
I still think someone really cares
And I'll keep swimming till I stop.
I'm with M@tt in that I wouldn't destroy a thing, even the crap! Still haven't spent a lot of time with the newest one, though. Too busy with the Archives!
But I'd agree that Are You Passionate is a bit underrated -- I think it got attention for the weird 9/11 song, but the rest of the album isn't really like that, it's more of a slow-burning soul album, or at least Neil's version of a slow-burning soul album. I think at some point I need to go back and give all the 00s albums a good listen ...

Tyler, I just listened to your Bad News I mp3 comp from your blog; I think I need to give the 80s albums a good listen again b/c those are great songs. "Interstate", "Boxcar", the early "Eldorado". I hope he makes it long enough to compile the archives for that era.

guitar playing below par

LOLs from 2001

Cool, Euler, glad you're enjoying that comp -- I think it just shows that Neil was pretty confused during that era, but still capable of incredible music.

i'd avoided the Hawks & Doves album until someone sent me "Lost In Space" last week. Fucking great. There's actually a lot of worthwhile material on the album too.

I just recently picked up Harvest Moon, which is the first Neil thing I've owned post-Live Rust. So I pretty much have skipped the 1980s. And I really like it a lot - more than Stars n' Bars or Comes a Time, both of which I enjoy quite a bit.

hawks and doves is amazing, especially the 1st side -- even though the 2nd side has a cantankerous charm, too ...

listened to the new live release today, all the songs from harvest moon, and it sounds pretty great, better than you would think he would sound in the 90s.

Yeah, Dreamin' Man Live has me appreciating some of the lesser Harvest Moon songs, and everything sounds great stripped down and solo.

Plus he gets big points from me for changing up the sequencing. Makes it a new experience.

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Damn, I screwed that up big time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2WfUzNYPwo

homegrown's alright with me

I don't pay much attention to Fallon, so maybe thats a recurring thing for him, but I found it interesting to see him do a parody as early 70s Neil. I mean, does the average Fallon watcher even know who Neil is?

My guess is yes.

Ah, I must have a fairly skewed image of his audience.

I don't know, most of what I have watched of the Fallon show consists of aging rockers (like Christopher Cross) performing live on his show. His Neil impression is the best one I've ever see him do, so, can't hurt to trot it out in front of a young audience, imo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvAZjefHoiQ

Stringman is such a great song. weird that its only official appearance is on that Unplugged CD.

love love love that Unplugged disk though...the "Transformer Man" is so great.

yeah! I just got it recently after having lost my copy years ago. kinda annoyed it doesn't include the other Trans track he did for the taping, or Dreaming Man

what was the other trans track he did? love unplugged -- thought it was weird that the Shakey autor thinks it's horrible. Only thing that's not terribly exciting are the too-close-to-the-album Harvest Moon songs.

Sample and Hold

no kidding! are there bootlegs of it?

thought it was weird that the Shakey autor thinks it's horrible

and yeah I thought this was inexplicable too but put it down to Neil himself hating it. which is also kinda inexplicable but lolz temperamental artists...

the pump organ Like a Hurricane is another standout for me

he should play trans songs live again -- "computer age" and "sample and hold" live w/ Crazy Horse were pretty awesome

agree mostly about the Harvest Moon stuff but I did love that he had some backup guy actually SWEEPING WITH A BROOM for the title track

xp

ha, i forgot about that -- is unplugged on DVD?

I don't think so - feel kinda lucky I caught it when it aired tbh. VHS copies probably out there somewhere tho lolz

yeah ... i have Weld on VHS, haha. No VCR to play it on anymore ... Actually come to think of it, in Shakey, they talk about how the *laserdisc* of Weld has different David Briggs mixes of the songs ... Anybody ever found audio of that?

Yeah I'm normally not so keen on "Hurricane" but the Unplugged version is great.

Tyler - check your mail.

An oddball "search" (also hated by Neil & Jimmy MD): The 45 mix of "Cinnamon Girl". I got ahold of a copy (b/w "Sugar Mountain") over the weekend and had a listen last night. It has a different mix on the vocal, w/Danny Whitten given prominence over Neil. Sounds kinda fresh and cool--almost makes up for the the solo guitar at the end getting chopped off. Would have been a neat bonus on the Archives box.

I was just thumbing through my copy of Shakey and now I'm kinda curious to hear exactly what makes Landing on Water so bad (given that I pretty much never agree with any of the opinions of Young's material expressed in the book)

"Hippie Dream" off Landing on Water is great, the rest not so good

it's a weird record -- not a lost classic or anything, but worth hearing at least once.
Did everybody hear Neil is touring with Bert Jansch this summer!? Whoa.

wtf?!

yeah! http://bit.ly/bdoSud
also, here's a link to that batshit Hal Wilner tribute from last month: http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=436

haven't heard Landing on... in years, but i seem to recall "Pressure" was pretty great

OMG: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSamboTHc7U

Kaneoism is this a real record?

Haha. Kind of my reaction.

So I've been reading through Shakey (great bio, as others have said), which re-piqued my interest in the never-released Homegrown songs. Writing about the songs of this period, McDonough says "It is hard to be enthusiastic enough about this period of Young's work. The wordplay is magnificent, his singing never more impassioned. In terms of record-making, Young was at the top of his game. Pain, it seems, brought out the best in him."

But while Chrome Dreams is widely available, I haven't seen Homegrown. I'm not asking for a link or anything, I'm just wondering - is it out there? I haven't been able to find it, so far. I realize that some of the songs on Homegrown were released later (on Decade, Hawks and Doves, American Stars 'n Bars) But what about the other songs? Are they out there somewhere?

no, as far as I know, there's a ton of stuff from that period (a lot of which is mentioned in Shakey) that's never made it out on to bootleg. he's played a fair amount of the unreleased stuff live, you could probably patch together a version of it from live stuff.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/30/Homegrown.jpg
Pretty useful wiki page here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homegrown_(Neil_Young_album)

Give Me Strength is amazing, one of my fave Neil Young songs
"Give Me Strength" - "on December 16, Young recorded "Give Me Strength." The lyrics catch him struggling to make the final break from Snodgress. It features a bittersweet chorus: "The happier you fly, the sadder you crawl/The laughter in your eye is never all." Untrained singer Ellen Talbot sang along on harmony, providing a crazy edge more than suitable for one of the last Snodgress songs. The sound is almost mystical. Guitar and harmonica, plus luminous overdubs of a tinkling piano and a finger tapping a paper cup, add glimmers of color that come and go. An impressionistic sound, precisely constructed without losing any of its spontaneous feel."

I think I may have responded to this back in the day w/ another screen name, but what the heck.

Search: Everybody Knows this is Nowhere, Rust Never Sleeps, Sleeps w/ Angels, Tonight's the Night, Zuma, On the Beach, American Stars & Bars, Live Rust, Ragged Glory, Mirror Ball, Broken Arrow [I think that's the name...]

Destroy: Trans, Living with War

Just heard "On the Beach" for the first time last week, after about a week of tour, on a hot summer night driving through Virginia. I found it in a thrift store on cassette, a needledrop backed with "Re*ac*tor" which also blew my mind. Damn damn damn amazing. "Ambulance Blues" and "Motion Pictures" are sooooooo beautiful.

I think the turntable it was dubbed from runs slow, because I listened to it on youtube and it sounds a little faster. The slow tape burn really fits that last half of "On the Beach" though....

The second side of "Reactor" is really great. The guitar noise on "Shots" is just killer!

Also that one-note solo in "Motor City" (I think). And the cool stuttering in "Rapid Transit".

This looks like a case of NEIL YOUNG FEVER!

On the Beach kinda kicked off an obsession a few years ago with me. I eventually worked my way through most of his stuff, and there's a tonyo love, but I think On the Beach will always be my favorite.

Re: the speed of the turntable, here's some information on this issue (copied from this site)

And we can finally settle another issue that has been dogging collectors of this album on vinyl: This is bad news for UK and some German/EU fans of the vinyl - ALL UK copies regardless of vintage were mastered using a faulty cutting tape that played at the WRONG speed. The resulting LP played too fast. It really makes a difference to the sound of the songs so I suggest all UK pressing owners frame the damn thing and put it on the wall and listen to the CD. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
This also applies to later EU and German pressings that carry the 'strawberry' mastering stamp. Original 1st press copies from Germany are OK as are most other nationality pressings to my knowledge - but if it says K54014 or 'Strawberry' in the dead wax run-out area, it plays incorrect. ALL UK pressings are affected.
All US copies are OK.

I found a vinyl copy about a year or two before the cd-reissue was released and upon getting the cd I noticed the speed difference right away, checked the runout wax and yep, there was a "K54014". I quite like the slightly faster "Walk On" though...

The second side of "Reactor" is really great

1st side has "Opera Star" and "T-Bone", so it's none too shabby

from some kind of new jonathan demme doc?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtM87hxp2FM&feature=player_embedded

goof whitney?

This marks the second time solo Neil has maintained more or less the exact same setlist night to night just for (I assume) the sake of a Demme film. Did this one ever get released?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpltKhz8fVM&feature=player_embedded

i guess not? i haven't seen it. would watch.

um, i saw it.

it's awesome.

yeah it looks good -- that tour was really strong, excellent band.

way better than Heart of Gold imo but i'd rather see bitter rocking neil anyway. it's on netflix i think.

is it? i thought i hadn't come out on dvd.
netflix sez
Availability: DVD availability date unknown
also sez
This movie is: Gritty

ok i'm an idiot. it played here for about a week last year. that was when i saw it. guess it hasn't been released after that. i looked on netflix for like 2 seconds and i don't even have it (netflix), lol.

it is kind of gritty tbh!

