Neil Young Spring Part Three: Into the Ditch

How did Neil Young respond to massive success? By putting out the darkest, most disturbing music of his career, much of it intended to alienate his newfound audience. He himself admitted to doing this deliberately, the first of many such moves he would make in his career. This era also happens to be the one I return to the most. I went through a rough personal crisis in my mid-30s and this music spoke to it in ways nothing else could. It's interesting that Young himself made it hard to acquire some of these records until recently. You get the feeling that the darkness here is truly real and something he wished never to return to. After all, I'm not keen to relive the crisis that made this music make sense for me, either. 

Journey Through the Past, 1972

Young's first record after Harvest is one that he later never bothered to put on CD. It's not a proper album, but the soundtrack to the film he made of the same name. The film is highly experimental, weird, confusing, and ultimately not all that good. With the record and film Young seems to be announcing that he does not want to be America's newest singer-songwriter sensation. The album is a literal soundtrack, meaning all the sound from the screen is on this record. That makes it spotty as a listening experience because the film is a pastiche of live performances, studio recording, and strange images. The early tracks have promise, especially the blistering take "Southern Man" and the rageful version of "Ohio." Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the 15-minute version of "Words." This album is ultimately an interesting curiosity and not in need of tracking down. 

Rating: Three Neils

Time Fades Away, 1973

The cover of this live album always gets me. It's an altered photo of a shaggy hippy early 70s rock audience with a guy flashing a peace sign, wholly unaware of the slab of angry, discordant depression and sadness that Young is about to unleash. This is where his "Ditch Trilogy" begins in earnest, with Young hitting his audience expecting "Heart of Gold" with the likes of the harrowing "Don't Be Denied." It came after Young fired Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten from his touring band before they hit the road. That night Whitten died of an overdose, and Young carried the guilt of it all, blaming himself. The title song sets the mood well, a rambling saloon song about junkies and dashed hopes. This is a warts and all live record, complete with Young's voice cracking and the band sounding ragged. He does not play the hits, or any songs off of his records, for that matter. "Yonder Stands the Singer" is the only misstep, but I still have to give that one some points for its raucous energy. "LA" is a moody study of that city's special brand of ennui, the "city in the smog." "Last Dance" presents the quotidian workaday life as a grotesque trap to be escaped from. (Out of morbid kicks I will listen to this one on my commute.) The previously mentioned "Don't Be Denied" is my favorite, pretty much a straight autobiographical song. Young talks about his father leaving his family, moving to a new town, and getting beat up by the other kids in school. He discusses success with Buffalo Springfield as nothing more than "playing for the highest bid." I was not able to hear this one until I got a turntable because Young had not allowed it to be put out on CD. (He later changed his mind.) I can assure you it's worth listening to on its own merits, not as an exercise in tracking down a rare, long lost object. 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Tuscaloosa, recorded in 1973 and released in 2019

This concert in the Archives series comes from the same tour as Time Fades Away, but comes across as less desperate and scary. The white line fever of life on the road has not ground him down yet. You can also hear Young perform some songs from Harvest, and he plays them pretty straight instead of trying to confound his audience. There are some songs that will appear later, as well. I love the version of "New Mama" on here, a blistering electric take rather than the acoustic brooder it would become. (I prefer this version, especially Ben Keith's junk sick steel guitar.) Parts are ramshackle, but not as gloriously so as they would be on Time Fades Away. If you like the Ditch Era of Neil definitely check this one out.

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Roxy: Tonight's the Night Live, recorded in 1973 and released in 2019

This is a legendary show and the inaugural one at the Roxy nightclub in LA. Young had spent the prior months recording what would later be released as Tonight's the Night two years later with a hybrid of Crazy Horse and the Stray Gators dubbed the Santa Monica Flyers. He basically performed the whole album on a stage meant to mimic Miami Beach, with Young wearing sunglasses and a lightweight summer blazer. The goofiness helps mitigate the deep darkness of these songs, and I dare say, improves them. Tonight's the Night is a cathartic record, and with those feelings out of his system is ready to rock again. If anything, these songs are a rumination on the death of the 60s, which I ultimately feel is the thread drawing all of Young's Ditch stuff together. The band has been playing and recording these songs for months, and they sound really tight. As I've noticed on other live releases, Young feeds off the crowd when it's a good one. They are actually happy to hear unreleased material and seem to be in on his "Miami Beach" joke. It's a great listen and one I keep returning to.

