Ok, I quite like "Heart of Gold", I really like "Cinammon Girl" and "Borrowed Tune". Apart from those though, Neil Young sucks arse! I can't get why he's so revered. "Tonight's the Night"...no it isn't.

I read that "Shakey" book and i'm still none the wiser.

What is it that makes the perma-plaid wearing mutton chopped thin voiced yokel a legend?

i really liked the "greendale" album.

Anxiety said:

thanks Anx, but i'm still not persuaded

Ambulance Blues
Tell Me Why
Barstool Blues
Motion Pictures
The Loner
See The Sky About To Rain
Thrasher
Old Man
Philadelphia
Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Down By The River
Cortez The Killer
Powderfinger
On The Beach
The Needle And The Damage Done
Don't Let It Bring You Down
Out On The Weekend
The Old Laughing Lady
Ohio
Stringman
I Am A Child

Listen to those and you'll get it.

His songs speak so much with so little.

I actually prefer him over Bob Dylan.

Dylan is like my favorite poetry book. But Shakey is that torn red rose I picked from a stoney pavement, that I slipped between the pages, soiling them forever.
[Edited 1/31/08 9:24am]
[Edited 1/31/08 9:36am]

LittleSmedley said:

If you're not feeling Tonight's the Night, he's just probably not up your alley. That's one of his best albums: "Bruce Berry was a working man..."

I can completely see why people hate his voice, but I personally love it. Everytime I hear it, it reminds me of how untainted he was by the whole corporate music scene. Also, his guitar is like an extension of his voice--he's able to pull a ton of emotion out of just a few notes. His brand of rough minimalism went on to affect a whole generation of indie rockers. Or something like that

I can't get into him either. I can't get past his voice I guess.

Great songs, but hate his voice. More than Dylan, who I actually like to listen to. I just can't listen to Neil Young.

I was watching him perform once (I think it was the Last Waltz), and I was wondering if maybe he was retarded or autistic. I don't know quite why.

LittleSmedley said:

yeah, i wasn't really doing my best to be persuasive.

i just like the "greendale" album.

forkupine said:

I cannot listen to that song without bawling. Beautiful! I was hoping that song would win the Oscar over the Springsteen tune.

Anxiety said:

i was being mildly sarky

have you read "Bowie, Bolan, and the Brooklyn Boy" yet? Visconti's book. I'll send it to you if you haven't, i've finished it.

LittleSmedley said:

mild sarky goes great with a beer chaser.

and no, i have not read that book yet. i don't think it's been released in the states yet.

super nice offer, though. thanks!

Its really just an aquired taste but you cant deny the talent in writing and bringing songs to fruition. Im not big on Neil or even Bob for that matter i have some of their stuff and i respect them, i was more into Harry Chapin,Springsteen, Mellencamp who had similar abilities for story telling, especially Harry.

I've been able to get more into him over the years but I feel the same way about him that I feel about Dylan: Love their songs, but hate hearing them perform them most of the time.

I've never been bothered by this man's voice. The first time I heard him (Out On The Weekend) years ago the music clicked with me immediately. Actually, I had more problem with Prince's falsetto during the early days. Of course, now I love them both to bits.

LittleSmedley said:

I'm not a Young fan, either. I would say that a lot of his "legend" status comes from the perception that he's achieved success and longevity while operating outside the "system".

Of course this is complete and total malarkey.

Ace said:

I'm not a fan,
but I'm curious....
how do you know, Ace?

Neil, like Dylan, is an acquired taste, mostly down to his voice. Some like it, some compare it to a castrated goat begging for its bollocks back.

Neil ain't like Dylan though. Dylan's made mostly great albums. Neil's been a lot more hit and miss. After The Gold Rush, Tonight's The Night, On The Beach, Rust Never Sleeps, Freedom, Ragged Glory, Harvest Moon and Sleeps With Angels are all great albums.

The other albums, up to and including Broken Arrow, all have a lot of great songs on them - apart from Everybody's Rockin', which was an expensive fuck you to Geffen, who asked him to make a rock n roll album; so he did just that - made an album of rock n roll covers and pastiches. Of particular interest is the very troubled, unloved "Geffen Period", which spanned the early to late eighties. He made a very controversial (among his fans) album called Trans, which was like country Kraftwerk.