I just scored a copy of Stills-Young cheap. Any thoughts on this least lamented of Neil's oop '70s work?

"Ocean Girl" is one of my 10 favourite Neil songs--love it as much as almost anything. For me, the rest of his half is tepid--the title song's somewhat better than that, but still pretty ordinary, I think.

yeah "ocean girl" is good. i like midnight on the bay. prefer long may you run on bootlegs / live albums.
stills' songs are pretty bad.

that's funny, i just bought stills-young the other day as well. still haven't had time to listen to it, but it was only a few bucks. looking forward to hearing "ocean rain", though...i assumed that only "long may you run" was any good!

"ocean girl", sorry. been listening to way too much echo recently

Two guys within a matter of days--Stills is on the phone to Neil as we speak. "Ocean Girl" always felt like a Zuma song to me; don't know if it was ever slated for that originally. I wonder if Neil has enough girl songs for a compilation: "Ocean Girl," "Cinnamon Girl," "Country Girl," "Stupid Girl"...

ok, "make love to you" may be the single worst song that I've ever heard

Stills brings the goods always

Actually enjoyed this a bit. I bet Warners wished at the time Neil could have delivered an album full of the the material he put out here--perhaps the closest he came to mellow El Lay studio rock. "Let It Shine" sounds like a Zuma outtake with industrial polish applied.

As for the Stills stuff, umm, at least they aren't as bad as that singles bar song song from CSN the next year, with the lines about "she's looking at your crotch". Really didn't need to know about Stills' late-70s sex life. Musically, the last song ("Guardian Angel") remended me alot of Steely Dan.

The Neil stuff makes for a nice EP. I wonder what if any of this material will make the cut for Archives II: Ditch Boogaloo. Meanwhile, I need to dig up my copies of the tour boots i got from Tyler's blog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gHR6lDM75Y

yes it's gonna take all night

"...to get my flabby coke dick semi-erect."

hee hee.
kind of coming around on A Treasure -- a fun listen for sure. The real "treasures" are "Southern Pacific" and "Grey Riders". Excellent band sound, great guitar from Neil. I also think the Toyota song is worth a chuckle or two -- second verse begins with the lines "Another thing that's buggin' me!" Haha. Old Man Neil writes a letter to the editor.

I wonder if Neil has enough girl songs for a compilation: "Ocean Girl," "Cinnamon Girl," "Country Girl," "Stupid Girl"...

Do Inca/Aztec songs on the side 2

I wonder if Neil has enough girl songs for a compilation: "Ocean Girl," "Cinnamon Girl," "Country Girl," "Stupid Girl"...

Do Inca/Aztec songs on the side 2

that makes a lot of sense actually

I have that Stills/Young album on vinyl and let me just say it's one of the few times when I wish I had it digitally instead, Still's songs are so execrable

it's like him and Neil's songs are from different planets

yeah, one dude hitting career peaks (maybe not w/ the songs here, but just in general) and the other bottoming out. though i guess stills had plenty more bottoming out to do.

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l7b58sBvr11qzsoufo1_250.jpg

OH MY GOD

is that stills?!

$100 if anyone can find a live video of modern day stills performing "Make Love To You"

yes that is steven stills

http://img2.timeinc.net/ew/dynamic/imgs/100929/hr-pufnstuf_320.jpg

he kinda makes me think of an aged sasquatch

http://scaryredhair.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/harry-of-the-hendersons_2.jpg

I can't think of a single Stills song that's better than okay.

yikes that "make love to you" song is awful

"Black Coral" has a good Stills piano part but, wow, I have no idea what he's trying to do with his vocal melody -- or if he's got one!

I can't think of a single Stills song that's better than okay.

^^^

Nash has the Hollies stuff, Crosby has the Byrds + "If I Could Only Remember My Name", Neil's obviously got tons of great songs... Stills has nothing

i like about half of manassas a lot

stills has a decent run going from springfield/csny/manassas.
he's got this too, which is pretty sweet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWkMMXgQohc

that's a cover!

as I'm sure you know

I've never heard the Manassas record

Appropriately, it's named after one of the bloodiest of Civil War battles.

xp yeah it's a cover, but it shows off how good a guitarist he could be.

poor steven stills looks like this lil fella in a hawaiian shirt

http://www.internationalhero.co.uk/c/caveman.jpg

I can't think of a single Stills song that's better than okay.

Not sure if this means just solo, but if not, to me there are a bunch of great ones (some I already named on a Buffalo Springfield thread): "Go and Say Goodbye," "Hung Upside Down," "Rock & Roll Woman," "Four Days Gone," "Special Care," "Uno Mundo," "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes," "Everybody I Love You" (the last was co-written with Neil; everything else was his alone). I think he was a really talented guy who a) is easy to knock today because he wasn't Neil, and because he got sillier and sillier as he got older, and b) seemed to have gotten a little messed up because he also realized he wasn't as good as Neil.

i'm a Stills hater for the most part, but dudes, "FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH"

A fair assessment. I don't know the BS stuff as well as I should.

He also auditioned for the Monkees, so he gets many bonus story-telling points. Sorry--can't believe I forgot "For What It's Worth."

Listened to After The Goldrush again today. It ruled.

Also heard a live solo version of "Ohio" w/o those nails on chalkboard CSN harmonies and it was such an improvement.

I can listen to "For What It's Worth" thanks to (a) The Muppets (b) Public Enemy's interpolation

I just did some online reading about Stills' Monkees audition and had a major misconception corrected (I think--it's the internet). I was always under the impression that he was turned away--you'd even often read that they said no because he actually knew how to play music. I found two different sources, though, that said he in fact landed one of the four parts and had to drop out because of another record contract he'd already signed.

Stills and Dewey Martin actually played on some Tork/Monkees sessions in '67-'68.

Stills and Dewey Martin actually played on some Tork/Monkees sessions in '67-'68.

Stills and Dewey Martin actually played on some Tork/Monkees sessions in '67-'68.

Didn't mean for "because he actually knew how to play music" to come across as sarcasm. I love the Monkees.

[x-post]Wow, sorry for the triple post. :-O

Stills basically didn't realise that being an amazing guitarist didn't mean he also had to try to be a songwriter

tbh I don't really dig For What It's Worth all that much. it's so over-exposed I can't really find a way into enjoying it.

Stop Shakey what's that sound

the melodious keening of sasquatch

it's so over-exposed I can't really find a way into enjoying it.

if you weren't vice-prez of the Forrest Gump fanclub you probably wouldn't have to hear it so much

Agree that "For What It's Worth" is badly overexposed--it, "Purple Haze," and "Somebody to Love" (or "White Rabbit") are the default songs for any footage involving Vietnam or hippies or LBJ. I wish somebody would have the imagination to use something like "Trouble Every Day" or "Omaha" instead.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1m0yCM5uhQU

My introduction!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWTqj5lvkFs

I feel like I oughta know, but who's the host?

the guitar bit on that 2nd track sounds like a direct rip of Jumpin Jack Flash. what's the chronology?

"Mr. Soul" predates "Jumpin' Jack Flash" by over a year.

Also, it's weird how certain aspects -- the lead vocals, part of Neil's solo -- are live, and the rest is canned. And I've never heard that little backwards-guitar bit before.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnH--RjdmTc

always loved this song - his version is fine enough, but the isleys (and aretha, for that matter) made it fly.

The Seger version is pretty nice too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-Wp-MhcZ6g

I thought Mr. Soul was an obvious rip of Satisfaction, not Jumpin Jack Flash...?

yeah, i think stills didn't want to do that song because the riff was so similar to satisfaction. the riff is definitely derived from it, but once the song gets going i pretty much forget about it.

I like a lot Stills' songs for Buffalo Springfield, it's his voice I don't like

I'll rep for this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbXKEjIApac

Rock and Roll Woman

love loads of stills' buffalo stuff... 'hot dusty roads' is great.

here's a comp i made of (mostly) lost songs from 1973-1980. mainly avoiding chrome dreams stuff. http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/11101846032/sad-movies-a-secret-history-of-neil-young
some incredible songs/performances. crazy that it's just scratching the surface of unreleased material from that period. bring on archives II!!!!

ooh!

yr a prince

Thanks!

thanks tyler! i added your blog to my reader at some point but then i stopped checking it, so i am always glad when you repost stuff.

cool. there's some key stuff on this comp, some of it more readily available than others, but all in all it's pretty solid. even all the CSNY 74 songs are great. at that point he could write a total throwaway like "hawaiian sunrise" and it would still turn out amazing.

man, I love "Heavy Love" and "Cocaine Eyes."

had no idea White Line was such an old song!

yeah, so many of those ragged glory tunes are old. here's the crazy horse version of white line from 75 or 76
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aaoi1_P8qY8

holy shit this is awesome tyler

basically at this point, i want neil to release a 10-disc archives for every year from 1973-1978. he could totally do it.

I think YOU should do it

i would if i had access to the tapes! who can give me access?!

Thanks for posting this! Can't wait to dig in.

crazy that it's just scratching the surface of unreleased material from that period. bring on archives II!!!!

