I've wondered about that too; off the top of my head I can think of Chrome Dreams, Homegrown, Island Dreams (I think that was the name), the original Old Ways, Toast that were scrapped at the very last minute. I'm pretty sure there's at least a couple more. Amazing that the bigwigs, except for David GeffenOriginally Posted by GuitarGeek
put up with "Neil being Neil" all these years. Guess the success of Harvest bought him a whole lot of industry capital.
Hands off the Harvest, please... how can you not rate it 10/10 when it has this one aboard...
Can't resist to remind you of one more video here...
Love the YT comment: "Careful with that axe, Neil!"
"The world will soon be right again,
Innocence and undying love will reign." - Transatlantic
Greendale was a real sleeper for me. I really like it now.
Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world.
easy.... even if this one track would be a 10/10 (and that's a good live version, easily topping the studio version), most of the other nine tracks don't rate above 6/10 (and 6 is valid for only Old Man, Needle and Alabama)... The overall album average is closer to 6 than 7... Simple arythmetics
Fairly tame version (didn't say "lame"
my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.
Hehe, seems like you know more about rhythm than arithmeticSimple arythmetics
Last edited by Azol; 05-11-2013 at 07:55 AM.
"The world will soon be right again,
Innocence and undying love will reign." - Transatlantic
Harvest is a stone classic for good reason. The level of musicianship on it is so high and the backing band's discipline so extraordinary that I think it will still be held up another 40 years from now as a "masterpiece."
For those who missed it, here's Neil back in business again at his annual Farm-Aid; one of the most powerful, perhaps the most emotional versions of "Old Man", or any tune from his catalogue. Bring it on Neil!
6 minute ramble about food, farming, gov't, nature follows. Bring it on Neil!!
"Henry Cow always wanted to push itself, so sometimes we would write music that we couldn't actually play – I found that very encouraging." - Lindsay Cooper, 1998
"I have nothing to do with Endless River. Phew! This is not rocket science people, get a grip." - Roger Waters, 2014
"I'm a collector. And I've always just seemed to collect personalities." - David Bowie, 1973
I own everything & have followed Neil since the mid-70s. So rather than restate the greats I'll simply list the albums that I think any newcomer can easily do without. As Neil has produced so many great albums those on the following list are simply unnecessary, in some cases they are just poor, in other cases NY has produced the same sort of stuff much better on other albums.
Landing on Water
Life
Broken Arrow
Silver & Gold
Reactor
Everybody's Rockin'
Trans
Arc
Mirror Ball
Are You Passionate
Greendale
Praire Wind
Living With War
And here are a few, which I think are great, that often get lost in the noise among all the top rated albums on NY threads,
Time Fades Away
Tonight's the Night
Eldorado
Americana
Fork in the Road
Arc Weld
And here are my top picks:
1.Zuma
2.Harvest
3. Everybody Knows This is Nowhere
4. Rust Never Sleeps
5. Comes A Time
6. On the Beach
Last edited by PeterG; 09-24-2013 at 08:58 AM.
It seems that Le Noise from 2010 flew under the radar for most of you. I think it is very strong. Any other fans out there?
Tim, I haven't given it a fair go yet, I've only listened to it a few times, so the jury is still out.
I don't even pretend to keep up with Neil. I might pick up something every so often, but that's about it. I picked up by Psychedelic Pill because of this thread. I'm not sure what I think about the rest of the album, but got absolutely floored by "Ramada Inn." I don't know how much of my reaction is to something intrinsic to the song, but I just experienced a deep emotional resonance with it. So much so, I felt its been kind of tough to bend my head around the rest of the album.
Even after all these years, Neil still sounds like Neil, and the Horse still sounds like the Horse, and they can still find a way to knock me down.
Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world.
Neil will be playing Carnegie Hall January 6,7,9 & 10, 2014.
"Henry Cow always wanted to push itself, so sometimes we would write music that we couldn't actually play – I found that very encouraging." - Lindsay Cooper, 1998
"I have nothing to do with Endless River. Phew! This is not rocket science people, get a grip." - Roger Waters, 2014
"I'm a collector. And I've always just seemed to collect personalities." - David Bowie, 1973
I like "LeNoise" very much. Good songs on that one. In contrast to that, I listened to Psychedelic Pill only once and found it very boring!
him and crazy horse half scared the audience when they layed that on their tour this year. crazy
Amazing show. I guess they still haven't released the DVD officially, what a shame!
