this is the default category / most important part of the front-page. Most posts come in as news/articles.
Brooklyn’s Barclays Center has announced that Neil Young and Crazy Horse will perform at the arena on December 3rd, about a week after their show at Madison Square Garden.
Tickets will go on sale June 25th through Ticketmaster.
Published: 2012/06/13 by Jambands
by Brian Robbins
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
Americana
Reprise Records
The first voice you hear on Americana is that of Old Black, Neil Young’s beloved, beat-to-shit, one-of-a-kind Les Paul that has been by his side since the late ‘60s. Old Black barks out a little cluster of close-cropped notes that lead up to a bit of gasoline-and-phlegm-soaked garage raga – the sort of drone and roar that shakes the bicycle pump right off the tenpenny nail driven into one of the 2×4 wall studs. Billy Talbot’s bass rumbles around the cement floor; and Ralph Molina’s drums sound like they’re exploding off the snow shovels tucked overhead in the rafters when he fires off a preliminary roll seven seconds in. The drums diddle with the beat for a few moments as the guitar stretches and groans, everything sounding restless and unsettled.
It’s the bass that finally brings things together with a defined groove at the 0:15 mark, freeing Old Black to get all snaky with a dollop of grunge jazz that pops, burbles, and lurches its way across the fretboard down to the heavy strings like a zombie-eyed Duane Eddy. When Frank “Poncho” Sampedro’s Les Paul begins its own growling chug half a minute in, the package is complete: Neil Young and Crazy Horse have returned, folks. The subject is Americana – and the sonic drama just described would be the opening seconds of Track 1, a rollicking, lumbering version of “Oh Susannah”. Yeah: that “Oh Susannah”.
(A confession: when I first heard the Americana version, I immediately thought, “Oh, man – ol’ Neil has taken Stephen Foster’s tune and applied the groove from Shocking Blue’s “Venus” to it!” Yeah, well – there goes my career as a music sleuth: turns out “Venus” was inspired by Tim Rose’s re-arrangement of “Oh Susannah”, as recorded by The Big Three in 1963 and Tim Rose & The Thorns in ’64.)
Perhaps this collection of covers – everything from folk tunes to doo-wop with a national anthem thrown in for good measure – will mark the last time that critics (and fans) refer to one of Young’s “phases” or “detours” … as if there was something that he was supposed to return to. Sooner or later, it’s gong to become obvious: whether it be a stripped-down acoustic arrangement of a message rooted deep in his heart or this joyously thrashed-out collection of songs by others, it’s all Neil Young’s music … the sound he was guided to by the muse. This is the trip – not a rest stop.
And what a trip it is. Offering up statements on the condition of the world without actually making any statements, Young and Crazy Horse peel back some layers and apply some topical sonic ointment. “High Flyin’ Bird” swoops, soars, and moans its “sit down, can’t fly, oh Lord I’m gonna die blues.” “She’ll Be Comin’ ‘Round The Mountain” is transformed into “Jesus’ Chariot”, its roar and thunder more second-gear diesel than second coming of the Savior. A jaunty butt-slapping-the-saddle rhythm and some ghostly Sons of the Pioneers-style moans manage to both take the edge off the lyrics of “Gallows Pole” and make the song even more haunting; “Tom Dula” is loaded with explosions of Old Black (amp tubes were harmed during the making of this album … they must have been).
In the old days, Crazy Horse was originally a doo-wop group – muscles which they get to flex on Americana’s version of “Get A Job”. (Oh, to hear the late Danny Whitten sing those sha-na-na-nas.) And you be the judge of what tongue is planted firmly in what cheek as the stately grunge of “God Save The Queen” thumps and crashes away – noting the blending-in of lyrics from “My County ‘Tis Of Thee” … by a children’s choir. “Let freedom ring!” is the thought that closes the album.
In the process, the album sounds and feels like old friends playing their asses off and having a hell of a time doing it. Talbot and Molina are masters at distilling a tune’s pulse to its barest essence and driving it home. And why doesn’t Poncho Sampedro receive more credit for his distinctive guitar work? Harnessing this kind of ragged womp and crackling muscle would be enough of a challenge for one guitarist; listen to Sampedro’s deft power weaves with Young, shake your head and smile.
In the end, the experience of listening to Americana can be as shallow or as deep as you want it to be. My advice is to not overanalyze Neil Young’s reasons for rejoining forces with Crazy Horse at this point in time and doling out this collection of songs.
It’s this simple: the muse spoke.
They played.
Enjoy.
There will be a limited edition of 500 copies that are signed, numbered, and leatherbound for $500.
At age 65, Neil Young, with no ghost writer, tells his story. Conversational in tone we get it all– the music, the bands, his son the quadriplegic, his daughter’s epilepsy…he has never compromised and doesn’t start now. Comparable to the big bios like Bob Dylan, Keith Richards and Eric Clapton. Appearances on Fresh Air, Letterman, CBS This Morning all confirmed.