Unfortunately, I think Neil's really crap now. Everything he's done since David Briggs, his producer and, I think, muse/alter-ego died, has been pretty fucking dire. The albums from Silver & Gold to Greendale had one or two great songs on them, but you had to wade through a lot of mediocre mulch to find them. Post-Greendale, the albums have been uniformly crap. Ok, the last one, Chrome Dreams 2, had Ordinary People on it - an eighteen minute epic, and one of his finest ever songs. The catch? It was an outtake from the 1988 Bluenotes album, and a fan favourite, because it's been bootlegged countless times (in a far superior live version).

And I completely agree with what Ace has said about Neil's "legendary" status being built on false perceptions. Neil has always been signed to a major record label - WB for most of his career, Geffen for a sort while. Trans aside, he's played very conventional music - folk, country and rock. He's abot as traditional and conservative as they come. Most of his lyrics are fucking dire, although, like New Order's Bernard Sumner, he'll accidentally write a great line.

I like him, heS' nice

Are you passionate?

is 1 great album.

I'm not a fan of his music,
but I don't mind his legendary status.
It doesn't really affect my ability to listen & enjoy my favorite music.
Come to think of it,
even the legendary status of an artist whom I like ( like good ol' Prince 4 example ) doesn't really affect my partiality to the music.

Neil ain't like Dylan though. Dylan's made mostly great albums. Neil's been a lot more hit and miss. After The Gold Rush, Tonight's The Night, On The Beach, Rust Never Sleeps, Freedom, Ragged Glory, Harvest Moon and Sleeps With Angels are all great albums.

You forgot to mention Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, Zuma and Comes A Time. And despite the critical backlash attributed to Neil Young's alleged "selling-out", I think Harvest can still be considered a great album. Live Rust, Weld, Unplugged, and the criminally unavailable on CD Time Fades Away are all underrated live albums as well.

And I completely agree with what Ace has said about Neil's "legendary" status being built on false perceptions. Neil has always been signed to a major record label - WB for most of his career, Geffen for a sort while. Trans aside, he's played very conventional music - folk, country and rock. He's abot as traditional and conservative as they come. Most of his lyrics are fucking dire, although, like New Order's Bernard Sumner, he'll accidentally write a great line.

While Neil has always been signed to a major label most of his choices as an artist are hardly conventional. It seems to me that he always adopts a kind of freewheeling attitude towards the creation of his albums. That's why most of them if not all are flawed and uneven, a number of them sloppily produced and unpolished. But they are regarded as classics nonetheless.

I don't get him either. One of the worst guitar players I've ever seen. And that counts every shlub I've seen at local shows.....

Shapeshifter said:

That is harsh. I think he has such a passionate vocal and his lyrics might be simple yet they are so powerful and true. And thinking back on "Prairie Wind", it was a great album.

I like "Country Home" on Ragged Glory.

Volitan said:

A dude I used to work with SWORE by NY's playing skills...

missed me by a country mile.

Volitan said:

If by worst you mean least technically proficient then I might agree. But Neil Young almost always wins me over by the passion and sheer emotion of his guitar playing. By fire, not by fireworks. Just listen to Powderfinger, Cortez The Killer and Cowgirl In The Sand.
[Edited 2/1/08 23:00pm]

forkupine said:

i'm sorry, the thing I saw of him playing was just outright terrible. Out of key bends. sloppy picking. It wans't a matter of not being techinically proficient, it was just bad.

VinnyM27 said:

I like his voice. I said it was an acquired taste.

Prairie Wind was absolutely fucking abysmal though. Sorry, Teddy.

forkupine said:

You're right - I forgot Time Fades Away (Don't Be Denied is a real wounded howl of a song), Zuma, Everybody Knows. I should also have mentioned Lucky 13, which was almost a new album, given the amount of unreleased stuff that was on there. I don't like Comes A Time much, and Harvest, apart from Out On The Weekend and Needle & The Damage Done leaves me pretty indifferent. I didn't include the live albums, because, great though they are (apart from that silly reggae version of Cortez The Killer), they're live.

I think Neil was at his most interesting when he was on Geffen. As in, he took risks. Otherwise, his albums follow a basic holding pattern of two rock to one one country.

forkupine said:

Exactly, just because he's always worked within the major label system doesn't mean his music was bound by its limitations. I don't think there's anything false about it. Even his last album "Living With War" had this great tossed-off, protest album vibe that few artists would ever be able to convince a major label to release.
[Edited 2/2/08 6:42am]