Holy moly, just listen to the first 30 seconds here: The seething, mega-distorted guitar sound on "Hey Hey My My" is just cartoonishly vicious. The world does not want for live documents of Neil Young and Crazy Horse, but this 1991 beast is still astounding, constantly teetering on the edge of meltdown ("Welfare Mothers" is nuts) and peaking with a mind-erasing 14-minute blowout on "Like a Hurricane." Fun fact: Neil apparently permanently damaged his hearing while mixing this. It should be rated R for graphic violence.
Maybe this should be subtitled "Before the Damage." This powerful live document from the band's 1970 performances at the Fillmore East features the original, incendiary Crazy Horse lineup. Danny Whitten's trademark searing guitar jumps off the tracks here, most notably on "Cowgirl in the Sand." Also included is the Whitten/Young-penned (and sung) "Come on Baby, Let's Go Downtown," which was a staple of Crazy Horse shows. By 1972, Whitten was dead from heroin overdose, which greatly affected Young and sent him down many different artistic roads. One quibble: where's "Cinnamon Girl"?
Neil's music, going all the way back to the iconic Harvest, had always contained a pungent whiff of country music. But in the mid-1980s he made the conscious effort to morph into a Nashville crooner. In addition to dropping Old Ways, an album featuring both Waylon and Willie, he assembled the International Harvesters, a backing band of Southern session legends, including pianist Spooner Oldham, and toured the nation. A Treasure collects some of the best recordings from these jaunts, and it is a must-hear for any serious fan of Neil Young or the intersection of country and rock 'n' roll.
Possibly feeling inspired by Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. calling him a primary influence, Neil Young constructed Arc, a 35-minute composition assembled from live recordings made throughout his 1991 tour with Crazy Horse (see Weld). It was probably the loudest and most cacophonous music Neil has ever made, qualities that are only more pronounced on this sprawling slab of feedback, caveman drums and the occasional vocal. Its freeform structure and aggressive droning share far more with '80s noise-rock than they do with anything in the classic rock canon -- ok, maybe Pink Floyd live in '68.
This album illustrates a benchmark for the peaceful folk-rock scene of L.A.'s canyon community (Laurel and Topanga) of the late 1960s. Before Neil Young, Stephen Stills and Richie Furay went their separate ways, they birthed a blend of country and folk-rock that, along with the music of the Byrds, helped to define the sound of a generation.
Any true Neil Young fan has already seen that jaw-dropping BBC footage of him performing acoustic on February 23, 1971. This monumental performance (from his second vault offering) predated that one by just over a month. Recorded on January 19, Young test-drives newly written songs like "Tell Me Why," "Old Man" and the ever creepy "A Man Needs A Maid" (with different lyrics bleeding into "Heart Of Gold"), as well as songs that would eventually become Harvest. Other rare gems include "Bad Fog of Loneliness" and "Dance Dance Dance" which was the blueprint for "Love Is A Rose."
Long May You Run, from 1976, was supposed to be a full-blown CSNandY album, but Stephen Stills and Neil Young ditched their, uh, pals by erasing all their vocals without prior notice. At the same time, Young allegedly grew tired of Stills' drug and alcohol abuse, while Stills believed Young wasn't offering up his best tunes. Oddly enough, none of this strife comes through in the music. In fact, the two sound as if they're a couple of beach bums gently grooving after splitting a bottle of spiced rum.
Between 1966-1976 Neil Young recorded some of the most important songs of his career. This '77 release compiles 35 of those songs, including a few recorded with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Not only is this perfect for beginners, but also for fans still pining for the release of Young's box set.
Recorded live in 1978 at San Francisco's Cow Palace, Live Rust is an epic double disc that balanced Young's lush, live acoustic songs with his Fender amp-crunching Crazy Horse style. This is the very sound that inspired a generation of ripped-jeans-and-flannel-clad Pacific Northwestern musicians in the early '90s.
Shakey has released some obscure treats from his early days, but Sugar Mountain is a revelation. Recorded not long after the breakup of Buffalo Springfield, here Young is a 22-year-old kid discovering himself before an intimate crowd at Ann Arbor's Canterbury House. He's a tad nervous, yet tells a ton of jokes while unveiling future classics ("Birds," "The Loner") and reworking some Springfield fare, the best of which just might be a "Mr. Soul" that's slowed down and stripped to its essentials.
Though serving as the soundtrack to director Jim Jarmusch's deeply visionary western, Young's music also stands on its own as a unique foray into experimental guitar; in this sense, it's not unlike Ry Cooder's exquisite score for Paris, Texas (another must-hear). Deconstructing the muddy noise he generates with Crazy Horse, he unfurls grimy cascades of feedback and prickly, reverb-soaked fingerpicking. It's all exquisitely haunting and ghostly, especially with the way snippets from the film (a mix of American Indian mysticism and William Blake poetry) have been worked into the music.
This overlooked gem from 1968 is most notable for Neil Young's killer guitar work on "Houses," a gutsy depiction of failed love. In fact, Weinberg has a lot in common with Young classics like Harvest and After the Gold Rush. Much of this album deals in introspective country-folk that spotlights the singer's gritty voice. But there are also touches of psychedelia, ornate pop and hard-to-describe eccentricities. Who knows -- maybe Weinberg was just a little too versatile for mainstream success.
Neil Young's Unplugged set came out when the press was hyping him as the "Godfather of Grunge," but his heartfelt performances here stayed true to his own sound. Rarities such as "Stringman" and "World On A String" may suggest some weird kind of string theme, but they're a real treat to hear in this setting.
Here it is, folks: the digital version of the boxed set Neil's fans have been waiting 1,000 years to be released. Covering the first decade of his career, it's packed with delicious rarities: recordings of his surf band The Squires, Buffalo Springfield outtakes and alternate versions of classics like "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" and "Only Love Can Break Your Heart." The only sticking point is that a decent portion of the collection was previously released as stand-alone titles. These include Live at the Fillmore East and Live at Massey Hall. Nevertheless, both are essential listening.
This collection of Neil Young's radio hits may seem like a watered-down version of Decade to some, while to others it could come across as the perfect amount of his more familiar cuts. Either way, you can't deny the monumental influence these songs continue to have on longhairs with guitars and stoic songwriters alike.
