Neil Young is quietly having yet another creative renaissance. Last year’s blog-post-as-album Fork in the Road was a blast of energy and spontaneity that was as much fun as it was charming (in that uniquely Neil way). Now he joins forces with producer Daniel Lanois for another potent burst of Neil idiosyncrasy. Here Neil is without a band, just grinding out six tunes of raw electric maelstrom (with two acoustic tunes thrown in to give audio relief) filtered through Lanois’s brilliant production techniques. Neil’s haunting wail is thrown through reverb and echo and an electric crunch that is primal.
At eight tunes it is rather short, but it makes its point, any more length would be overkill. As usual, there are a couple of throwaway songs (“Sign of Love” and “Rumblin’”), but the rest of the songs are quite good. “Walk With Me” opens the record with a wall of distortion, yet there is a catchy melody underlying the crunch. “Angry World” is an arresting listen, where his guitar is so distorted that it sounds like your speakers are busted. “Love and War” is an intriguing tune (one of the two acoustic numbers), because it addresses Neil’s well publicized and somewhat notorious Iraq protest album and show Living With War (a record which I consider to be one of his weakest efforts, regardless of politics). What I find interesting is that while he is unapologetic about his motives, he admits “I sang for justice but I hit a bad chord,” but he asserts that he will continue to sing about the duel topic of the title. Young is one of those rare artists who is loved by his fans as much for his failures as for his triumphs.
The other acoustic tune is a noble attempt at a historical epic, “Peaceful Valley Boulevard,” that fails, but just barely. Neil has always used American Indian imagery wonderfully in his music (from “Pocahontas” to “Cortez the Killer” to “Inca Queen”), and the first part of this song is beautifully constructed while addressing the conquest of the American West with memorable imagery ("...before the railroad came from Kansas City / and the bullets hit the bison from the train...") It loses some steam as he tries to bring it to a modern environmental message in the latter half of the tune, though. Again, noble effort with a haunting acoustic accompaniment which Lanois renders as open as the Plains that Neil sings about.
The highlight here is clearly “Hitchhiker,” which already ranks with Neil’s all time greats in my book. It is actually a tune he has had lying around since the late 70's, by some accounts. I have a bootleg of him doing an acoustic version back from about 1992. But here he and Lanois transform it into a savage journey into Neil’s heart of darkness. It is great to hear Crazy Horse-esque crunch sans Crazy Horse. It is the sound of Neil playing the distorted electric part of a song that is waiting in vain for its drums and bass. That tension just adds to the desperation of the tune. Neil goes through a litany of drug experiences, giving hash, grass, cocaine, valium and amphetamine each a verse, while tracing his life from his Toronto beginnings to the current times (“how many years have come and gone / like so many friends and enemies”), and tellingly adding a verse of Aztec and Incan mysticism. It is a harrowing song and is what makes Neil Young such a vital artist going into his fifth decade as a recording artist. I can’t think of anyone else who has stayed so vital and so relevant for so long in rock and roll.
ABOVE: The video for "Hitchhiker." Well worth watching and cranking up to 11. This is a revitalized Neil Young. Sorry for the ad they make you watch before the video.
Dez says: **** out of *****
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