Neil Young

[Jahfin]

Click on the image for more info.

[Charles_Obscure]

FANTASTIC!

Simply fantastic news...

Thank you Jahfin for the news!

[Fan_S.]

↑ Can't wait to see it! I loved their collaboration (Demme & Young) in that great film, a couple of years ago, Neil Young, A Heart Of Gold!

[Edwin]

Trunk Show set listing :

Sad Movies (previously unreleased)

Harvest

Cinnamon Girl

Oh Lonesome Me

Kansas

Spirit Road

No Hidden Path

Ambulance Blues

Mellow My Mind

The Believer

Like A Hurricane

Cowgirl In The Sand

The Sultan

[Jahfin]

In addition to his new album, Le Noise, which is due to drop on the 28th of this month (Sept.), Neil will also be reforming Buffalo Springfield for this year's Bridge School Benefit in October. More info here, the lineup is listed below.

Saturday

Buffalo Springfield

Pearl Jam

Elvis Costello

Merle Haggard and Kris Kristofferson

Lucinda Williams

Billy Idol

Jackson Browne and David Lindley

Modest Mouse

Grizzly Bear

Sunday

Buffalo Springfield

Pearl Jam

T-Bone Burnett’s Speaking Clock Revue featuring Elton John, Leon Russell, Elvis Costello, Ralph Stanley, Neko Case and Jeff Bridges

Elvis Costello

Merle Haggard and Kris Kristofferson

Modest Mouse

Grizzly Bear

[Jahfin]

New Neil:

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid88099121001?bctid=608837617001

Edited to add: Is there any way to embed videos besides those hosted on YouTube such as Vimeo or this one (which comes from Gawker)?

Edited September 14, 2010 by Jahfin

[Jahfin]

From showbizspy.com:

Neil Young Refuses To Play With A Band Again

NEIL Young doubts he’ll ever work with a band again.

The rocker — whose closest collaborators, filmmaker Larry “L.A.” Johnson and multi-instrumentalist and producer Ben Keith, died in the last nine months — says he’ll perform the majority of his material as a solo act.

“There is about 70 percent of my repertoire that I will never do again with a band,” Young told the Chicago Tribune newspaper.

“There is no sense in trying to redo what was already great. There’s no payoff in that. That’s not what I’m about.

“I’m thankful to have known Ben and played with him for 40 years. He was one of my best friends and I miss him very much. I don’t see myself playing those songs with a band in the future. I can play them by myself, but I can’t play them with a band.

“I just don’t think I could handle it. I don’t know anybody who can do what he did. It closes a door on a period of my life, and it also opens up a giant space for me to be creative in the future.”

Young then discussed solo acoustic album Le Noise, which is due out Sept. 28.

“It’s folk-metal,” he says with a laugh. “We got this sound on the guitar that was very exciting to us. There’s the singularity of a folk performance on the guitar, but with a heavy-metal civilization of sound around it.”

[Jahfin]

Another clip from Neil's new Le Noise record:

Edited September 29, 2010 by Jahfin

[Rock N' Rollin' Man]

Two songs sounded good. Neil is such a prolific guy puts out an album a year or just about.

Edited October 2, 2010 by Rock N' Rollin' Man

[Jahfin]

Two songs sounded good. Neil is such a prolific guy puts out an album a year or just about.

He can be very hit or miss though. I like what little I've heard of the new record but I'm not quite intrigued enough to buy it. Yet.

When you find yourself with an extra 40 minutes or so on your hands you might wanna give this a looksee, it's the full Le Noise film:

Edited October 2, 2010 by Jahfin

[kenog]

Neil Young has never had much time for journalists - or even his fans. So how did Rod Liddle, a journalist and lifelong admirer, fare when he met his hero for the first time, in California?