I share your optimism, but we all know Neil well enough to know that "Archives II" ≠ "unreleased material."

hee hee, well, yeah, but this next volume really is going to have to include a lot of unreleased stuff. unless neil just hates us all.

i would if i had access to the tapes! who can give me access?!

heh... Neil moved his operation out of the studio my buddy was working at. to a studio around the corner from my house lol.

oh man this Home on the Range version

Do you think acts like Neil, Prince and the prolific like have it in their wills or whatever just what to do with what's in their vaults after they die?

I'd bet yes with those particular examples

Prince especially, since he doesn't have any children

i mean, prince will definitely be buried with his master tapes.
don't know about neil, i'm sure there's a fairly elaborate plan for all of that.

Stevie Wonder has a clause in his contract that all unreleased material is to be destroyed when he dies.

(all of his unreleased material, that is)

for real? crazy.

A ton of Young's albums on his MySpace. Not every track on each album, but most are complete (I think). 125 tracks from Archives, 35 from Decades, and a lot of original albums, so some duplication, but not too much (plus studio vs live presentations of Greendale etc)

okay that news about stevie is pretty depressing

little (or big, i guess) addendum to that comp of unreleased tunes i made: http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=919
Road Of Plenty: The Unreleased Songs (1966-2010 & Live Rarities 1969-1984) [The Godfather Box, 6CD]
one or two things that i missed for my 70s comp -- "homefires" and "lady wingshot", though i think the recording quality on both is pretty dire. also some tunes that were written in the 70s but not performed until much later. "try" is particularly good, i think that's an outtake from "homegrown". they seem to have left out "pushed it over the end" which is a major miss!

http://neilyoungnews.thrasherswheat.org/2012/01/massive-news-new-crazy-horseneil-young.html

I tried and tried to like him...never really clicked until I got Tonight's The Night. Still haven't found On The Beach on vinyl...

http://devonrecordclub.wordpress.com/2012/10/24/neil-young-tonights-the-night-round-38-toms-selection/

A great, great record in my opinion.

Waging Heavy Peace vs. Shakey vs. Harvest 33 1/3. Which do I read? Both? None (spend the money at the Jamba Juice instead)?

shakey

Shakey

sufjan didn't you say you live in santa barbara? why would you go to jamba juice

Shakey!

shakey

neil does get in a dig against mcdonough in waging heavy peace -- something like "never hire some sweaty hack to write a book about you, he'll ask you questions for years and years."

Shakey is the perfect bathroom book.

neil does get in a dig against mcdonough in waging heavy peace -- something like "never hire some sweaty hack to write a book about you, he'll ask you questions for years and years."

― tylerw, Wednesday, October 24, 2012 4:39 PM (19 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

tbh though even though mcdonough wrote the book, towards the mid-90s you get the vibe that he'd sort of become obsessed w/neil and was probably a borderline stalker

I hate the nineties too but McDo's conservativeness makes him surly.

the recent paul nelson bio/anthology talks about how he was hired to do a neil bio in the early 80s, but he couldn't deliver for various reasons. neil may have dodged a bullet -- if anything, Nelson was even more obsessive than mcdonough.

I guess Neil has his reasons, but tbh Shakey probably did more to keep his legend alive in the 2000s than any of his new albums could achieve.

it certainly works as an extended advertisement for the archives series.

Thanks, will go with Shakey first. iatee, I've never had a jamba juice. I just said jamba juice b/c we have one by the bookstore on campus. If I wanted a smoothie, I would go to Blenders In the Grass. My money is more likely to go to the Warbler, Salzer's, or Amoeba though honestly.

you should never have a jamba juice ftr but yeah blenders rules is all I was trying to say

i think shakey is pretty fantastic up through the early 80s

i kind of hope that someday there'll be a complete transcript of all those mcdonough/neil interviews that are interspersed throughout the book. pretty hilarious stuff.

There's link on one of the other Neil threads to an interview w/McDonough wherein he mentions a scrapped plan to put out a different edit of the book every couple years--a Springfield version, CSNY, Crazy Horse, TransBand etc.

Shakey is the perfect bathroom book.

Shakey is the perfect rock biog.

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/923245_10151409797990878_1615056798_n.jpg

Neil made a record @ Jack White's...will be released on Archives V, due in 3045.

So you put $0.35 in and animatronic Neil Young comes out of the booth and hands you a fortune from inside his guitar?

lmao, that was my precise thought LL

imagine a neil young instrumental record - just a single pair of bongos

My mate called me up and offered me his spare ticket to go see Young in two weeks' time. I jumped at the chance and decided to revisit his work.

Neil's early run is pretty much unimpeachable; Everybody Knows This is Nowhere is, on most days, my favourite album by him, but everything up to Rust Never Sleeps is at best classic, at worst still worth investing your time and money.

I first listened to Harvest when I picked it up from the local HMV in the last week of my first year of uni. The album's mood reflected how I was feeling, not having had the greatest of times so far. It still surprises me that Harvest was the best selling album of 1972 in America; it's a pretty down set of songs, even if the music masks it somewhat.

I think his early 90s albums aren't really given the consideration they deserve; Ragged Glory and Harvest Moon are v. good at least (not listened to many of the others, but recommendations are always appreciated).

really loved Sleeps With Angels and think his Pearl Jam collabs have a lot of charm too

just ordered shakey based on the posts above. i only really dabble with rock i suppose, but in recent years i've got hugely into neil young.

you'll love it, ronan. it's just... wonderful. endlessly readable, and you feel it's getting you closer to neil, even as shakey himself seems to be eluding donagh himself. probably my favourite music biog of all.

Weirdly it was the combination of "best bathroom book" and the more serious praise that convinced me.

I might actually go to the O2 gig in a few weeks too. I had a bit of a rough time around the start of 2012 and I developed a big bond with On The Beach in particular, but I have delved into 5 or 6 other albums over the (thankfully better) time since.

Only saw him once, at Hop On The Farm 5 years back, but he was sublime. Cover of A Day In The Life was proper breath-taking.

Read a chunk of Waging Heavy Peace a few days ago. Boy, he's more tolerant of Graham Nash these days – as in, he acknowledges Nash's existence.

Everybody Knows This is Nowhere is, on most days, my favourite album by him
listening to the remaster of this on headphones recently = the best thing.

I love his 90s run. Ragged Glory is aptly titled, Harvest Moon is lovely and Weld is one of the greatest live albums ever recorded and would probably be the NY disc I take to a desert island. He and the Horse take things to another level - super heavy, with some wild solos. Sleeps With Angels is his last 'great' album IMO, with Crazy Horse, with some of his most atmospheric and unusual songs. The title track is amazing - that molten, discordant lead guitar and the eerie harmony vocals. After that you get the thoroughly enjoyable Pearl Jam collab and the underrated Broken Arrow - although the Year Of The Horse live album has better versions of some of the songs on that. Also, the incredible Dead Man soundtrack, one of his masterpieces.
From the most recent album, check Ramada Inn - 15 minutes of achingly gorgeous, cinematic Crazy Horse.

really loved Sleeps With Angels and think his Pearl Jam collabs have a lot of charm too

― media conglomerates are pedaling the same product (stevie), Thursday, May 30, 2013 2:27 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I am also a stan of sleeps with angels

love SWA.

too late

too soon

I always thought Gillian Welch kind of ripped off Western Hero/Train of Love for Nowhere Man and the Whiskey Girl. #stufffewerthanthreepeopleonILMwillcareabout

In the Kim Gordon feature in the latest New Yorker (available online only for subscribers right now) she expresses her unhappiness with the tour when Sonic Youth and Social Distortion opened for Neil Young. The author Alex Halberstadt, says he recalls watching Neil Yong fans boo and scream insults at Sonic Youth at the Ohio stop on the tour. Gordon recalls the sound people turning down the volume on Sonic Youth and says Young's crew were disrespectful.

I saw the Washington DC area gig on that tour and most Neil Young fans just went to the concourse to buy stuff during Sonic Youth or sat there confused. I don't recall heckling.

Neil Young fans too

Gordon recalls the sound people turning down the volume on Sonic Youth and says Young's crew were disrespectful.

Yep. That anecdote's recounted in Shakey too.

I told this story on another thread, but when I saw the tour (Rosemont Horizon, outside Chicago), Sonic Youth were greeted with a few scattered boos that vanished by the end of their set. An older guy next to me said, "You like this stuff?!" I said, "Sure, it's just faster Crazy Horse!" He said, "Hmmm...ok, I can see that."

Was there really that much musical difference between NY and Sonic Youth in the 90s though? Why the OTT hate? Were these gigs attended by a bunch of Harvest nostalgics?

I remember the audience ranging from about late 30s to early 50s, and the hall (a 12,000-seat basketball arena) was half-full.

I saw the Washington DC area gig on that tour and most Neil Young fans just went to the concourse to buy stuff during Sonic Youth or sat there confused. I don't recall heckling.

― curmudgeon, Thursday, 30 May 2013 18:55 (19 minutes ago) Permalink

yeah well, washington dc

if the audience shots from the Weld video prove anything, neil young has a very wide audience base -- even dudes who love his loudest stuff might find sonic youth overly abrasive.

I don't really get how people don't see huge differences between crazy horse and sonic youth

As I recall, only college radio geeks and future ilxors were listening to both Neil Young and Sonic Youth at that time.