Rating: Five Neils

Somewhere Under the Rainbow, recorded in 1973 and released in 2023

This is one of the latest "Official Bootleg" concerts, meaning it comes from an audience source. It was recorded in London and like the Roxy show leans hard on Tonight's the Night material. Unlike the other "official bootleg" releases, the lowered sound quality on this one is really distracting. That's a shame, because the Santa Monica Flyers are still tight and the setlist is interesting. Hearing this band take on "Helpless" was a highlight. Unfortunately, the sound is so garbled that I had a hard time enjoying this one, which is a real shame.

Rating: Three Neils

On the Beach, 1974

Like Time Fades Away, Young kept this album from getting reissued until the 21st century. When I finally heard it I was blown away, and before I embarked on this series I considered this a top five Neil Young album. While Tonight's the Night was recorded earlier, it would not be released until 1975. This album is far less intentionally abrasive because Young seems to have gotten the worst feelings out of his system. The first song, "Walk On," is practically sunny, reveling in the joy of leaving bad times behind. It's musically fitting for an album opener, but the themes get much darker after. "Revolution Blues" is sung from the point of view of the Manson Family, essentially, and "Vampire Blues" from the perspective of an oil company "sucking blood from the earth." "Motion Pictures" is a gorgeous lament of lost love, and "Ambulance Blues" is probably Young's definitive statement on the death of the 60s. His verdict: "you're all just pissing in the wind." Re-listening to this album I was struck by its uniqueness in his catalog, which is probably why I keep going back to it. 

Rating: Five Neils

Citizen Kane Jr Blues, recorded in 1974 and released in 2022

This is another Official Bootleg, one that gives a unique insight into the Ditch Years. Young performed a little acoustic show at the Bottom Line in New York, going back to his folkie roots. The show is really intimate, and key to any good Young concert recording, the audience is sympatico with him. The sound quality is not the best, but because it's just him and a guitar the limitations are not as noticeable as on other bootlegs. I had not heard this one until doing this project, and I listened on my headphones as I walked down Broadway in a rainstorm, which seemed to fit the mood. There are songs from Tonight's The Night and On the Beach, but I was most struck by the early rendition of "Pardon My Heart," which would later show up on Zuma. The crowd laughs at the dark humor of "you're all just pissing in the wind," which might be the intended response. Apart from sound quality this is a must-listen. 

Rating: Four Neils

CSNY 1974, recorded in 1974 and released in 2014 as part of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young

I must admit, I was not initially not looking forward to listening to this. As I mentioned in the last installment, I am not a huge CSNY fan. They are the ur-bougie hippies, symbols of resistance turned into cultural affectation. In 1974 they went on a massive tour despite not putting out any new material, leaning into their fundamentally bougie nature. This album is a box set put out forty years later and assembled by Graham Nash from live recordings. The thing is...I really like it. I might even like it better than Four Way Street, the document of their 1970 tour. The members of CSNY seem to be enjoying the break from their solo careers, and Nash does a good job of picking a wide range of songs to feature here. As always, Young brings some grit and much needed edge. I can't imagine what the typical CSNY fans thought when he reeled off dirges like "On the Beach." They also get more political with stuff like "Fieldworker," "Prison Song," and "Goodbye Dick." This set is really long and the campfire acoustic section gets too crunchy for my tastes, but this is an ideal road trip spin.

