Search and destroy: Neil Young

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?

Here ya go: Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young: C/D, S/D

lol thank you

I'm curious about that drawing--was it one of the "Rock Dreams" portraits, or a really good copy? (I don't know because I stole the pic from Facebook)

Don 'n' Glenn recorded no interactions, right?

This is all gold LOLz thanks guys!

more like neil old

DON: Like everybody else, we first noticed Stephen Stills in Buffalo Springfield and their political hit "For What It's Worth". From there of course there was all the CSNY classics and solo work that showed that meaningful lyrics and great harmonies weren't exclusive to the Beach Boys.

GLENN: We hung out some on their '74 tour. I played Stills some stuff we'd been working on for One of These Nights, to which he replied that "Maybe one of these nights you'll right something worth a shit!" That hurt me. It hurt me in the heart.

DON: Well, yeah. (sobs)

T/S: Stephen Stills trying to neg Dylan about Blood on the Tracks vs. Stephen Still erasing Jimi Hendrix's last recorded guitar solo to do bongo overdubs vs. Stephen Still showing up in front of Paul McCartney's house in a Ferrari and fur coat and Paul McCartney not even answering the door

Amazing he invented wearing football jerseys on stage, what an important contribution to rock n roll.

a renaissance man

I had no idea Stills played on Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine". This is possibly the only piece of music he plays on that I enjoy.

bruh you don't like buffalo springfield????

not really

Well, he also played on Joni's Blue and FTR, and on a few Isley Bros recordings (they also covered "Love the One You're With").

yeah okay Blue is good

Stephen Still erasing Jimi Hendrix's last recorded guitar solo to do bongo overdubs

waitwaitwait...this actually happened? How was Stills not legally barred from making sounds after that?

i'm sure they at least took away his bongos

Stephen Stills: As bad as things got, I don't even think it was the craziest tour I ever did. I had some overly lubricated solo tours later on, and then Manassas… For a few years of my solo career the bourbon king showed up and it was just messy. I don't run from it. I own it. It left my voice shot. It's cool now because I've gotten it back. I'm hitting the high notes again. The present for me is fine.

I had some overly lubricated solo tours later on, and then Manassas… For a few years of my solo career the bourbon king showed up and it was just messy. I don't run from it. I own it. It left my voice shot. It's cool now because I've gotten it back.

stills continues to believe he's the cock god straddling rock mountain huh

he's psychotic.

Tarfumes - yeah the story goes that Jimi and Stills were hanging out and Jimi stopped by the studio and cut a solo for "Love The One You're With" and after he left the studio Stills decided he needed more percussion overdubs so he erased Herndrix's solo, then he died shortly after