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1991-02-22/entertainment/1991053124_1_sonic-youth-neil-young-audience

In 1991 Gordon said for this article:

And then the Young fans get it?

Well, not quite. "I think it's more like the guys with mustaches and beards going, 'Well, it's weird, but I like it,'" says Gordon

Many Neil Young fans probably didn't approve of screwdrivers being used for things other than driving screws.

"I think it's more like the guys with mustaches and beards going, 'Well, it's weird, but I like it'"
kinda sums up 80% of sonic youth's audience also, doesn't it?
i dunno, even if neil had taken dino jr out on the weld tour -- arguably a more classic rock band -- some of his fans would've booed.

Were people really that compartmentalized in terms of what they listened to, even in the 90s?

I think you're missing the obvious generational distinction implied here.

heh, probably.

I know age 50 something Neil Young fans today who don't listen to Sonic Youth and never did. They looked confused watching Patti Smith open for Neil on this recent tour. Yes people, there are rock fans who never embraced indie/alternative/whatever.

tbf, it's taken my dad literally 30 years to come around to the idea of the Smiths. then again, he apparently dug the VU back when they first came out, so I don't know how that works out...

Were people really that compartmentalized in terms of what they listened to, even in the 90s?

FWIW, SY got a worse response (but not booed off the stage or anything) when they opened for Public Enemy the month before.

and curmudgeon, are they fans of the more laid-back country rock style or do they embrace the hard/distortion albums too?

I would assume the vast majority of people at NY shows were older fans, in spite of the "godfather of grunge" rebranding that was going on at the time.

at 90s NY shows

That "godfather of grunge" thing hadn't happened yet; this tour was pre-Nevermind.

FWIW, SY got a worse response (but not booed off the stage or anything) when they opened for Public Enemy the month before.

Don't know why it was a surprise to me that SY and PE toured together when Chuck D guested on "Kool Thing."

the first time i saw neil the openers were stone temple pilots and blind melon. boooooooooo!

Los Lobos are opening at the show we're going to see. can't express an opinion one way or the other.

xp they didn't tour together, just did the one show (and Chuck D didn't join them on "Kool Thing," weirdly). It was immediately pre-Gulf War, and there was a demonstration on the street right after the show that the cops tried to shut down. John Cusack wrote about it in the Sun-Times the next day.

Ah, that explains why I haven't heard of this (non-existent) tour.

Reading about Sleeps with Angels and it talks about how Neil tried to contact Kurt Cobain before he died.

I wonder what would have come of a possible Young-Cobain collaboration?

if the audience shots from the Weld video prove anything, neil young has a very wide audience base -- even dudes who love his loudest stuff might find sonic youth overly abrasive.

^^^^^ this. the camera captures many cosby sweater-wearing yuppies in the crowd.

I see much more of a connection between NY and Nirvanna than I do btw NY and SY.

I wonder what would have come of a possible Young-Cobain collaboration?
it would've been called On The Bleach that is for sure

hahaha

In the Kim Gordon feature in the latest New Yorker (available online only for subscribers right now) she expresses her unhappiness with the tour when Sonic Youth and Social Distortion opened for Neil Young. The author Alex Halberstadt, says he recalls watching Neil Yong fans boo and scream insults at Sonic Youth at the Ohio stop on the tour. Gordon recalls the sound people turning down the volume on Sonic Youth and says Young's crew were disrespectful.

I saw this tour in Mpls and I don't recall the crowd being disrespectful (in fact I seem recall a handful of SY fans up front), mostly just ignoring them. I mean the place probably wasn't even half-full when they started. Of course, we had just sat through Social Distortion who were really awful, so SY by comparison might have seemed like aural balm to even the most hardened classic rocker.

But, Gordon was having issues with her gear & I vividly recall her walking offstage several times and it seemed like she was having words with who ever was running stage sound. I had only been to a handful of concerts at that point and never seen anything like it, it all seemed very tense onstage. Eventually she stormed off & the set was cut short. They were pretty great when they were playing.

hahaha @ on the bleach
i can hear neil chiming in to sing polly and then segueing into a 30 min down by the river mega jam

with bonus murder ~subtext~

then there would be a _____blues medley and kurt would sing the part about going to the interview
not sure how i feel about this tbh

The Capital Centre was huge -- where I sat at the Weld show, I saw old druggie hippies into SY and non-ironic trucker cao wearing folks screaming at them to get off. Everybody (but me) loved Social Distortion, though.

Ugh, fucking Social Distortion were interminable.

I saw the tour in Philly and no one was booing Sonic Youth. There were hippies twirling, sure, but I don't recall any booing. Really broad crowd: yuppies, bikers, hippies, scuzzy punk kids ...

I really fucking hate Social Distortion, like I don't get what their appeal is to anyone

is the weld tour the only time neil's done an entirely electric set? not sure i can think of any other tour where there weren't at least a handful of acoustic numbers...

Good question. When even "Blowin' in the Wind" is electric, you know they're committed.

I was thinking maybe the '86 Rusted Out Garage tour was all-electric, but then I see by the setlists that they did "After the Gold Rush" and "Heart of Gold" (unless those were electric, in which case, wow).

yeah afaik, on that tour, he'd do a few of the acoustic hits. maybe some of the blue notes gigs were all electric, though i don't know if that really counts.

Looks like Arc/Weld was recorded on that early '91 tour.

Certainly claiming that Sonic Youth made midwesterners 'boo' them adds to their brand of being provocative punk rockers.

maybe, although it also kind of contributes to their image as an effete, coastal band. Punk has a strong working class strain.

it worked out ok for everyone, neil young got to look cool to rock critics, sonic youth got to have a brush w/ mainstream america, social d got to continue sucking.

I really fucking hate Social Distortion, like I don't get what their appeal is to anyone

― i don't even have an internet (Hurting 2), Thursday, May 30, 2013 8:28 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yes you do.

Once upon a time pre-91 they were part of the LA punk scene and so some folks liked 'em for that; they also had a Stones/roots/country aspect to their sound so that appealed to others, and later they got on commercial rock radio which made them appealing to some, even if most of us hated how they did it and hated the singer's mannerisms. I liked 'em circa '82 and got tired of 'em later, and understand you not liking 'em at all, but c'mon, compared to much of the rock on the radio they were arguably more interesting (while that alone should not have gotten them a slot on a Neil Young tour it does explain that some folks like them). I don't like PearlJam btw.

Mommy's Little Monster album > any Pearl Jam

hell no

Never understood Social D. hate. The band is fine.

If you've got access, here's a new Kim Gordon profile. She confirms that those Neil Young shows were rough on the band.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/06/03/130603fa_fact_halberstadt

I saw the Meadowlands stop of that NY/SY/SD tour. I went with my best friend (dead now), my mom and my aunt. Both my friend and I were big into all three bands, but Social Distortion were dwarfed by the arena stage and made basically no impression at all, and Sonic Youth were just bad. A noisy (but not in a good way), boring and underpowered set. And it seemed obvious to me that things were tense backstage too, as during Neil's set, he said something like "Hey, I can do that, too!" and ripped out a huge burst of very Thurston Moore-ish guitar noise mid-song. He did this more than once, in fact, as I recall, and it definitely didn't feel like affectionate teasing - it felt like "Hey, fuck you, kid."

is the weld tour the only time neil's done an entirely electric set? not sure i can think of any other tour where there weren't at least a handful of acoustic numbers...

― tylerw, Thursday, May 30, 2013 4:29 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Ha, just remembered their 1970 tour was probably all-electric, if the Fillmore set is an accurate representation. (I used to have a boot of either a Cleveland or Cincinnati stop on that tour that was also all-electric)

Mommy's Little Monster album > any Pearl Jam

― curmudgeon, Thursday, May 30, 2013 2:54 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hell no

― A deeper shade of lol (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, May 30, 2013

hell yes! great, great album.

xp, neil would do an opening acoustic set for those 1970 crazy horse shows

Ah, didn't know that. I also thought about the Time Fades Away tour, but remembered "Journey Through The Past."

"Till the Morning Comes" off After the Gold Rush: contender for the best 1 minute song ever?

It's great, but Wire owns that category

http://www.magnetmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/1996/05/bobpollard378.jpg
*ahem*

I saw the Meadowlands stop of that NY/SY/SD tour. I went with my best friend (dead now), my mom and my aunt. Both my friend and I were big into all three bands, but Social Distortion were dwarfed by the arena stage and made basically no impression at all, and Sonic Youth were just bad. A noisy (but not in a good way), boring and underpowered set. And it seemed obvious to me that things were tense backstage too, as during Neil's set, he said something like "Hey, I can do that, too!" and ripped out a huge burst of very Thurston Moore-ish guitar noise mid-song. He did this more than once, in fact, as I recall, and it definitely didn't feel like affectionate teasing - it felt like "Hey, fuck you, kid."

― 誤訳侮辱, Saturday, 1 June 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Well at least he was driven to do something else. Weld is the only thing I bother with.

Going to see NY and Crazy Horse this evening. Really stoked. Only my second NY gig and first with Crazy Horse.

"Till the Morning Comes" off After the Gold Rush: contender for the best 1 minute song ever?

