Search and destroy: Neil Young

Change Your Mind

From "Sleeps with Angels"? I *love* "Change Your Mind" and love its place on the record.

Love Rust--Neil's long-lost album of Barry White covers.

The only Neil records that actively annoy me are Change Your Mind (destroys the flow on an otherwise great record) and I’m the Ocean (it’s grating).

Wah? Two of my favourite 90s Neil jams!

Yeah, me as well, especially "I'm the Ocean" which could be his greatest '90s release, IMHO. "Change Your Mind" isn't on the same level, but it's the centerpiece of Sleeps with Angels which is a really good album, maybe even a great one. I never got into Mirror Ball overall, there's only a few keepers like "I'm the Ocean" but Sleeps with Angels is the only studio album from the '90s besides Ragged Glory that I really like as a whole.

I guess I can understand "I'm the Ocean" dribbling on, but dribbling on's what he does best, or among the things he does well, so if you prefer other Young james we're cool.

Sleeps with Angels continually surprises me with its spookiness: "Driveby," "Safeway Cart," the title rack, "Prime of Life."

Yeah, the rest of that LP is stunning start-to-finish.

I re-listened to both those records, and I still think Ocean is a unexceptional stomper with cloying lyrics and a repetitive melody (even by Young standards, speaking as someone who likes the mashed potatoes song on Reactor).

Change Your Mind has wonderful atmospherics when he’s not singing, and I enjoy the verse melody, but I always dread the arrival (and re-arrival and re-arrival) of the chorus, so I can’t lost in it like, e.g. Ordinary People or Cortez

'barn' is sounding pretty good on first listen!

I'm stunned by Christgau's "A." I also think he vastly overrated Fork in the Road but he was more or less right about Americana (which would be an A album in my book had Neil dropped "Get a Job" and maybe "Wayfarin' Stranger"), so I'll give it another try.

(*it* being Barn)

digging the noisier songs, especially

There's a piece on the new Neil Young album on the AV Club, and it contains this clunker:

There are likely two main reasons why Young hasn’t seemed to engender the kind of latter-day renaissance that some of his contemporaries have enjoyed, like Joni Mitchell or Jackson Browne.

Wtf is he talking about? Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne? They had latter-day career comebacks? Or is he talking about just a general re-appreciation? 'Cause Joni hasn't put out a record in maybe 15 years, but it doesn't matter, because she's been more or less worshipped for her entire career. And Jackson Browne? Who gives a shit about Jackson Browne? Maybe there was some belated "Late for the Sky" love, but that album seems like one of those "I don't like Jackson Browne except for ... " situations.

And of course Neil famously *did* "engender" a "a latter-day renaissance." It's just been that much more "latter" *since* then.

I think there's been a greater appreciation of Joni in recent year, not that she wasn't well regarded, but it seems like you hear more about her and she's now where she should be in the canon

no idea what he's talking about with Jackson Browne

also Neil is just Neil now, as you say after the 90s comeback I feel like he's in that zone of permanent respect

Huh, I always thought at the very least several of her primo '70s albums ("Blue" et al.) were totally canon. For sure, afaict nothing she released after the '70s got much traction, but I'm not sure much of it really deserves reassessment as lost masterpieces or anything.

Anyway, "Barn" is already more memorable than "Colorado," which I always forget even exists.

Phoebe Bridgers recently put out a new version of "Kyoto" featuring Browne, and she appeared in his most recent music video. So he's a little hip right now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_gWWzLph24

re the xpost topical: there's this thing that can happen, esp. as you get older, when you look away from what RIP Dave Hickey called misty mountain bullshit, and accept that you're an organism, with a sell-by date, circle o' life. But you can't accept no more life to carry on, maybe especially if you have kids, grandkids, and see the planet with its own accelerating sell-by date. Hence, in the midst of a massive wave of legacy product, music old and new, we got The Monsanto Years, which I also dig the sound of, so P&J'd it (I've liked most of the all-new albums he's released this century, but only TMY and Americana made my Top 10s--albums sure don't have to be perfect to do that, but they have to satisfy in ways that nothing else quite does during year of release)

(See also Harry Dean Stanton re mortality, thinking etc., over on his thread.)