The Times (London); Oct 3, 2010; Rod Liddle; p. 26 Full Text:

(Copyright © Times Newspapers Limited 2010)

We're at a log-cabin restaurant in the middle of a damp, silent redwood forest just south of San Francisco, a handful of miles from Neil Young's ranch. Young is inside, finishing an interview with the Canadian broadcaster CBC, and I'm next, so this is a nervy time, because the singer is not terribly keen on journalists and most usually takes the piss out of them, or is truculent, or monosyllabic, or just grouchy. Difficult, one way or another, and full of disdain.

It is not nice to be disdained. I crunch around outside in the gravel and dirt lot, smoking -- this may be the only place in California where you can smoke -- and wonder how I might ingratiate myself. But that doesn't usually work either -- as we will see, he has even less time for his fan base than he does for hacks.

Inside, the television lights are being dismantled, so I make my way into the bar area and tentatively ask Jasmine, the CBC babe: "Happy, then?" "Believe me," she replies, "shit like this don't determine my state of happiness, y'know. This is just, like, work." Uh-oh.

There's another reason to be nervy about this interview. For 36 years, I have had the perfect relationship with Neil Young: he makes an album, I buy it; he plays a show somewhere, I go see it. This has been true since, as a 14-year-old kid, I bought On the Beach, unheard, on the strength of a damning review I'd read in, I think, the NME. The reviewer was so utterly mystified, I just had to have the record, so I saved up my pocket money for six weeks and bought it. Only much later was On the Beach cited as a work of unparalleled genius, and so on, and much the same process applied to his next extraordinary release, Tonight's the Night -- first the mystification and bewilderment, then, rather later, the extravagant praise -- and, for that matter, many, many subsequent recordings. This in part explains his disdain towards the press: often, they don't get it. Yet I'm not sure I want to jeopardise what has been, hitherto, a perfectly happy relationship. You don't get many perfect relationships in life, do you?

Now he is seated across the table from me in this charming backwoods restaurant, flanked by his producer and fellow Canadian, the appropriately leather-clad and affable Daniel Lanois, with whom he has collaborated on his latest album, entitled, punningly and as a backhanded compliment, Le Noise. It is an odd thing, being face to face with Neil Young. He is much bigger, much more substantial than you would assume from those emotive whining vocals.

He doesn't have the hollowed-out, drugaddled, skeletal face of many rock'n'roll survivors, your famous Keith Richards mask. Nor the expensively acquired youthfulness of the more mainstream old lags of pop. Rather, with the acres of stubble and the pouchy skin around the eyes, the encroaching sideburns, the dress-down grunge T-shirt and loose jacket, he resembles a 64-year-old plumber whom you have called out early on a bank holiday to fix your cistern, who is not awfully pleased to have been called out and who is probably going to overcharge you as a consequence. There is a worryingly appraising look in those eyes and the shadow of an ironic smile playing about that lopsided mouth.

Le Noise is a very good album indeed, perhaps Young's best since Sleeps with Angels, back in 1994. A lot is made by both Young and Lanois during the interview of the unique nature of the album -- just Young alone with an acoustic or electric guitar, which is then subjected to Lanois's clever sonic interference, with those strangulated vocals sometimes looped and Young's two favourite electric guitars squalling or growling away in the background. It is (surprisingly) true that, live records apart, Young has never recorded an album in this way, without a band, although I am not sure it is quite so singular in the history of popular music as the two of them seem keen to insist.

"This is what the old bluesmen, you know, John Lee Hooker, were doing. This is getting right back. We hit the mother lode with this one," Lanois says, full of congratulatory awe at himself and Young. Well, yes, they were, up to a point -- and quite a few non-old-bluesmen have done the same since, not least the late John Martyn. They are protesting a little too much, and making claims that they do not really need to make -- for this is, as I've mentioned, a wonderful album, and Lanois is no small part of it, not merely tinkering around at the edges, but even convincing Young to drop whole verses, to change the structure of his songs. It is a genuine collaboration and commended as such by the album title. If there is a similarity with any former album of Young's, it is with Freedom (1989), a collaboration with another auteur-producer, Niko Bolas, where gentle acoustic melodies are suddenly usurped by howling guitar and feedback. "This is a close-up," Young asserts, "an extreme close-up. You can't have anything better."