― arctic mindbath (President of the People's Republic of Antarctica), Saturday, June 1, 2013 9:50 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It's great, but Wire owns that category

― Z S, Saturday, June 1, 2013 11:16 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I just dissed Moby Grape in another thread, but "Naked If I Want" might be the correct answer here. The revelation of something like "Field Day for the Sundays"--the fact that 1/5th of a full punk song is still a full punk song--is p profound, but I'm not sure it matches "I ain't got no money now, but I will pay you before I die"

Was there really that much musical difference between NY and Sonic Youth in the 90s though? Why the OTT hate? Were these gigs attended by a bunch of Harvest nostalgics?

yes!!! for a very long time (and maybe still; i haven't seen him in a long time) neil's gigs were very very heavily attended by harvest nostalgics who didn't have a lot of interest in hearing neil play feedback for five minutes, never mind hearing sonic youth play feedback for a lot longer.

and whether there was much musical difference between ny and sy -- and there was -- is somewhat beside the point. his audience was very much a classic-rock audience. and theirs was not.

!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=doPtRvVPlhY#!

i mean:

!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=doPtRvVPlhY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doPtRvVPlhY

haha, yeah i'd only seen a clip or two of that, never the whole thing. strange! hal asbhy directed!

neil jamming on the synth drums and then coming out w/ the shocking pinks...such a weird era.

...after starting out singing "heart of gold" on acoustic guitar. i think it was even weirder then than it looks now.

it is funny -- in these internet days, we can know all about what an artist is going to be doing during a tour, but back then people probably saw an ad in the paper that said neil young was playing in their town and that was all they knew. and then they got ... this.

excited to watch this

lol'ing at interminable length of opening credits....

I've seen video footage of Trans stuff being performed on the European tour (Nils Lofgren does some interpretive dancing) that is just amazing

Is this the same footage as that DVD of the same tour?

no, there's the Berlin video, which is the euro tour, this is after that... don't think this has ever been on DVD.

yeah I was referring to the Berlin video

This blows the Berlin stuff away. Deeply weird, but the audience gets their money's worth.

neil jamming on the synth drums and then coming out w/ the shocking pinks...such a weird era.

― tylerw, Wednesday, June 5, 2013 5:19 PM (51 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

He's pretty much begging Geffen to sue him at this point.

lol @ synthdrum fills on Don't Be Denied

so weird to see Neil w/a microphone and no guitar

omigod!

xpost

hmm this Willie and the Hand Jive ripoff is pretty good

shocking pinks do seem like they'd be fun live...

gonna be able to watch this tomorrow and i can't wait

confession: I have never heard the shocking pinks album

this is a lot better, really.

seems as though the shocking pinks numbers (get gone and don't take your love) included on the Lucky 13 comp are from this show.

More on NY/SY tour http://thrasherswheat.org/jammin/sonic_youth.htm

"This thing here is called a Synclavier."

goddamn it clip taken down :(

shakey pictures websherriffed it

Don't want hurt the sales of Archives III in 2061.

damn. well now that neil knows there is a ravenous demand for this era, maybe he'll put it out on PONO Ray.

i would love to hear trans outtakes, c'mon neil!!

PONO!

i would happily buy that video to play on my ponograph machine.

Trans is ace.

Listened to Comes a Time today, which I haven't in a long, long while. It feels like the natural successor to Harvest in many ways, and I'm sure it's what a lot of people had expected as the follow-up to 1972's best-selling album, rather than the Ditch Trilogy (I believe it was the first of Neil's albums to reach the top 10 since Harvest). It's very good, but I never hear much about it from NY fans. Opinions?

i LOVE Comes a Time.. it's a glorious and wonderful record. <3 four strong winds <3 lotta love <3 the title track..

comes a time is classic -- could probably do without motorcycle mama, but everything else is awesome. one of neil's breeziest/easiest (even moreso than Harvest, really) but it kind of sneaks up on you.

Motorcycle Mama isn't bad it's just out of place on the record

I dunno, that record never really did it for me. Love "Lotta Love" and "Look Out For My Love" especially, but the arrangements on the rest (especially the jaunty strings on "Comes A Time") felt too syrupy.

This is definitely one of the few times when record executives made a suggestion to a major artist(that Neil supplement his solo acoustic recordings with a rhythm section) which turned out to be the correct move.

From 1969's Everybody Knows This is Nowhere through 1979's Rust Never Sleeps and including eight studio albums, Neil must have one of the greatest streaks in rock history, no?

Tarfumes, I can see why someone would think that. Are you more a fan of Neil's heavier stuff?

Generally yeah, I'd say so, but not to the exclusion of his acoustic side. I love the Massey Hall and Riverboat sets, and "Thrasher" is probably in my top 5 (with "Pocahontas" close behind). That said, "Sail Away" is my least favorite song on Rust, ditto "Through My Sails" on Zuma (but I love "Pardon My Heart"). There's a certain approach he takes in some of his acoustic stuff that's just a little too smooth for me.

I'll have to re-listen to those tracks and see if I can spot what you're saying, I'd be interested to compare it with some of his other acoustic numbers and pick out the differences.

god, I've never listened to the Massey Hall set in full, although I've listened to bits on Spotify. People seem to go crazy for it, but never actually sat down and listened to it through yet...I should do that tomorrow.

It's been a long time since I listened to Comes a Time in its entirety. "Comes a Time" and "Look Out for My Love" stayed with me--love both--the rest I only remember dimly. Except "Motorcycle Mama," which I really hated.

"goin back" and "already one" are songs that really stood out the last time i played it.

Comes a Time is easy to underrate, considering what's before and directly after.

yeah, i might rate it as his least essential 70s album, but it is still totally essential.

well, AS&B is his least essential.

sometime i'm going to have to listen to side a of American Stars and side b of Hawks and Doves back to back.

though side a of Hawks & Doves followed by side b of American Stars would obviously be a cooler album

was gonna say!

The unreleased Chrome Dreams might be a top 5 neil record, had some stuff from as&b

For some reason I always think of "Comes a Time" as the start of his '80s period. Like, a salve after "Rust Never Sleeps," before Neil drinks deep from the mug of mediocrity. If anything, the disc serves as a reminder that he's always been weird and erratic. Did "Rust Never Sleeps" take people by surprise?

Side A of Comes a Time is one of the best sequences of songs in Neil's back catalogue. It does feel like a sequel to Harvest but it's missing the more melodramatic moments, it's breezier on the whole. Silver and Gold and Prairie Wind are very much in the same mold I think.

Comes A Time also his first genuine hit since Harvest; it paved the way for RNS-LR.

I think the proper sequel to Harvest was Oceanside/Countryside which is supposed to be on the next Archives, I think that's the one Neil thought was ”too good” to release

Never heard of Oceanside/Countryside before, did any material get reused on later albums?

The unreleased Chrome Dreams might be a top 5 neil record, had some stuff from as&b

― unfinest DN (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Saturday, June 8, 2013 8:41 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Love Chrome Dreams. Hangs together so much better than AS&B, and that version of "Too Far Gone" is tremendous.

Theres also the unreleased album Homegrown from that era

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homegrown_(Neil_Young_album)

i dunno, i think stars and bars is a totally strong album, even the throwaways are fun. and the guitar sound on the crazy horse/saddlebags tracks is A++++. chrome dreams is probably a bit better, tho, yeah. i'm under the impression that several of the oceanside/countryside tracks ended up on side 1 of hawks and doves.

I do like AS&B, but once I heard Chrome Dreams, Neil's vision became that much clearer.

That said, I'm glad he put out AS&B and held back some of the Chrome Dreams stuff for Rust Never Sleeps; ultimately, it was worth it.

I saw a track listing of oceanside online but it had to be fake cuz there were way too many songs on each side to fit on a vinyl record

The Neil gig was pretty good and I've been digging into hitherto unexplored areas of his catalog; mostly the post-Rust Never Sleeps era. I bought Hawks and Doves and am liking it, although at a mere half hour, it feels like a slight addition to his oeuvre.

Anyone have any particular favourite Neil albums between 1980-88?

We're trying to figure it out!

STYLE Change FASHION change: Neil Young's Eighties Albums

oh, nice one.

tonight was great, some nice rarities. might do it again at the next london show in august.

Love and Only Love / Powderfinger / Psychedelic Pill / Walk Like a Giant / Hole in the Sky / Red Sun / Comes a Time / Blowin' in the Wind / Singer Without a Song / Ramada Inn / Cinnamon Girl / Fuckin' Up / Mr. Soul / My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) / Like a Hurricane / Roll Another Number (For the Road) / Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

Dates cancelled (from Warner Bros pub)

http://press.wbr.com/media/cms/images/201203/photo-credit-danny-clinch-extralarge_1331574075548.jpg

August 19, 2013 - (Burbank, CA) - Neil Young & Crazy Horse regretfully announce that in addition to canceling the remaining dates on their European tour, they must also cancel their upcoming U.S. tour dates due to a hand injury sustained by guitarist Poncho Sampredo, whose doctor has indicated that Sampredo's hand requires additional time to heal properly.

"We are sorry for any inconvenience this causes to our fans or the Festivals where we were scheduled to appear," the band has said in a statement. "As you must be, we too are disappointed at this unfortunate turn of events."

The tour dates that have been canceled are as follows:

8/31 Dundas, ON Greenbelt Harvest Picnic

9/02 Port Chester, NY Capitol Theatre

9/04 Ottawa, ON Ottawa Folk Festival

9/07 Arrington, VA Interlocken Music Festival

# # #

On D1mead0zen at the minute.