Rating: Four Neils

Homegrown, recorded in 1975 and released in 2020

Stuff like this is why people were so excited by the Archives project. Young had planned to put this album out in 1975, then decided instead at the last minute to release Tonight's The Night, which had been sitting on the shelf. Accordingly, some songs here show up later in his career in other forms on other records. When the album came out I was shocked to hear "White Line," a song I knew from 1990's Ragged Glory. There's also "Love Is a Rose," a song I had seen him perform on TV in the 90s that's a sort of remake of "Dance Dance Dance." Homegrown points to the folkier paths Young would return to in the second half of the 70s, but with similar themes to the Ditch material. He opens with "Separate Ways," a disarmingly frank song about the breakup of his marriage. I get the feeling he thought this was too personal for public consumption an opted for Tonight's The Night because that album's themes were more about the times than about the man. This is still an excellent record, even if it's not quite as powerful as the album he released in its place. It's a testament to Young's abilities in this era that he had whole secret albums just lying around. 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Tonight's the Night, 1975

As I mentioned before, this album was recorded in 1973, and by the time Young released it in 1975 it was already kind of an artifact. By this point he seemed to be shaking the "bad fog of loneliness" that envelops this record. Before I ever heard it, I read it was an inspiration to the Sex Pistols. The music does not sound like heavy punk riffage, but there is an immediate rawness to it that would define punk in a deeper way. His voice breaks (especially on "Mellow My Mind") and the production is entirely unadorned. This album feels like one long, raw meditation on the dead dreams of the sixties, starting with a title song about Young's roadie Bruce Berry dying from a heroin overdose. "Tired Eyes," about a murdered drug dealer who "tried his best but could not" brings this vibe across most powerfully. It's fitting that this album came out in 1975, post-Watergate, post-Vietnam, and post-postwar economic boom. People at the time were well aware that not everything in life works out. While this is an amazing record, I rarely listen to it because it replicates the feelings of being in a deep depression too well. 

Rating: Five Neils

Zuma, 1975

People like to talk of a "Ditch Trilogy" that ends with Tonight's the Night, but I like to think of Zuma as a coda. The vibe is much more fun, but Young is still wrestling with his failed marriage to Carrie Snodgrass. Musically this is still rough and ready with Young back riding the Horse again. This is the first album with Frank Sampedro on guitar in the Horse, and he seems to bring out some extra growl from the band. While the songs themselves are about the fallout of a broken relationship the music feels jaunty and fun at times. This is the sound of a person emerging from a time of darkness. The bad thoughts of the past weigh him down, but he's starting to look to the future. For that reason I find it to be an optimal post-COVID album. It certainly replicated a lot of my feelings over the last couple of years. I only have to ding it for the tiresome rock guy misogyny of "Stupid Girl."

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Dume, recorded in 1975 and released in 2020

This is a reimagined and lengthened version of Zuma with lots of new material recorded at the time. It adds to the shaggy vibe of the original album, and I daresay improves on it. The first track, an electric version of "Ride My Llama," is perfect for Crazy Horse's stomp and bash. The additional material tends to be more light-hearted, leaning into the shaggy vibe of the original. Even more than the original album, this is the sound of someone beginning to emerge from a deep funk.

Rating: Five Neils

Neil Young Spring Part Two: Find the Cost of Stardom

While Neil Young has been a popular artist for decades, there was only a very short period where he was a true star, with a name that people outside of the rock world would know. He later famously said of this period that he got tired of being in the middle of the road, and wanted to head into the ditch. In the early 70s, Young's folk music sound nailed the introspective, post-60s vibe perfectly, catapulting him to mainstream success. Young was not compromising himself to gain success, he had just inadvertently come into his own at the exact moment that his approach was the thing everyone was looking for. For that reason, the music still really holds up and does not sound like a time capsule.