Young continues, saying he enjoyed the freedom of not having to write songs for a band: "I wanted to make a solo record, where I don't have to make any decisions about having to write in a certain way because of, you know, the band. This opened certain doors for me, where there's no limitations." It is interesting for a fan, like me, to know that he writes in this way, that the songs sort of follow the band, from the magnificent raucous lumbering of Crazy Horse to the plangent country rock of the Stray Gators (who gave him his biggest British hit with Harvest, back in 1972). With this record, Young apparently performed sitting alone with a guitar, then Lanois went to work in the studio.

Le Noise has been greeted with equal parts adulation and that usual mystification by both the press and the Young obsessives. The fan sites want another crunching rock album, like Zuma or Ragged Glory, or maybe another sweet country album, like Harvest or Comes a Time. They get cross when he does stuff like Le Noise, just as they got cross when he made Tonight's the Night. They get cross when he confounds expectation -- yet almost every Neil Young record has confounded expectation. That, you might argue, is the point.

Young guffaws. "You never, ever listen to your fan base. The last thing you should ever do is follow your fan base. That's all they are -- a fan base. There's no ownership. I don't have to deal with them... They get angry about the very things that they seem to value, that make them fans in the first place," he says, humorously exasperated. That sense of ownership of the artist, enhanced by the internet sites, has a fascistic side to it. One Neil Young site has asked: "Should Neil be allowed to follow his muse?" Young shakes his head: "These people... should your fan That's all are -- a I don't deal with they need to have something to do."

It is true that if the fans had had their way, there would have been no On the Beach orTonight's the Night; and if the fans of those two albums had had their way, no American Stars 'n Bars, or Trans. He does something different every time. This is what marks him out as a performer; that and the fact that he has a better grasp of that limited and overrated medium, rock music, than anyone you care to name. It is probably true that Young could not have written a song as neat and perfect as Bob Dylan's Simple Twist of Fate; it is equally true that Dylan could not have made an album as musically attuned as Tonight's the Night, where the raw performances and instrumentation matched the tenor and feel of the songs.

Tonight's the Night still stands as his greatest album, the closest -- in Young's words -- that he has come to art. But if you ask him to compare it to any of his other records, he won't play ball, won't engage. They are all good, or all bad, or all indifferent, or all three of these things. He won't draw lines between them, even those that are genuinely awful, such as Journey Through the Past and the comparatively recent Are You Passionate? I ask him whether he is a good judge of his own material. "God, no, no, no, I'm a terrible judge. That's why I had him for this album," he says, nodding to Lanois.

He has been eviscerated, too, for the occasional political faux pas, as far as the liberal music press was concerned -- the lefty hippie who said that maybe Reagan was a better bet than Carter back in 1980, and later supported Ross Perot's bid to win the presidency. On the first point, there are surely few who would disagree with him now. "I'm not going to not say things just because other people might disagree with them," he says. He insists that he is not primarily a political songwriter, and that he tries to see even the most right-wing of politicians, such as Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, as human beings. A few years back, he released Living with War, a fine and again confounding album full of rage about George W Bush's war against Iraq, the furious Let's Impeach the President. It sits oddly with his assertion that he is not political, but he has said it was made because so few contemporaneous -- ie, young -- artists were making the same sort of stand. What about the likes of Conor Oberst, of Bright Eyes, I ask him?

"I meant in the mainstream. Such as, hey, you know... how about Britney Spears? It would have been great if Britney Spears had made a record about it . You know, she's awesome, a brilliant performer, made some great records."

have to them' I like the idea of a Britney album about the invasion of Iraq. I think that's a good call, and some enterprising producer should get on the case right now.