The Ducks (short-lived band of Neil Young, Bob Mosley, Jeff Blackburn and Johnny C. (Craviotto).
"July, 1977" compilation
Santa Cruz, California, USA

EX soundboard! - Previously uncirculated!

This just came my way from a friend who I recently met here in Santa Cruz. It came from outside of the "tape collecting world" from cassettes squirreled away many years ago and were just transferred to share for the first time. The other three members besides Neil Young were associated with Moby Grape and this band only did perhaps 20 shows or so at most, and all in the Santa Cruz area. No soundboard recordings of live shows have circulated til now and nothing has ever been released in any form by this band. I transferred two 90 minute compilations of live tracks that were not well labeled but they are from more than one night with the likely venues being The Catalyst and The Crossroads. (This torrent is from two 46 minute cassettes and was labeled as being from July, 1977 but some of it actually may be from August, 1977.)

CD1 - 40:40
101 [1:08] announcer intro, talk, tune ups and applause
102 [3:43] Poor Man
103 [3:51] Tore Down
104 [4:47] Your Love
105 [5:11] Two Riders
106 [4:12] Gone Dead Train
107 [0:15] Neil talk
108 [4:36] Little Wing
109 [3:37] Truckin' Man
110 [0:17] talk
111 [2:31] Hey Now
112 [0:21] talk before end of set
113 [5:54] Silver Wings
114 [0:17] thanks and applause at end of set

CD2 - 53:02
201 [4:27] Wild Eyed And Willing
202 [4:25] Human Highway
203 [2:52] Gypsy Wedding
204 [3:42] Honky Tonk Man
205 [4:44] Hold On Boys
206 [4:05] I'm Ready
207 [4:28] Windward Passage [cut]
208 [5:19] Mr. Soul
209 [3:02] Car Tune
210 [0:32] talk
211 [5:44] Leaving Us Now
212 [6:06] Sail Away
213 [0:24] talk before end of set
214 [3:12] Do Me Right [cut on last notes]

Neil Young - guitar, harmonica, vocals
Bob Mosley - bass, vocals
Jeff Blackburn - guitar, vocals
Johnny C. (Craviotto) - drums, vocals

yeahhh, you can get the whole thing here too : http://www.guitars101.com/forums/f90/neil-young-amp-the-ducks-1977-santa-cruz-soundboard-163509.html
it is pretty good, definitely the best sonic representation of this band. lots of tasty guitar work from neil, though some of the other dudes' songs are not amazing.

There are another two Ducks recordings on the tracker as well from the same source.

yeah there's a whole other set
301. announcer intro, talk, tune ups and applause
302. Poor Man
303. Tore Down
304. Your Love
305. Two Riders
306. Gone Dead Train
307. Neil talk
308. Little Wing
309. Truckin' Man
310. talk
311. Hey Now
312. talk before end of set
313. Silver Wings
314. thanks and applause at end of set

401. Wild Eyed And Willing
402. Human Highway
403. Gypsy Wedding
404. Honky Tonk Man
405. Hold On Boys
406. I'm Ready
407. Windward Passage [cut]
408. Mr. Soul
409. Car Tune
410. talk
411. Leaving Us Now
412. Sail Away
413. talk before end of set
414. Do Me Right [cut on last notes]
their version of mr soul verges on punk.

second set seems to be the better/tighter performance....

306. Gone Dead Train

^^woah that's a deep cut

403. Gypsy Wedding

is a Mosley jam from the Grape's 20 Granite Creek

http://youtu.be/QphAfZq_HUI?t=27s

pretty fun sidetrip for neil overall, don't know exactly how into it was, but he seems to be having a good time being a guitar player in a band.
i guess he was into it enough to have pants made though
http://www.sugarmtn.org/extras/197708220p003.jpg

"Jimmy Page has dragon pants? Big deal! I've got Duck pants!"

Until he breaks out some PONO pants I'm not taking that endeavor seriously.

new song. kinda sounds like zz top.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pLVpVtstNw

what? performing in a small club?! when!? why?! who?!

the lady there is his wife -- he usually plays with her if he's not on tour, i think...
that's johnny d's in beautiful somerville, ma.

yeah
Pegi Young & The Survivors

A friend of mine was there. He's the Fenway Park organist and a huge Spooner Oldham fan, and was pretty pleasantly surprised to see Neil show up. Posted about 20 fb updates with many exclamation points.

haha, awesome, yeah thought that was spooner there. i would post lots of exclamation points if i was seeing neil young play guitar at a club that size. johnny d's is probably , what, 300 capacity? when i lived out there, i saw richard buckner play there, if that gives any indication.

It was funny, all the fb comments were "Neil played in a club?! How did I not know about this?!"

I can't even fathom how mindblowing that would be to see Neil just pop out of the shadows like that.

Oof that song is pretty bad

I like it

in a dumb-boogie-about-cars way

it's better than "hole in the sky" the other new song he's been playing this year, that's for sure.

Neil takes a journey through the past:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ufauKwn28E#t=51

Full transcript:

"This is good."
"I like this one."
"This is a good one."

George Harrison wasn't a fan (at 14:00)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=xYUglwhHpuw

that's pretty funny

anyone going to these carnegie hall shows in January? i'm assuming it'll be on the folkier spectrum of things, but who knows?

neil totally missed his chance to celebrate the 30th anniversary of everybody's rockin

George complaining about Neil's voice is pretty rich

haha yeah. though it is interesting to hear classic rock dudes talk a little shit -- you get the impression everyone's buddy buddy sometimes. obviously neil was the best thing about that bobfest tribute (w/ a little competition from lou).

who's the other half of that conversation - sounds Scottish...? Is that Dave Stewart?

but yeah this kind of candid convo seems pretty rare, nice to see George just hanging out talking shit

George didn't hide his opinions.

It's Bob Geldof, for some reason.

xp

George probably just hated Neil because McCartney dug him:

Neil,
Linda and I have been listening to Live Rust over and over, side four kicks ass.
Lotta Love,
Paul

in fairness i think i did hear george say "he sings even worse than me" or something like that

is this why neil wasn't asked to be a traveling wilbury!? hold on, i'm going to pitch an investigative piece to mojo magazine.

I can totally get why Harrison and Clapton would be mystified at Neil's guitar technique - Neil doesn't worship at the same blues/R&B altars they do, his style comes from a different place

naturally clean soloists like Clapton and Harrison would hate Young.

"He's the one person I thought who sings worse than me!"

"He just stands and hits that one string and goes ERRREWEERRRERR."

also, they are all revered classic rock icons but there's just a touch of a mini-generational thing i think going on too...neil came up just a bit behind them, didn't really peak until harvest commercially and was more associated with that LA movement, so i could see some distance between dudes like clapton and harrison (like proper 1960s UK guys) and this weird canadian loner

but <3 this weird canadian loner

over gross old clapton, who may as well have been an eagle.

heard everybody knows this is nowhere played in three different places over the past two weeks -- is there any other record that sounds as good in every context imaginable?

also neil didn't throw his kid out the window xp

the last recent neil young album i listened to and loved was "sleeps with angels" which is 20 years old now. i keep going back to the old stuff. whats a good neil young album since 1994?

Prairie Wind is ok. (rehashing old country ideas, of course, which he had already rehashed in Harvest Moon)

anyway...

Silver & Gold is better than Prairie Wind in the folkie Neil vein, thought Harvest Moon isn't really a country album anyway and I don't really think
Neil Young writing Neil Young songs constitutes "rehashing" stuff.

Anyway...I'm a Mirror Ball guy (Pearl Jam as his backing band) but opinions vary...
Living With War was pretty divisive but I think people should at least check out the later version where the children's choir was scrubbed from the record...

obviously, Psychedelic Pill would probably be most ppl's choice, there's some pretty vintage Crazy Horse on that and a couple of tunes that I put in the company of all time Neil jams

Le Noise is a really cool sounding record, solo electric, swamped in weird Lanois reverb etc...so maybe that might appeal to you if you like the kinda weird throbbing vibe of Sleeps With Angels...it's definitely like nothing else he's done...also features the first proper recording of Hitchhiker, a 70s song that's up there among his best

Greendale is a weird, low key concept/story album that some ppl love, i'm not super huge on it...

Chrome Dreams II is assembled from tracks from the 00s and I think maybe some 80 stuff, not bad...

Broken Arrow is pretty solid stuff

Are You Passionate and Fork in the Road I would avoid

also assuming that you've dived into the Archives material because if not you're basically missing some of the best music of his career that's ever been released

Broken Arrow is great; I'd put it just a slight notch below Ragged Glory (and largely for the weirdly desultory Jimmy Reed cover that closes the record). UMS OTM re: Le Noise. And A Treasure (live mid-80s stuff) is shockingly good, and arguably better than any of his pre-Freedom 80s stuff.

thanks john. ive heard some of mirror ball, i remember thinking it was pretty good atm. no i havent heard the archives stuff either!

Are You Passionate and Fork in the Road I would avoid

imo :)

Also Americana is worth hearing at least once.

oh yeah americana and the new covers album stuff i've heard as well sounds cool

i don't mind fork in the road but i was sort of assuming that the asker of the question was not as far gone as me personally so like it's not exactly the first one i would point anyone to

are you passionate does have one REALLY good song, a crazy horse raver stuck in the middle for no reason

I agree, Fork in the Road is probably like my 4th/5th favorite from the era in question, whereas Are You Passionate is my least favorite thing he's ever done. But yeah it has "Goin' Home" and I think "She's a Healer" is OK, too.

i'm actually super pumped for a letter home based on the song i heard on the radio

"Ordinary People" - 18:13 - on Chrome Dreams II is worth a listen.