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, 1969 (with Crazy Horse)

This right here is where Young is no longer in someone else's band or still feeling his way around. His first foray with Crazy Horse is killer top to bottom. There are the melodic hard rockers like the title track and "Cinnamon Girl," guitar workouts like "Down By The River" and "Cowgirl in the Sand," and spooky ruminations like "Running Dry." This is the only studio album with Young and the soon to be departed guitarist Danny Whitten together. I love his harmonies, and while the Horse is still great with both Pancho Sampedro and Nils Lofgren, Whitten had a wonderfully shaggy spirit that was never really replaced. More than anything, there is a confidence in this record that you can hear in the early live recordings but not in Young's earlier studio work. To me, this is the magic of Crazy Horse. To say they are not great musicians would be like saying Joan Crawford wasn't much of a mother. Nevertheless, they bring out Young's wild, creative, chaotic side. Young's work with Crazy Horse is why he is often considered a godfather of punk and grunge because he understood that feel and emotion and guts matter more in rock and roll than competence. There's plenty of other great Crazy Horse records, but maybe only one better (I'll get to Rust Never Sleeps eventually.) 

Rating: Five Neils

Live At The Fillmore East (1970), released 2006 (with Crazy Horse)

This was the first of the Archives releases I ever heard and it blew me away at the time and still does now. My only complaint is that it's too short! I'm guessing they did not have quality recordings of full concerts for this. The Horse smashes and thrashes and I enjoy the songs that feature Danny Whitten the most ("Wonderin'" and "Come on Baby Let's Go Downtown.") The versions of songs from the prior album are pretty great, too. 

Rating: Five Neils

Deja Vu, 1970 (with Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young)

Neil Young was ridiculously busy in 1970, putting out his own album while also joining Crosby, Stills, and Nash and touring with the band and solo. He gave that group the necessary grit that they had lacked on their first album, making Deja Vu far superior. Young's "Helpless" is an all-timer, and my favorite song on the record by far. I don't know if there's another song that describes the sense of all-consuming isolation you can feel as a child lying awake at night in a small town. Young's guitar and harmonies add a lot to the other songs and it's great to hear him and Stills duel at guitars again. The band followed this album with a huge tour, putting Young into the stratosphere of stardom, where he would not be comfortable.

Rating: Four and a half Neils

After the Gold Rush, 1970

While Crazy Horse's members play on this album, it's credited to Young alone. It's a dark and contemplative album, mostly sticking to quieter songs except for "Southern Man." The title song sounds cheesy today, but really encapsulates the rising environmental consciousness of 1970, the year of the first Earth Day. This is the first Young album I ever bought, included on side A of a cassette with Harvest on side B. I have a very distinct memory of one long, dark teenaged Nebraska night when I listened to "Don't Let It Bring You Down" and felt that song speaking to me in a moment of lonely melancholy. This is an album I have a very hard time listening to during the day. Some nights I would play it as I lay in bed, the jaunty "Cripple Creek Ferry" easing me into sleep. It's obvious here why Young would not be long for CSNY. The brooding melancholy does not lend itself to the hippie sunshine of "Teach Your Children." 

Rating: Five Neils

Live at the Cellar Door, recorded in 1970 and released in 2013

There are so many great live shows from this era that Young has released that it can be hard to differentiate them. This one has an interesting anomaly: "Cinnamon Girl" on piano. I can't imagine what it was like to be in that small audience and hearing Young lay down banger after banger, some of which had not yet even been recorded. He sounds tired and world-weary at points, probably exhausted by a year of whirlwind touring and recording. Despite that issue, he still sounds great.

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Carnegie Hall 1970, recorded in 1970, released in 2022

This show comes days after the Cellar Door shows, but on a bigger stage with a larger audience. This release is also part of Young's "official bootleg" releases, rather than the "Performance" series that Massey Hall and the Cellar Door fall into. Accordingly, the sound quality is not quite as good, especially in the earlier tracks on guitar. The songs on piano, however, are stunning. This album has my favorite version of "Birds." There's also a great moment where the audience is so inept at clapping along to "Sugar Mountain" that he asks them to stop (that really cracked me up.) 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Live at Massey Hall (1971), released in 2007

This show from Toronto was among the first Archives releases. There are plenty of shows from this era with releases now, but this is my favorite. This performance comes just a month after the Cellar Door show, but he sounds far more invigorated in front of the larger audience. The fact that he's back in Canada adds something special, especially on "Helpless" and "Journey Through the Past." There are some fantastic early versions of songs that would later appear on Harvest. "Old Man" has a burning passion here that elevates that already wonderful song. Stripped of their later bombast, "There's a World" and "A Man Needs a Maid" are truly revelatory. If you only want to listen to one Neil Young release from this period in his career, this should be the one. 