500 Limited editions for $500.00 apiece – signed, numbered, leather bound.
Details
ISBN: 9780399162848
SKU SKU3095
Weight 5.00 lbs
Author Neil Young
Publisher Blue Rider Press
Edition Signed limited hardcover
Page Count 416
Print Run 500
Release Date October 2012
Price: $500.00
“The publisher doesn’t provide an overview and there isn’t any information listed that it is autographed”
Neil Young grabs his second-highest-charting album as Americana debuts at No. 4 with 44,000. His only other set to surpass that ranking was 1972’s Harvest, which spent two weeks at No. 1. Americana, recorded with Crazy Horse, is mostly a collection of folk standards. A portion of its first-week sales came from a concert ticket/album redemption offer, a la Madonna’s MDNA release earlier this year.
more on: hollywoodreporter.com/ /adele-21-billboard-music-chart
June 11, 2012, 3:01 pm
For Neil Young, a Journey Through Rock and Rust
By PHIL PATTON
In the new documentary “Neil Young Journeys,” the musician, activist and car tinkerer of the film’s title recounts how he acquired a taste for the road.
Assured by a local bully that it would taste just like chocolate, the young Mr. Young ate tar right off of a street in his boyhood home, Omemee, Ontario.
“I guess that’s where my interest in cars began,” he says.
The documentary, scheduled to open in New York and Los Angeles on June 29, intercuts concert video with scenes of Mr. Young reminiscing about his upbringing as he drives a 1956 Ford Crown Victoria from Omemee to Massey Hall, in Toronto. The concert hall was the final stop of his 2011 solo tour in support of the 2010 release “Le Noise.”
“Journeys” is the third film about Mr. Young directed by his friend Jonathan Demme, known for directing “The Silence of the Lambs” and “Philadelphia,” as well as the Talking Heads concert film “Stop Making Sense.”
“This whole world of cars and music, that’s a big chunk of Neil’s DNA,” Mr. Demme said at the film’s premiere at the 2011 Toronto Film Festival. “He’s all about cars and driving and music in motion.”
Mr. Demme and Mr. Young were in New York last week on a publicity tour for the film. In an interview in Midtown, Mr. Demme described “Journeys” as a road film, equating it in spirit to his films “Melvin and Howard” and “Something Wild.”
Mr. Young says he believes that listening to music in the car is the best way to judge its quality.
“You can tell a great song if you listen in the car,” Mr. Young said. “Why? Because if you are listening in the car, you have a changing picture. You are also distracted by driving. You are doing two things at once, which is really good for music. The soundtrack to the landscape? There you go.”
Mr. Young said he did not, however, write music in a car, save one experiment, the rock opera “Greendale,” released over 2003 and 2004 with an accompanying film and graphic novel. “I wrote the songs while driving around on my ranch in a 1951 Plymouth. When I got an idea, I would just stop and write. When whatever I was thinking was gone, I would just drive on another three or four hundred yards. When I got another idea I would stop again.”
Mr. Young had nearly three dozen cars before he began to cull his collection. It now has a dozen. “I’ve got a few cars,” Mr. Young said. He is big on Buicks. “I’ve got the first 1953 Buick Skylark ever made. I’ve got a 1947 Roadmaster station wagon, a woody. A 1947 Roadmaster sedanette.” His first car? “A 1948 Buick Roadmaster hearse. That sucker was huge. It had wheels in the back, which were great for loading amps.”
As a collector, Mr. Young is preservationist and mad scientist. Several years ago, he said, he grafted the front of a 1949 Studebaker Starlight coupe onto the nose of his Eagle tour bus, with part of a 1951 Hudson Hornet on the back. The bus later burned, as did his LincVolt: a 1959 Lincoln Continental retrofitted as a hybrid plug-in electric with an ethanol-burning motor. In his keynote speech at the 2010 Specialty Equipment Market Association or SEMA Show, Mr. Young described the vehicle as a rolling statement about energy independence.
The LincVolt is being rebuilt, and the car’s Web site indicates a remarkable amount of engineering involved.
“It’s a sensational car,” Mr. Young said. “It has a bank of A123 batteries down the middle of the car where the driveshaft used to be. It has a Ford Atkinson 4-cylinder Escape hybrid motor customized to run on cellulosic ethanol.” He had recently visited a pilot plant making the fuel, in Sioux Falls, S.D.
Mr. Young plans a film about the LincVolt project. He framed his involvement in the film and car as an energizing break from music.
Asked why he would rather build his E.V. than buy a model from the major automakers, Mr. Young was diplomatic. “They are doing a good job, but they have to build a present car,” he said. “I can build a future car, push things.”
“We have all the energy we need here in the U.S. so we don’t have to fight wars for fuel,” he added.
This and other arguments are made in a coming book, “Waging Heavy Peace,” out in October. “Americana,” a new album recorded with Crazy Horse, radically recasts traditional songs like “Oh, Susanna!” and “She’ll Be Coming ‘Round the Mountain.” On its cover is the infamous so-called Geronimo Cadillac photograph from roughly 1905, depicting the Apache chief in captivity in Oklahoma at the wheel of a Locomobile.
As a musician who uses the phenomenon of rust as a leitmotif in his songwriting, Mr. Young explains his attraction to old cars, even ostensibly lifeless ones, in human terms.
“If you go for a walk in a junkyard, every car is talking to you,” he said. “There are voices. It’s like a cacophony of sound. Every car has got people in them. There are junkers, all piled up, but if you get close to them there’s history in every one of them: the families that grew up in those cars, the kids, the lovers. Everything that happened in those cars, it’s all right there. That’s why I love cars. They all have a soul and story to tell.”
read more: wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/for-neil-young-a-journey-through-rock-and-rust/
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