nowtoronto.com/issues/2007-10-11/music_discs6.php

Discs
NEIL YOUNG Chrome Dreams II (Warner)
Rating: NNN

Not that Neil Young needs to reaffirm his proclivity toward eccentric behaviour, but in lieu of a new rockabilly recording, he decided to follow his Living With War tirade with a rejoinder to an album named after a David Briggs doodle that was shelved some 30 years ago and never officially issued.

Although Young's compositions on Chrome Dreams II aren't quite up to the quality planned for the first volume (i.e., Pocahontas, Will To Love, Like A Hurricane, Sedan Delivery, Look Out For My Love, etc), the 10 songs at least have some of the shape and gravity if not the epic dimension of his classics written decades ago.

As the years pass, Young seems progressively more prone to settle for mediocre ideas and hammer away at them longer, stretching them out with pointless guitar wank (and there's loads of it here) that some fans might actually enjoy. But I prefer the sort of concise poetry that went into the three-minute-and-23-second version of Powderfinger.

Neil Young returns to Massey Hall November 26, 27 and 29.

--Tim Perlich

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Sharry (Up in T.O. keepin' jive alive)