neil young

haha what a mess

And apparently as a boon to make those who managed to grab the original run feel better, their boxes will come with a "letter of authenticity"! Which I can only imagine is going to delay the shipping for those original sets that should have been out next week. Oh, Neil.

When it was released, Sleeps With Angels was talked about as a return to the Ditch Trilogy (which is sort of half-true). Do any of his many subsequent records return to the "ditch" mood? I've only heard Mirror Ball, Le Noise and Psychedelic Pill since then.

https://www.wordsense.eu/ditchy/#:~:text=Adjective,Having%20ditches.

Not really? I mean, that's such a singular period for Neil and it's hard to imagine anything he's done in the last 25 years coming close. I'd say maaaybe parts of Chrome Dreams II come kinda close, even though some of that material originally dates from just after the ditch era. Scrolling through the discography it's hard to see much else, feel like it would be more scattered songs over the years instead of any full albums.

But if you haven't heard either Hitchhiker or Homegrown, those might be good places to go next.

Peace Trail (imo) is the most distinctive and odd album he's made in recent times. Great band for that (Jim Keltner kills it) and odd experiments w/autotune in a very "neil" way

dunno if it will scratch the ditch itch but worth hearing

Return to Greendale is making me like Greendale more, this live version is better than the album

xpost - oh yeah if you haven't heard Hitchhiker or Homegrown those are amazing, but like *actual* ditch period albums, listen to them asap!

Peace Trail actually not a bad call, I feel like that one is a little underappreciated.

it's not perfect but it has *something* that weird neil-ness that i find missing from a lot of the recent stuff esp the promise of the real albums

I went for a walk last night with Colorado and warmed up to it a little bit.

yeah i had the same thing the other day w/colorado
at a base level i just like the sound of crazy horse

but some of the lyrics are so bad

that's the biggest problem with all this later stuff, his political lyrics are just abysmal. neil is not good at being topical

I can def see people's mileage varying with Peace Trail, but for me the weird/odd choices on it are very classic Neil and not half-or-quarter baked like some of the modern era stuff. Keltner is awesome.

Colorado I still have not been able to make it through

Oh yeah, even when his heart in the right place, his lyrics are pretty cringeworthy. But, yeah, something about that Crazy Horse sound on like, "She Showed My Love" is still catnip.

yeah that and "milky way" are highlights

re: Peace Trail, I think the Keltner vibe is pretty interesting — in all honesty, Neil and Jim could probably just jam instrumentally for 25 minutes and it'd be my favorite record of the year. Neil needs to get into straight improv, I think.

I've heard Hitchhiker but it didn't strike me as anything more than "demos for songs he later recorded better". I couldn't put myself into a 1976 mindset and unhear all the songs I already knew.

Homegrown was already on my "to-hear" list, and I'll look out for Peace Trail.

still confused but:

After the initial run sold out in less than 24 hours, NEIL YOUNG is releasing an additional batch of his monumental Archives Volume II: 1972-1976 deluxe edition box set, available exclusively via The Greedy Hand Store at Neil Young Archives (NYA). In tandem, Young is also announcing a retail edition of the set, available at both standard music retail outlets and via The Greedy Hand Store. Both releases are now available for pre-order and will be physically released on March 5, 2021.

Those who pre-order these newly announced sets through The Greedy Hand Store (NYA) will have instant access to hi-res 192/24 digital downloads of four Instant Grat tracks (“Come Along And Say You Will,” “Homefires,” “Powderfinger”) and a 1973 live recording of “The Losing End.”
Both editions includes free hi-res digital audio downloads from the Xstream© store at Neil Young Archives (NYA) on the March 5 release date when purchased through The Greedy Hand Store.
All who have already pre-ordered the first run of the Deluxe edition will receive the entire digital collection on November 20, the same day the first run is released.

lol what a mess

can you imagine being one of those people who rushed to buy this deluxe edition because it was limited to 3000 copies only to find out that 1) oops there's actually another 3000 copies, but the II on the cover is in red now, and 2) oh and in case you don't want to spend an extra $100 for a crappy cardboard box and a book you'll look at once, you can buy the same set on Amazon for $160 (a price that will likely decrease before the release date)