Before my time is up, I ask Young about Time Fades Away, a lost live album of his that has never been released on CD, and is much loved by that aforementioned fan base. Young is capricious and stubborn even over past material of his that the critics adore -- On the Beach was not released on CD for 20-odd years, and Time Fades Away will have spent nearer 40 languishing only on vinyl (which might nonetheless be the best medium for it). Yes, he says, Time Fades Away will be released as part of his archive series, a long and exhaustive process. It will be released one of these days.

Then I'm out of there, the log cabin in the woods, and the next journalist waiting is saying to me: "Happy, then?" Well, hey, bud, shit like this don't determine my state of happiness.

'The last thing you should do is follow your fan base. That's all they are -- a fan base. I don't have to deal with them'

[Hotplant]

He can be very hit or miss though. I like what little I've heard of the new record but I'm not quite intrigued enough to buy it. Yet.

When you find yourself with an extra 40 minutes or so on your hands you might wanna give this a looksee, it's the full Le Noise film:

Thanks for posting that, and when I have those 40 minutes I will check it out, as Neil is in my top five...or so.

I really am dismayed with rock concerts these days but I SO SO would have LOVED to see Buffalo Springfield. *sigh*

Some of my favorite songs of his were with Springfield.

I really need to move to California, for many reasons.

[Jahfin]

Thanks for posting that, and when I have those 40 minutes I will check it out, as Neil is in my top five...or so.

I really am dismayed with rock concerts these days but I SO SO would have LOVED to see Buffalo Springfield. *sigh*

Some of my favorite songs of his were with Springfield.

I really need to move to California, for many reasons.

A few clips from yesterday are starting to pop up on YouTube, here's one for For What It's Worth:

[Hotplant]

I checked those out and I think so far my fav was Mr Soul.

Neil sounds GREAT. Stills was a bit rusty.

I loved how Neil had the Bridge School kids right on stage with him. Bless his heart.

Now if I can just hear Expecting To Fly . Haven't had time to check out if they even played it. Hope so.

Thanks Jahfin.

[Jahfin]

I checked those out and I think so far my fav was Mr Soul.

Neil sounds GREAT. Stills was a bit rusty.

I loved how Neil had the Bridge School kids right on stage with him. Bless his heart.

Now if I can just hear Expecting To Fly . Haven't had time to check out if they even played it. Hope so.

Thanks Jahfin.

Keep an eye on the Thrasher's Wheat blog. I'm sure they'll post last night's setlist soon. Here's the setlist from the first night:

[Hotplant]

I see... great set.

Kind Woman

Bluebird

Good ones for sure, Must have been a lovely evening.

They were awesome.

I saw some pro photogs there, so perhaps it will be released.

Nicccce!

[SickTangerine]

Wow.

In the past month I've really gotten into his albums, especially most of his 70's stuff. It's an incredible journey to listen to Nei'ls albums, like I only had Harvest and Everybody knows This is Nowhere before this month.

I'm so glad I discovered "Neil Young", "On the Beach", "Tonight's the Night" and the Rust albums. They're brilliant! Everything Neil does (yes even his weird 80's stuff) is great. It may be leaning on someone elses style but you can ALWAYS tell it's Neil.

Anyoen else here like On the Beach as much as I do? I think it deserves more recognition than Harvest, Harvest is good but On the Beach is fantastic. That's just my opinion. The whole second side of the album is so mellow, ultimate music to just sit back and think to.

[Jahfin]

On the Beach was finally released on CD and for good reason. I loved when Neil sat in with R.E.M. at one of the Bridge School benefits and they covered Ambulance Blues. What's your take on Neil's more recent output?

[SickTangerine]

I haven't actually really listened to more of his recent output. Listened to some of Le Noise, and I think it's pretty damn good. Creative too.

[Jahfin]

I haven't actually really listened to more of his recent output. Listened to some of Le Noise, and I think it's pretty damn good. Creative too.