Rating: Five Neils

Young Shakespeare, recorded in 1971 and released in 2021

This performance in the Archives series was recorded only three days after the Massey Hall gig. It's strange that Young released such a similar show, but hearing these concerts one after the other has brought home just how powerful Young had become as a live musician in this period. The stage banter is not as light as the last time around, and his voice is not quite as strong. If I heard it without hearing any of the other shows, I would think it was a revelation, however. This is probably my least favorite of the recent live releases, but it's still really damn good. 

Rating; Four Neils 

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Royce Hall, Recorded in 1971, released in 2022

This is another one of the recently released "official bootlegs." It was recorded in January 1971, the same month as the prior two albums on this list. Listening to them one after the other gets a little repetitive, so I hope I am giving this one justice. Young's voice sounds stronger at this show, and the version of "Needle and the Damage Done" would later appear on Harvest. Unlike at Carnegie Hall, the audience knows how to clap along with "Sugar Mountain." Unfortunately, Young treats this beautiful song pretty flippantly. That fits the general laid-back vibe here. Some of the songs really shine. "Don't Let It Bring You Down" has an angry passion to it that I like. "Down By The River" has never sounded more anguished or threatening. 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

"I'm happy that y'all came down," recorded in 1971 and released in 2022

I thought I had listened to all of Young's recent "official bootleg" releases, but had overlooked this one. It comes from February of 1971, very soon after the Royce Hall show. In listening to these shows I've noticed that Young feeds off of the audience and their enthusiasm gives him a little extra bit of energy at the top. After joking with his audience he plays "Heart of Gold," the crowd unaware this unreleased song will be a number one hit in a year. I am not a fan of "A Man Needs a Maid" but this performance might have the most convincing version I've heard. "Don't Let It Bring You Down" is also especially powerful. Apart from the Massey Hall show this is my favorite of the live recordings of this era. I only had to knock it down half a star for the sound quality, which is still remarkable considering it's an audience recording.

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Four Way Street, 1971

In the 1970s there was a law that said that every rock band worth its salt had to record a double live album. The rock show itself had become a crucial "happening" and big business. In 1970 CSNY performed THE tour of the year, and this album is the artifact for those who wanted to remember and those who couldn't make it. Crosby, Stills, and Nash has always existed in that zone where the hippy meets the bougie, which is why Young's contributions are so key. Unfortunately, the live performances suffer from too much of a "hootenanny" vibe with an audience that doesn't know how to clap on the off beat. Nevertheless, when Stills and Young get a chance to cut loose the results are wonderful, as on the jammy version of "Carry On." I had not listened to this one before and won't revisit the whole album, but certain tracks are definitely superior to what's on the studio records.

Rating: Four Neils 

Harvest, 1972

This is a weird album considering it was the biggest seller of 1972 and Young's biggest hit record. It combines a song recorded live, some mellow country-tinged stuff recorded in Nashville, two songs featuring the London Symphony Orchestra, and some guitar-heavy songs put together at Young's ranch. Not all of it works, especially the bombastic orchestra on "There's a World" and the rambling "Words." Furthermore, "Alabama" is just a warmed-over version of "Southern Man." This album became a hit on the backs of "Heart of Gold," which went to number one, and "Old Man," one of the best songs in Young's canon. Listening to the latter yesterday with new ears I was blown away by what a perfect song it is. I still remember how it stopped me in my tracks when I first heard it as a teenager. Its power has not dimmed in the slightest. The Nashville touches provided by the Stray Gators (especially steel guitarist Ben Keith) gave these songs a quiet power that ensured they would be heard by a lot of ears. The early 70s was the heyday of the sensitive singer-songwriter, and Young put out "Heart of Gold" at the right exact moment for fame. Even the title and sepia tones of the cover feel warm and inviting. This album brought all the normies to the yard, and Young would soon decide to "head into the ditch" from the middle of the road, in his words. In that regard, "The Needle and the Damage Done" points the way forward to some years when his lyrics took a much darker turn. 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Archives Volume I, recorded 1962-1972 and released in 2009.