The least he could have done was, I don't know, add a bonus disc or a Blu-Ray or something to the first deluxe edition

Yeah, it's been a total shitshow from day one. That said, I'm really happy there will be a (comparatively) cheaper scaled down box that is going to be mass released. It'd be a real shame if, after years of hype, this was just a limited edition boon for the flippers. Even the "retail version" is too expensive, but I'm a sucker for this era and Vol 1 is looking mighty lonely on my shelf.

I'm trying to imagine the fury of the dudes (and, face it, it was always a dude) that paid almost $3,000 for the sold out first edition on eBay.

Following these threads and the ongoing misadventures of Neil's archival releases is hilarious. Neil releasing archival stuff is like Lucy pulling away the football, only if the recurring joke, rather than Charlie Brown's gullibility and her malintent, was a thousand variations on miscommunication and snafus, where Lucy thinks that pulling away the football is actually what will make Charlie Brown happy, or she really wants to let him kick it but is distracted by something, etc.

(Forget that football I was about to have you kick -- I just ordered 5 more incredible footballs! They should arrive in 6 months.)

Imagine if on top of all this there's a glue on discs problem like the first box.

oh there will be

https://i.imgur.com/l8p51lr.png

So this won't even be available to stream in full on NYA until March. What a mess.

being a neil young fan in 2020 is like a part-time side gig, except instead of them paying you, you pay them

Maybe they should have waited a few months before the big promo push? Such a tease at this point (that said, absolutely loved reading tyler's review!)

re: Peace Trail, I think the Keltner vibe is pretty interesting — in all honesty, Neil and Jim could probably just jam instrumentally for 25 minutes and it'd be my favorite record of the year. Neil needs to get into straight improv, I think.

Intriguing, but an illustrative counter is the album Bill Frisell did with Jim Keltner on drums, which iirc was ... dull.

I'm assuming this new news means it won't be on Spotify any time soon either.

haha, man, Neil is really pushing it with his fans ...

if anyone wants to drive out to colorado I'll play vol II for you in my backyard.

what's your barn setup?

lol

barn setup is probably some shitty logitech speakers connected to a laptop. just as neil intended.

I'll figure out a way to rip the stream to 128k mp3s, we can upload that to my Pono and use your speakers

Archives2_NYoung_HD(real).mp3

At this point I think ol' Shakey is just straight up trolling his fans. I haven't searched it out yet, but apparently in the middle of this roll-out confusion, the first thing he did today was throw up an alternate version of "Ambulance Blues" on NYA that isn't even on the box. Oh Neil, never change.

has there ever been info on how many subscribers to NYA there are?

lol goddamn about that "ambulance blues" ... great solo version, obviously should've been on the box. the on the beach disc is pretty light in terms of unreleased stuff.

lol, this fuckin guy

somebody YSI me that shit plz

yeah is there a place to hear the NYA stuff without dealing with the site?

Not yet, I don't think. Other than three pre-release tracks, nothing new is up on Spotify. I'm guessing it's gonna come in March with the regular retail release at this point.

I would be totally cool with Neil ending up in bankruptcy on some stupid car/train scheme and having to sell his catalog to a soulless media mega corporation that will actually treat it with the respect it deserves.

Taylor Swift should buy it.

I would prefer that didn't happen; I'd rather have haphazardly-curated releases than coherent/cohesive boxed sets but "The Loner" is now in ads for Zoloft.

xp

XP ...and rerecord it.

he needs a project manager or something. I know that sounds stupid, but the way he treats his catalog is nutso

I believe his project manager is named Bernard Shakey.

tyler is there a specific person or team who handles Dylan's bootleg series?

that's pretty amazingly well done

Jeff Rosen has been doing it since before the beginning (I think he even put together Biograph back in the 1980s). yeah, I mean, that shit has been a dream come true.