Setlist:
1. Mr. Soul (Buffalo Springfield song)
2. I've Been Waiting for You
3. Cinnamon Girl
4. Spirit Road
5. Love and Only Love
6. Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)
7. Too Far Gone
8. Oh, Lonesome Me
9. Mother Earth (Natural Anthem)
10. The Needle and the Damage Done
11. Old Man
12. Heart of Gold
13. Get Back to the Country
14. Words (Between the Lines of Age)
15. No Hidden Path (27 minutes long!)
Encore:
16. A Day in the Life (The Beatles cover)
"The world will soon be right again,
Innocence and undying love will reign." - Transatlantic
I like him when he sounds prog-folky, as in Old Man, Tonight's the Night (the song) and the opening track from Comes a Time, whose name eludes me for the moment. Not so keen on straight country-style songs like Harvest or Comes a Time, though I love his rendition of Four Strong Winds.
I'm a Crazy Horse fan, so a lot of my faves come from that part of Young's discography. Srill, here are some of my tops, in no particular order:
- After the Goldrush
- Tonight's the Night
- Rust Never Sleeps / Live Rust
- Freedom
- Silver & Gold
- Chrome Dreams II
- Psychedelic Pill
- Le Noise
- Weld
- Live at the Fillmore East (1971, with CH & with most of Everybody Knows This is Nowhere,the better choice of the two, but you need one of them as some of his most enduring songs are on it/them).
Apparently, there's very little love for American Stars 'n Bars? One of my all time favorite Neil albums. I mean, this is the album that gave us "Like A Hurricane" and "Star of Bethlehem". Not to mention tracks like "Will to Love" and "Hey Babe". I know this was recorded during some of Neil's darkest hours, but its pretty worthy of praise, IMHO.
Don't have a lot but I really love the stuff I do have...my fave song is probably a toss up between The Needle and the Damage Done, Sedan Delivery, and Cortez the Killer...
1) Psychedelic Pill
2) Rust Never Sleeps
3) Zuma
Check out my solo project prog band, Mutiny in Jonestown at https://mutinyinjonestown.bandcamp.com/
Check out my solo project progressive doom metal band, WytchCrypt at https://wytchcrypt.bandcamp.com/
Outside Comes A Time, I'd says that AS&B is the weakest album he made in the stretch between Beach and Rust (or even including Time Fades Away to include the whole of the Ditch trilogy)....
Not that Neil ever made very coherent albums (collection of songs that don't make a cohesive album ... for ex >> what is Southern Man doing on After The Goldruush, instead of Everybody Knows) , but AS&B really has a feeling of throwing bits & pieces together, though side-A makes sense, but I hate country rock. Not to mention that I got sick of hearing the force-fed Hurricane for about twenty years... t's only a five or six years since I can hear it again.
my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.
Neil Young has several personas that are reflected on specific songs and sometimes even whole albums
There's the country music Neil
There's 60s singer songwriter protest folk music Neil
There's the homegrown, hillbilly, farmers aid, railroad and union man Neil
There's the hard rocking, grungy, feedback Neil in front of Crazy Horse
There's the 1950s rock n roll, rockabilly Neil
There's the music technology through the ages Neil
There's petrol head Neil
There's history Neil
There's biographical Neil
There's awful 80s contractual album Neil
and so on...
I'll stick to these two
my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.
I like all of Neils albums from the debut up to and including 'Live Rust' with the exception of 'Comes A Time' and 'American Stars & Bars'. AS&B is redeemed slightly by including 'Like a Hurricane' and a couple of others but 'Comes A Time' has nothing I particularly like. Well, maybe 'Four Strong Winds' but he never wrote that one. It's the 'chuck-a-boom' style of music I really dislike. It is not that I dislike country (Harvest I rate very highly) and I'm a fan of Gram Parsons, the Burritos, the Byrds etc but 'Comes a Time' is Neil's 'wet and wimpy' album IMO. I find the songwriting weak.
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