The Archives box sets aren't albums per se and include a lot of the albums listed, so I am using this place to discuss the material in the box from this period that was not on its own album. For instance, the almost psychedelic version of "Everybody Knows This is Nowhere" is pretty delightful. Some of these songs would appear live, like the fun "Dance Dance Dance." As far as I'm concerned, Bob Dylan's Bootleg Series is the only other similar project that matches this one for revelations. One of these days I am going to get the physical media version. 

Rating: Five Neils

Neil Young Spring Part One: Expecting to Fly

Part of the trick of a series like this is periodization, but in Young's case his first phase is pretty easy to divine: before Crazy Horse and after Crazy Horse. Even if he doesn't play most of his albums with the Horse, that's the moment when he went from being a member of a band to the leader of a band. His songs also picked up more confidence in that period. Young's early efforts show someone who, in the words of a song of this era, was "learning to fly."

Buffalo Springfield, 1966

When I was putting this series together I realized something that made Young different from Springsteen and Dylan: he had recorded with multiple groups. I decided not to limit this series to his solo records, since I think his time in group settings is really revealing. Young performed songs from his Buffalo Springfield days for years after so I think they should be included here. 

In the aftermath of the British Invasion the garages of North America exploded with rock bands trying to find a sound. Most of them cut a locally-released single or two then faded into obscurity. One of those bands was the Mynah Birds, Young's group after The Squires, a pre-Invasion surf rock band. He then famously moved from Canada to LA and met up with Stephen Stills to form Buffalo Springfield. Along with Love and The Doors they were part of a formidable scene that moved beyond garage rock into something more complex and profound. 

Buffalo Springfield would grow even more with their next album, but their debut puts them miles ahead of their contemporaries. "For What It's Worth," their big single (added to later versions of this album) is still used today as a shorthand for the 1960s in films and TV to the point of cliche. There's something spooky about this song and the Springfield's other best tracks on this record, like "Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing." Not every track is killer, but this is a strong first effort overall and a harbinger of what's to come. 

Rating: Three and a half Neils

Buffalo Springfield Again, 1967

Things come together much better with this album. Evidently the band took their time recording it, and it shows. It starts with "Mr Soul," an absolute barnburner where Stills and Young craft a killer twin-guitar attack. "Bluebird" contains a similar energy that pushes the song to the bursting point. I tend to like those rockers best, but there are a couple of moody, grandiose pieces by Young that point to something else: "Expecting to Fly" and "Broken Arrow." There is a painful longing in these songs that will go on to define some of his best subsequent work. Here, when he is so young, it verges on sounding adolescent and petulant. Even so, this is a fantastic record. If the band had managed to hold together I bet it would be their music, not the Eagles, all over classic rock radio for decades to come. While I would have been glad to have been spared The Eagles, we got CSN, Poco, and Neil Young's solo career out of the breakup, which is far better. 

Rating: Four and a half Neils

The Last Time Around, 1968

The last Buffalo Springfield album was mostly thrown together and Neil Young has disowned it, but I like it. There's a relaxed, hazy vibe I find appealing. "On the Way Home" and "I am a Child" are great Young compositions. Some of the songs stick out too much and others are half-baked but it's an enjoyable listen all around. The country touches point to how Richie Furay and Jim Messina would go on to form Poco, an unjustly forgotten country rock pioneer. Again, Buffalo Springfield could've been The Eagles, but better. Their three albums add up to a helluva greatest hits record, one everybody should own. 