I thought Americana a fun minor diversion like Reactor; did not understand Christgau-ian hosannas. They're Crazy Horsed versions of folk songs I don't play willingly.

I love "Americana." With "Le Noise" and "Psychedelic Pill," it helps complete another great mini comeback streak.

It's the way he sings them, in that sequence, that makes them make sense worth hearing to me. Also speaking of topical, I like grunting along with the good-humored "Lock 'im up" on Peace Train, which is quite a refreshing sidetrip, for the most part.

er Peace Trail

Peace Trail easily the best of his recent work

This is the first Young album I listen to since 2013. Anything changed?

Wtf is he talking about? Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne? They had latter-day career comebacks? Or is he talking about just a general re-appreciation? 'Cause Joni hasn't put out a record in maybe 15 years, but it doesn't matter, because she's been more or less worshipped for her entire career. And Jackson Browne? Who gives a shit about Jackson Browne?

He doesn't know what he's talking about. Jackson Browne's new work has only gotten less attention, a situation that hasn't changed since he took part in this joke on The Simpsons:

https://frinkiac.com/meme/S14E20/1129420.jpg
https://frinkiac.com/meme/S14E20/1131297.jpg

And he hasn't grown in the public discourse - "These Days" has to an extent, but more for Nico's cover. And I actually love Jackson Browne, I think his achievements as a great singer/songwriter will never go away, but the kind of resurgence they're alluding to feels more like whatever's "fashionable" and that hasn't happened with Browne.

But appreciation for Joni definitely has grown. She's never been forgotten or overlooked, but now she's been put in rarefied air - where Neil was in the '90s, that's where Joni is now, someone who's talked and worshipped to an enormous degree across all generations (i.e. you see the influence and appreciation to an enormous degree among the youngest generation). She's also benefitted from the recent push to bring more women into the spotlight (think NPR's greatest albums by women list, which she topped, or Rolling Stone's rebooted 500 list that launched the same album into the top 5 or 10), as well as her not-insignificant health problems. I honestly was afraid she'd leave us by now, or at least be silenced for the remainder of her years, but she's thankfully made a great recovery. And in all fairness, despite her accolades and achievements, it kind of felt like she could be overlooked even 15 or 20 years ago - I was shocked that it took this long to get her a Kennedy Center honor when they've bestowed it on Don Henley and Glenn Frey a long time ago. (Being Canadian doesn't mean anything - just look at McCartney, the Who and Led Zeppelin, all honorees, which reminds me, when's Neil going to get his?)

Damn meme generator!

https://frinkiac.com/meme/S14E20/1129420.jpg?b64lines=IEknbSBoZXJlIHRvIHNlcmVuYWRlIHlvdQogd2l0aCBhIHNvbmcuCihhbGwgY2hlZXJpbmcpCkZyb20gbXkgbGF0ZXN0CiBhbGJ1bS4=]

https://frinkiac.com/meme/S14E20/1131297.jpg?b64lines=KGFsbCBncm9hbmluZyk=

Hope that works.

Actually saying she "benefitted" from her health problems is awful - I should say it made people more appreciative because there was the very real possibility they were going to lose her, and as Joni already said it best 50+ years ago, sometimes you don't know what you've 'til it's gone.

oh no you di'int

Jackson Browne is also in the Velvet Underground documentary fwiw.

Pft. Forget Jackson Browne or "latter-day renaissance," John Cale was *in* the VU, and his entire subsequent solo career has been more or less ignored by anything more than a cult audience.

Did Jackson Browne beat you with a switch when you were younger?

A lot of his stuff does make me switch it off.