Just curious. As I previously mentioned in this thread, his work can be hit or miss. I always make it a point to at least sample a few tracks from his newest albums whether it be via a YouTube clip or something on his website. I'm certainly intrigued by Le Noise but it hasn't been enough to compel me to fork over the cash for it just yet. On the other hand, I haven't missed any of his archival releases (save for the Archives, Vol. 1 boxset). That's a bit pricey and is apparently rather redundant. I always understood it would be mostly unreleased stuff but evidently it's not.

[SickTangerine]

Just curious. As I previously mentioned in this thread, his work can be hit or miss. I always make it a point to at least sample a few tracks from his newest albums whether it be via a YouTube clip or something on his website. I'm certainly intrigued by Le Noise but it hasn't been enough to compel me to fork over the cash for it just yet. On the other hand, I haven't missed any of his archival releases (save for the Archives, Vol. 1 boxset). That's a bit pricey and is apparently rather redundant. I always understood it would be mostly unreleased stuff but evidently it's not.

I agree, upon listening to a lot of his stuff, after the 70's (and even in the the 70's) most of his albums tend to have one or two really great songs (there are exceptions of course), and the others seem to sound like every other generic country/piano/harmonica song he's written

His 80's output is scary imo. When I first listened to Transformer Man (from Trans) I nearly crapped my pants. Of course not all his albums are like that in the 80's, but at least he's not afraid to try new styles.

I also don't really see the point of his archives series, asides from the live albums that he is releasing with it and the huge boxset thing, the rest are just remastered albums. However I am thinking of saving up for the Vol. 1 boxset, it just seems interesting and I need more Neil on CD.

[GoneFishing]

I haven't actually really listened to more of his recent output. Listened to some of Le Noise, and I think it's pretty damn good. Creative too.

Just got it on Vinyl it is hands down very good.Worth the purchase very rootsy.

[Reggie29]

His 80's output is scary imo. When I first listened to Transformer Man (from Trans) I nearly crapped my pants. Of course not all his albums are like that in the 80's, but at least he's not afraid to try new styles.

I saw Neil for the first time in the early '80's and he played for over three hours without any extended breaks, first solo, then with The International Harvesters and brought it home with Crazy Horse.

He helped in the development of the voice decoder used on Trans.

Sample and Hold is one of my favourites along with Like an Inca and the rest of the album is not too shabby, either.

Some people can never be satisfied, if he stayed with the same old formula he would be bagged for not trying something different and when he does he gets bagged for straying away from it.

It's better to burn out than to just fade away......

[SickTangerine]

I praise him a lot for trying a lot of different styles. It's great and fresh, instead of sticking it safe he always did what he really wanted to do. I was just saying that when I first heard Trans it scared me cause I was only used to be his early 70's stuff at that point Also just to clarify, by scary I mean genuinely frightening, not like "bad" scary. It honestly frightened me, the wailing vocals and what not.

Plus there is a nice story behind his use of the vocoder, I read because his son understood him better when he talked through it (since he had cereberal palsy), so you could say the album is almost a reaching out to his son, and in that case it's really great. You guys probably knew that, but eh

Edited October 30, 2010 by SickTangerine

[Jahfin]

The first time I saw Neil in concert was on the Trans Tour. The first half was just him, an acoustic and a harmonica. The second half was the Trans set. It was quite bizarre but also ahead of it's time. As I'm sure you will recall, Neil was sued by his label (Geffen) at the time for making "uncharacteristic and uncommercial music" which included Trans, Everybody's Rockin' (with the Shocking Pinks) and Old Ways. I admire Neil greatly because, like Dylan, he does what he wants and doesn't care what the general public (or record labels) think. Also, like Dylan, he's released a lot of pure crap but when he's on, he's capable of knockin' it out of the ballpark. Like any truly great artist, it would be impossible for him to be "on" all of the time, that's why we love him.