Rating: Four Neils

Neil Young, 1968

Neil went solo with a self-titled record, a statement of independence. Believe it or not, I had never listened to this one all the way through before starting this series. It's been described as "uneven," and that's a fair assessment. The sound is very raw and moody, with Young not quite in control of the tone. "The Loner" is the key standout, one of the best songs he ever wrote. (I also used the "unplugged" version of this as a sort of personal anthem in my anti-social teenage years.)  These early records show an artist tapping into something unique and special, but he has not yet figured out to give it proper shape and definition. 

Rating: Three and a half Neils

Sugar Mountain Live At Canterbury House, recorded 1968 and released 2008

Now we are getting into Young's "archives" releases, which have more than paid off on their promise. Young had talked about it for years, building up high expectations and for once the hype was worth it. The production on his first record doesn't work for me; these solo live recordings give the songs the air they need. Young's links to what he later called "the old folkie days" are here. The eponymous song, which was later shunted off as a B-side, is one of his most beautiful. He wrote it as a 19-year old, already sad about childhood's end. I first heard it at 17 when I was having similar emotions and the song zapped me like few others ever have. This recording is interesting as a document, since it includes some hippie stage banter and a window into a lost world of folk music clubs. Young's voice and playing are top-notch and the emotions come through strong. Listening to this I can hear the seeds of the success that Young will soon harvest. (Yes, I intended that pun.)

Rating: Four and a half Neils

Live at the Riverboat 1969, released 2009

Here's another show from the Archives series from the same winter of 1968-1969. I had not heard this one before doing this project. A lot of the tracks are similar to the Sugar Mountain release, but the stage banter feels edgier in this one. The sound quality is not quite as good, but apart from that it's about the equal of the prior release. Both show that Young was maturing and ready to truly take flight. 

Rating: Four Neils

Introducing Neil Young Spring

I have mostly been writing over at my Substack and have been neglecting this more venerable space. Over there I wrote about the joy of reading Ulysses and the sorry state of social trust after COVID. I have been searching for a series to keep me writing over here, where I am more likely to let my freak flag fly. In the past I used full run-downs of Dylan and Springsteen albums to inspire me, and this year I figured I would devote spring on this blog to Neil Young.

Why Neil Young, apart from him being another legacy classic rock artist with a massive catalog? Well, Neil has been in the news. He is back on tour with Crazy Horse, and he has also ended his Spotify boycott. With his music more available again, I thought it would be great to give it all an evaluation. If I get a chance to see him live, this would be especially fruitful. 

I also want to add that I am one of the weirdos who subscribes to Neil's Archives site. This site allows you to hear his entire catalog of music with vastly improved sound and access to stuff you can't get elsewhere. I appreciate Young's independent-mindedness and his genuine desire to put out streaming music that sounds better. than what we get now. This also means that my series will cover EVERYTHING. I'm on break now, so get ready for the first installments to drop!

Shadow Show, "On a Cloud" (Track of the Week)

One thing that both thrills and depresses me is that there is an unending stream of amazing new music coming out every day. The embarrassment of riches is thrilling, but the fracturing of the listening audience is depressing. It's often hard to find this new music, and when I do, it's hard to find other people digging the same thing. When the encounters do happen it's amazing. A few weeks ago I was at a record store in Hoboken and the clerk was playing an album by the Sundays, a band I've recently returned to. I enthusiastically let her know this, and later when I bought a Ween live album she returned the favor by gushing about it. 

I thought I would share some new music today so the world has a slightly better chance of hearing it. I get a lot of my new music from New Jersey's freeform station WFMU. The other day as I drove to the train station I heard a song come out of my speakers that blew me away. When I stopped at a light I immediately turned on Shazam so that this nugget would not escape me. 

The guitars shimmered and jangled with pristine, pure beauty. The tight harmonies lifted me up further, ready to face my day ahead. The song in question is "On a Cloud" by Shadow Show, which I listen to multiple times a day. I know almost nothing about this band, other than I want a way to hear this sublime sound forever. 

