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