The anecdotes about/responses to "Ordinary People" in "Shakey" are pretty funny ("Neil doesn't fucking know any ordinary people!")

i think the solo live recordings of neil playing/explaining Greendale are generally more successful than the album itself.

since sleeps with angels, i spent a lot of time listening to broken arrow & mirror ball. mirror ball has a couple of incredible cuts, 'i'm the ocean' is a towering tune imo. broken arrow is good but it doesn't really thrill me to death. it's one of the jammiest NY&CH albums and at the same time it moves along pretty slowly, ranges from slow cuts to midtempo jams. vocally, neil sounds like he's gonna pass out most of the time. i do like it, though. it's just the guys doing their thing. 'big time' and 'music arcade' are especially strong imo.

living with war was good the one time i heard it. i like silver and gold and prairie wind well enough, agree that the former is better.

chrome dreams II has some great tunes on it and if you're a neil fan probably worth the $1 the CD will cost.

another vote for Le Noise

Le Noise is really good, as is Pill. Even Americana clicked with me, eventually. Imo "Broken Arrow" should be called "No, I am Not Passionate." Almost everything (including that one) has one or two worthwhile tracks.

I like Are You Passionate, "Differently" is a jam

another vote for the Le Noise album, video, and pertaining tour documentary by Demme, and also for 'Harvest Moon' the song and video, and for Neil the guy. that's the extent of what I know about him so far.

see also Julian Cope's 'Feels Like a Crying Shame' for a 10 min+ Youngian epic. it's on his Citizen Cain'd album.

Love that song and it is a killlller crazy horse vibe. Also "I Will Be Absorbed" from the same Cope album.

Listened to mirror all last night. Pearl Jam compliment NY nicely. "I'm the ocean" and "downtown" are great tunes.

Mirror Ball is a good un. I've heard people say it would be better as a Crazy Horse album, but it's really a different kind of rock record to one he'd make with them: Neil's take on 90s alt rock with four guitars and dynamic drumming. CH don't really have the stamina or chops for that.
That's not a diss of CH though - I love the slightly knackered, drawn out jams of Broken Arrow. Again, he takes them to a different place (as he had with the great Sleeps With Angels) with quite gentle, wistful melodies over blown-out Crazy Horse jams, something he perfects on the gorgeous Ramada Inn from Psychedelic Pill. Damn fine album. Giant Sand's cover of Music Arcade is excellent too.
I must give Le Noise a proper listen. The Hitchhiker is excellent. Americana is a lot of fun. The version of Oh Susannah that sounds like Shocking Blue's Venus is a hoot.
Are You Passionate was a huge disappointment on arrival, but I should maybe revisit it to give it a fairer listen.

Neil's take on 90s alt rock with four guitars and dynamic drumming.

I think one reason I never really got into Mirror Ball (with the exceptions of the songs Michael B mentioned, which are great) is that the Eldorado EP struck me as a far more dynamic and agitated realization of that approach.

Well, that EP is particularly awesome. Stealth Japan-only comeback! "Mirror Ball" ... eh, I'm not sure Pearl Jam brings anything that Neil needs. His b-team did just fine with a similar (iirc) sound on "Living with War."

Just to reiterate Neil silently released a version of Living With War with the choir taken out (a release of particularly poor selling album a year after it came out is classic Neil) but it's well worth hearing

That's a fair point Tarfumes. Eldorado is fantastic. There's nothing as vicious as Cocaine Eyes on Mirrorball. IFRC from Shakey, this was when Neil was experimenting with Marshall stacks instead of his usual chain of Fender deluxes plus massive speaker. Neil with Marshall was too brutal for many of his entourage to take, heh heh.
The songwriting across Mirrorball isn't consistent - Downtown is nothing special, although its goofy hippy fantasy of classic rockers playing in a bar is quite cute in Neil's hands - but Song X, I'm The Ocean and Throw Your Hatred Down are great, and I'll also rep for Act of Love and Deep Green Country. It's a really fun album to play guitar along to as well.

Again, "Eldorado" was 6 or so years pre-"Mirror Ball," so don't see why anyone would compare them. Now, comparing "Eldorado" with "Living with War" makes more sense, because it's the same band of Chad Cromwell and Rick Rosas, Neil's A+ b-team. Though per the thread revive, "Eldorado" is also well pre-"Sleeps With Angels," too.

Telling me that Living With War features the Eldorado rhythm section actually makes me want to hear it (I never have).

so every time i sit down to "long may you run" i think "hell yea! mid-70s neil!" but shit it's really bad, huh? i never make it through in one sitting

blame Stills. his songs on that are an abomination

does always seem like a weird case of neil trying to fit into someone else's scene. i dig the yacht rock slow-jamminess of Midnight On The Bay.

when in doubt, blame Stills. I blame Stills for global warming for instance, bellowing like that on "Black Queen".

I really like "Black Coral", probably my favorite Stills song, but the rest of his songs on here are pretty rough. "Midnight on the Bay" is great; in general, I love the vibe of Neil's songs on this record. It was not at all a surprise to learn that he was living on a boat in Florida at the time.

it's weird i've never actually listened to long may you run

Midnight on the bay! how did I live without that one?

i guess the title track isn't too bad either

sounds like it could easily fit on comes a time

Title track rules!

midnight on the bay is good too!

title track is fantastic, i just generally prefer it in live versions.
here's a kinda weird unreleased track from the stills-young tour - "evening coconut," named after neil's boat.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHmU2xoQo7k
not entirely sure, but he may have reworked this into "Thrasher".

the only problem with this record is that they didn't put all the stills songs on side 2 so you would never have to listen to them.

haha still is a douche but i think he's kind of underrated in a way! he's a great guitar player...i like the first manassas record quite a bit, and super session w/bloomfield and kooper...plus some of the CSN stuff and Buffalo Springfield...as far as cocaine cowboy asshole dudes i have more respect for him than like henley and frey

oh for sure

evening coconut sounds great, thanks tylerw. totally has the feel of "thrasher" (which is definitely my top 5 neil tunes for sure)

yeah it is nice - though haha, stills does his best to ruin it with his weird latin patois improv vocals at the end. Stills!

i like stills fine (i'm a fan of of the roughly contemporary dark star from csn) but these songs are all pretty weak. black coral is ok.

xp Compare that to Young's desperate attempt to salvage the abomination that is "Make Love To You" with his kinda-awesome "Love you! Love you!" backing vocals on the chorus. For the most part they seem to stay out of each other's way on the rest of the record, I think.

would've been interesting if they had taken the opposite approach -- having stills come in and record with crazy horse. would probably be a weird-but-classic record. but it was probably never on the table, given the contempt CSN showed for the horse.

It's amusing to hear Neil get Old Black cranking on the Stills stuff.

Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones plays bass on and co-authored "The Love Gangster" and is reported to have said that he would have left the Stones to join Manassas.[1]

the "Midnight, midnight!" backup vocals on "Midnight on the Bay" froze my blood.

listening to this right now for the first time

obv knew the title track

stills bringing the lols already with "make love to you.....awwwwriiight"

oh man never heard this

thing that sucks about stills is he is pretty good at guitar and he shoulda just been a real good sideman type dude, but too much ego

yeah just seems like he had this idea of "I CAN DO ANYTHING." whereas neil was aware of his limitations and made them into assets.

but too much ego cocaine

fixed that 4 u

oh man midnight on the bay is a stone groove

Stills' voice is fucking gross.

haha black coral is hilarious

take it easy DOWN THE-AH
you've only SO MUCH AIR

goddamn these lyrics are next level

Have you ever been down deep?
I mean way down under the ocean
Just inside Odin's reach
Better beware of this potion

And remember you don't belong
It always seemed so unfair
The fishes around will always remind you
Got to go slow, take it easy down there
You've only so much air

When you get a little deeper
If you slow down you might keep her
The sea, unforgiving and she's hard
But she'll make love to you
Show you glimpses of the stars

At about two hundred feet
You realize the peril
But seductive is the deep
That shark over there holds no terror

For a while you really belong
The ocean will always share
You become one like friends and lovers
But remember, take care, she'll try to keep you there

The deeper you go
'Cause of the pressure of the air
The nitrogen comes and goes, gets you high
It's an alien atmosphere

They call it rapture of the deep, be you not afraid
You're too far down by now to be scared
Two hundred and eighty-seven feet
I saw Jesus and it made sense that He was there

So belong but don't be long
There's plenty of ocean to share
Please take heed, there's mouths to feed
The ocean, she'll provide
Don't take more than you need
'Cause Heaven just might be the sea

you take that midnight on the bay, lotta love, and ocean girl and you have the beginnings of neil's great lost yacht rock album.
this could be the cover
http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ls1o32NzB51qf4c00o1_500.jpg

he has the best face!

maybe he could have repurposed "Kahuna Sunset" by Buffalo Springfield from the archives too

yeahhh, and "wind through my sails" and "sail away" would probably work in there too. there actually was supposed to be a geffen era album called "Island In The Sun."

i love this idea

and lol @

Have you ever been down deep?
I mean way down under the ocean

dancing across the water

and windward passage!