Josh isn't a woman so I'm guessing no

From the free Xmas Xgau Consumer Guide, here's an approval ov Barn (although, since I strongly disagree with his dismissal of the past 12 years, I might not agree with this either, if I ever hear the album all the way through):
Neil Young & Crazy Horse: Barn (Reprise) In case you haven’t been keeping track, I have. It’s been a full dozen years since the once inexhaustible Young released an album of new songs worth hearing: Fork in the Road, his eco-car statement back when his passion was a revamped Continental that got 100 miles per gallon on “domestic green fuel” and Crazy Horse could thud along like it was old times. Here Crazy Horse is quieter and gentler as the green consciousness their boss embraced as of 2003’s Greendale turns ever more militant and also, unfortunately but fittingly, much darker: “Canerican” is defiantly bipatriotic, “Change Ain’t Never Gonna” takes direct aim at the yahoo yokels whose side he’s always tried to see, and “Today’s People” blames those people for killing the planet and “the children of the fires and floods” who’ll go out with it. There’s relief in the credible romantic passion of “Tumblin’ Through the Years” and “Don’t Forget Love.” But the full-bore astonishment is the penultimate 8:28 “Welcome Back”: “Gonna sing an old song to you right now/One that you heard before/Might be a window to your soul I can open slowly/I’ve been singing this way for so long,” it goes, and that’s just the vocal. What convinces you he means it is the guitar, so quiet and caring it feels like love. A

OK OK, I'll listen!

It’s been a full dozen years since the once inexhaustible Young released an album of new songs worth hearing

what is this inexcusable slander w/r/t Le Noise and Psychedelic Pill

It's fine?

xpost

xpost yeah what a idiotic opinion

I don't like either of those albums -- Lanois is the last producer I'd expect to work with Neil Young successfully, unless I get goose bumps and think of James Murphy -- but I won't stop anyone for embracing them.

yes, we know, you've been wrong on this specific issue for quite some time now but I won't stop you from failing to hear the greatness

unless I get goose bumps and think of James Murphy

this is very xgau-esque in that I have no idea what that means

the most wounding thing you've ever written about me

Psychedelic Pill was kind of disappointing - a few great tracks (basically the epic ones), but I didn't think it was a great album. Tour was great though, glad I caught it.

Love Le Noise though. That and Americana were Neil's two great albums of the 2010s, IMHO.

inexcusable slander w/r/t Le Noise and Psychedelic Pill

These are the only post-95 Neil records I've heard, I liked a couple of tracks from each but mildly enough to think, "If this is the cream I can do without the rest for now". I'm a late adopter though, I just listened to Freedom for the first time this afternoon. I should get to Barn some time after I turn 80.

aw Alfred I'm sorry I'm being dickish

I have the impression that every time Neil Young releases a new album, it is to pretty positive reception, only for about everyone to forget about that album a year later and claim that none of his post 2010 (or even post 2000) work is worth much. I think it'll be the same with Barn, which on first listens sounds like continuing the overall sounds & quality of all of those records.
And those, I think, ARE good. Obviously not as overwhelmingly spectacular as 70s Neil. And the typical comfortable Neil song of these days might maybe be very good, but on the other hand also tends to not be overly memorable.

Psychedelic Pill is an obvious standout with it's lengthy stompers; I myself would name Storytone as a beautiful post-2010 highlight, but I don't see much wrong with Peace Trail, The Visitor or Colorado & now Barn - I enjoy them all a great deal.

aw Alfred I'm sorry I'm being dickish

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown),

haha no worries at all. I thought xgau was in my rear view mirror.

Christgau appears in a pair of Young-themed DVDs I just watched with my brother, The First Decade and Three More Decades, released in 2006. It's 20% performance clips, 10% contextual voiceover and 70% critics weighing in. I think the only studio album that doesn't get a mention or appear onscreen is Landing On Water.
Xgau says he became a Young convert seeing him with CSNY live in New York in 1970. I was curious to see Johnny Rogan, whose 1982 Young biography must have been one of the first rock books I ever read. Rogan defends Greendale while Barney Hoskyns says that the Greendale shows appalled him with their arrogance and convinced him that Young had lost his spark.

i listened to barn on friday and found the best parts completely interchangeable with any number of new millennium neil albums: decent for sure, but certainly nothing revelatory. i enjoyed it while it was playing, but have not felt the urge to hear it again. two and a half mics.

This has been my experience for the last 20 years of NY.