Falling in love with a song and a band isn't that different from falling in love with a person. The desire can be persistent, insatiable, and even maddening. I remember when I became a Bowie-head in the late 90s. I bought practically his entire back catalog on CD in less than two years (and I was broke.) It is amazing to me that I can still get that crazy feeling of connection with a band that I used to have as a teenager. It's less fun, however, if you can't share it. I recommend that you go and tell people about your favorite new song the way you did in high school. I think it will make the world a better place. 

Ween, "Transdermal Celebration" (Track of the Week)

Life has been busy recently and I have been neglecting this blog and not cross-posting my Substack stuff. I wrote a primer on what I call "baby politics" about simple narratives low information voters have and how to address them. I also wrote about Inside Llewyn Davis and the dismal nature of February. Little did I know that things would get even worse!

Death took a relative and a colleague this week, and I took my own advice to wallow in my negative feelings a bit. After a few days I've come out on the other side and am ready to talk about the things that have been pulling me through.

One of them has been the music of Ween. They were a band I did not rate much in the 90s and early 2000s when their profile was highest. They seemed like a joke band and purveyors of the kind of deep hipster irony that I just didn't get as perhaps an overly earnest young person. My biggest encounter with them was hearing that "push the little daisies" song on Beavis and Butthead and the college radio station in grad school spinning "Bananas and Blow." 

It's fitting then that I would finally "get" Ween by hearing them on the radio. One of my favorite DJs on WFMU likes to spin them, and after loving every song he played I realized that I actually really enjoy Ween. It might be that I have started listening to lots of Zappa and Beefheart and so crave the weirdness. It might also be that I am not so earnest anymore and need to mock the world around me instead of trying so hard to fix it. Ween's irreverence has been a welcome addition to my life in a trying time. 

Hearing more of their music I also realized they have some truly heartfelt songs, and that the ironic front gets dropped in surprising and effective ways. I have been digging the Quebec album the most for that reason. I am not sure what "Transdermal Celebration" is even about, but it has a kind of joy of living beating inside it. That's a feeling that I think we could all use. Put it on and turn it up. 

Taylor Swift Is a Welcome Distraction at America's Most Dismal Public Event

It's Super Bowl Sunday, and this is the first Super Bowl I can remember whose discourse is dominated by someone who will be merely attending the event instead of playing or performing at halftime. There's already been a secondary discourse about why the hell conservatives seem so upset at Taylor Swift. I am not here to participate in that, but to proclaim that I welcome how she has added something new and welcome to the Super Bowl mix.

The Super Bowl is by far the most dismal event in American life, and that is saying something. It is supposed to be the championship game of a sport proven to turn its participants' brains into mush, a sport defined by the American dysfunctions of violence and commercial breaks. At this point, however, the Super Bowl is not really a football game. Half of the game's viewers probably have not seen a full football game this season. They are watching because it has become a media spectacle, one of the few that exists anymore that people from the entire broad social spectrum can participate in. It's also just another excuse for the excess consumption of tasteless lite beer and garbage food. It happens on a Sunday evening to boot, making work the next day even more miserable than your average Monday.

A significant chunk of the audience is watching just for the commercials. Is there anything more dismal than advertising being turned into entertainment? The structure of football itself makes this easy, considering that it has frequent breaks, and the ball is barely in play. Famously, there are only eleven minutes of action in a broadcast that lasts over three hours, and a lot of that action is boring two yard runs up the middle. The Super Bowl thus represents the triumph of capitalism where the advertising at the game ends up being more significant than the game itself. 

Even though I can't tear my eyes away, I've long felt that the Super Bowl sucks. It's certainly appropriate that due to changes in the NFL's schedule that it is played in mid-February, the most depressing, wretched time of the year. This year, Taylor Swift's presence has led to Super Bowl backlash for all the wrong reasons from the world's most irritating reactionaries. I, on the other hand, welcome her participation. She will give something to bond with my daughters over, who are normally lukewarm on this event. Swift is a cultural phenomenon on the level of Beatlemania right now, and like Beatlemania it's a lot of fun to participate in. Certainly a lot more fun than three hours of commercials.