I saw Jesus and it made sense that He was there

BETTER BE-WEAH OF THESE MOOHHTIONS

i'm gonna start using "Have you ever been down deep? / I mean way down under the ocean" when i meet new people

I saw Jesus and it made sense that He was there

I actually like this line! It's my favorite part of the song, along with the weird instrumental intro/outro thing. As gross as Stills' voice is, the delivery helps; the whole song looks fucking ridiculous on paper but...ehh I give up. :)

It's Friday, Defend Stephen Stills Why Not?

That shark over there

Stills' voice is fucking gross.

― guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, June 6, 2014 12:09 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Something happens at 1:54 here that makes this^^^ feel like an understatement:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NinBbafMn3c

YouTubes of each (though a couple have already been removed), next to brief commentaries by Andy Greene (page by page, but loading pretty quickly this afternoon):
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/pictures/20-insanely-great-neil-young-songs-only-hardcore-fans-know-20140515/1-kansas-0315696

how many of these are on Tyler's Sad Movies comp

not all of 'em but if you throw in the bad news and the homegrown comps, i think that about covers it. can't believe "give me strength" isn't on the RS list.

the bad news and the homegrown comps Eh? Where are these?

yonder!
http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/32393488141/homegrown-the-lost-album-neil-youngs-memoir-is
http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/24071228066/bad-news-neil-young-in-the-1980s-as-a-follow-up

lol @ Neil in leather pants btw

lol yeah i like everything about that pic

Thanks! I've got Sad Movies, but don't remember seeing these at all, although Neil's pants ring a bell (not in a good way). Here he is, blazin' a 12 minute "Homegrown" with Willie and the Horse at Farm Aid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uALLzqB9GvY

dang near 13 min., that is.

http://m.rollingstone.com/music/videos/neil-young-teams-with-new-kickstarter-campaign-to-save-the-rainforest-20140728#ixzz38nZJFctQ

Says he's gonna make an album with Willie Nelson's sons, Lukas and Michah. Lukas's voice and lead guitar is differently quirky than his Pa's, to whose Heroes he contributed rolling drama, like a somewhat diffently stoned Jimmy Webb. Hope his group Promise Of The Real get to pitch in, maybe Willie will too. Was more familiar with Micah as visual artis, but he's been showing up live with his relatives and Neil, doing his share. Pono's out now---text and more on the video, though haven't watched yet:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/neil-young-recording-new-album-with-willie-nelsons-sons-20150108?utm_source=newsletter&utm_content=daily&utm_campaign=010815_16&utm_medium=email&ea=YmFtYWxsYW1hQGFvbC5jb20=

*are* differently quirky, duhhh

jeez typos fuc u fone

here's a show from last year w/ the nelson boys' band. "the promise of the real" is like the worst band name of all time, but I can imagine neil thinking it was real cool. http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=1989

Silver & Gold came on shuffle yesterday. Much better than I remember it.

Album cover art done with the Game Boy printer

i enjoy random tracks from silver and gold when they come on unexpectedly, yea. but whenever i put it on intentionally i tend to get bored.

i remember being a little bored with comes a time when i first got it, too, but that one gets better and better the more i listen to it

Yeah, some of those albums really require some time and room to grow on me. The thing about Lukas is, judging by his own albums and appearances, live and studio, with his father, seems like he could participate at whatever level Neil requires: as a co-writer, duet partner (vocal and/or guitar), strictly as a sideman, or in the trad country way, as opening act, then as director of his and Neil's backing band, during Neil's set. (What I'd like even more: new Traveling Wilburys incl. Neil and Willie, or at least Neil.)

i hope promise of the real is involved just so they can call it Promise Of The Neil.

here's a show from last year w/ the nelson boys' band. "the promise of the real" is like the worst band name of all time, but I can imagine neil thinking it was real cool. http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=1989

I wonder how many people showed up for that Neil Willie + Young Nelson gig.

Oh yeah, I finally got around to checking A Letter From Home on Spotify (don't buy; sound quality's not worth it). From my P&J comments, soon for bloglivian:

A Letter Home: Mostly well-chosen chestnuts, though Jerry Lee’s version of “Early Morning Rain” is the only one that totally keeps the song’s I-been-there aspects from eventually turning into schlock of recognition via droning mildew accumulation of self-pity: he goes from firm declaration, “cold an’ Drunk, as Ah can be,” while sounding all-too-cold sober (worked up to a tolerance level again?) to getting tickled at the sad truth that "Naw, yew cain’t hop a jet plane, like no freight train."
Also mostly good performances, starting with an impromptu but sincere-sounding letter to Mom, advising her that it’s time to talk to Dad again, since they’re finally in the same place, and "Remember how we used to watch the weather report together, up in Winnipeg?” Telling her ‘bout how there’s a weatherman for the world now, named Al, and people getting mad at him when things go wrong, and they’re going real wrong, all over the world. (He’s in a record booth in Memphis, and being history-minded, maybe thinking about how, when Elvis first recorded at Sun, he was making these same auto-dispense records for his own Mom.)
But the sound quality is sometimes distracting, especially when his acoustic guitar sounds out of tune, if not warped. Really self-indulgent, and he should have made it a free download---although that wouldn’t appease vinyl freaks, so here y’all are.
Nice surprise: his piano does sound in tune, rollicking through “Reason To Believe,” of all sad songs---inappropriate, but who cares. Also good piano on “On The Road Again,” good neck harp too, and Jack White picks and sings bits there too. Young leads me through some lyrics I don’t remember noticing before, like when he and White do the Everlys’ “I Wonder If I Care As Much” (teven in the moments he thinks he can’t bear, even then,“I wonder if I care”: depression as self-defense, self-medication?) But think I’d think about more if the surface noise and wobble didn’t come through even on digital files. “Don’t overthink it,” he’d prob advise. So that's all.

welcome to the desert of the promise of the real

Didn't they release a clean-sounding version of this album? They called it Audiophile version, IIRC.

i really love A Letter Home, and the sound quality seems as intrinsic an element as the lo-fi quality of prime GBV, which I also love (so ymmv)

Noise of recording mechanism etc. is more noticeable with this kind of music; I don't mind it w garage rock. Good to know there's an audiophile version of this, though prob pricey.

R.I.P. Tim Drummond:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/tim-drummond-bassist-neil-young-bob-dylan-dead-20150112

yeahhh bummer. rough time to be a neil young bassist -- first talbot has a stroke, then rosas dies and now this!
drummond had an amazing career -- from james brown to neil to dylan (and that's just scratching the surface).

Yeah, totally. Tim was with Brown for the Boston '68 show (the night after Dr. King's assassination) and the Vietnam tour (where they were supposedly shot at) -- after that, dealing with Neil's mood swings must've felt like a vacation.

so many good drummond quotes in the csny doom tour oral history:
"The promoters supplied us with cocaine if we wanted it. I was like, 'I'm not putting this shit up my nose.' I was into cocaine back then, but I got my own. Then they all came to me wanting some of mine! I had to send somebody out to help these guys out. There was an ample amount. You could find it anywhere. I did my share, and I'm still here. It's all a matter of how smart you were. There wasn't any heroin, though. That took you the other way."

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/the-oral-history-of-csnys-infamous-doom-tour-20140619#ixzz3OdXqOh7Z

hahaha holy hell:

Drummond: "He played us all the songs from Blood on the Tracks on acoustic guitar. We were on twin beds, across from each other. Oh God, I can't tell you how great it was. At one point Stephen said something to him about the songs not being good. I was so Goddamn embarrassed. He was probably coked out. Dylan, being the arrogant man that he was said, 'Well, Stephen, play me one of your songs.' That was the end of it. Stephen couldn't even find one string from another at that point."

they should do a quantum leap type show where stills travels from time period to time period negging shakespeare, genghis khan, etc

only in every episode he throws one of their famous lines at them before they thought of it, revealing that stills DID create everything

"fuck that commission, willie, to thine own self be true..."

"hmmmm...."

starring dean stockwell as dean stockwell, telling him he can't leave until he gets thomas paine to write thomas paine, etc

haha yeah seen that one about Stills and BotT before

write common sense, i mean

lmao @ the followup to that from nash:

"Stephen walked out of the room and said to me, 'Bob's no musician.' In the back of my mind, I also remember Stephen buying a Precision bass for Paul McCartney and telling him it was time to start playing a 'real' instrument and not his old Höfner."

RIP Drummond, but yeah man what a career.

Love that Stills-Dylan story, I have this image in my mind of Drummond just slowly closing his eyes and rubbing his temple while muttering "Shut up Stills, christ"

Also, I would complete watch a Stills negging vers of Quantum Leap...him all going back in time to "pep" talk Mick Jagger while wearing a Jets jersey

finally episode reveals the entire series happened in stills' mind while he stared at a snowglobe

"steve, you ok? we had to bust the door down! jesus, what happened?"

"dean...dean...what day is it?"

"friday"

"what YEAR?"

"it's 2015!"

"and hamlet? is that a thing? democracy? be my baby?"

"steve, what the fuck did you take?"

"i did it! i saved us all!"

haha yeah seen that one about Stills and BotT before

― Οὖτις, Monday, January 12, 2015 3:30 PM (44 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yea me too, never gets old though, it's like the best stills story and there are so many

the snowglobe is filled with cocaine

well, yeah.

haha what thread was it that somebody posted a drawing of a female hitchhiker standing outside a car with CSNY inside?