 
|
|
    |
or YOUR COUNTRY's FLAG. Thank you!!!)
An unofficial news blog for Neil Young fans from Thrasher's Wheat with concert and album updates, reviews, analysis, and other Rock & Roll ramblings. Separating the wheat from the chaff since 1996.
Labels: monsanto, neil young
by thrasher@PermaLink: 5/27/2015 05:21:00 PM
32 comments
Neil Young Archives Says: "HAPPY 25th Anniversary Thrasher’s Wheat!"
>> Pre-Order on Amazon.com << 
Enter your email address
Mailing list subscribers eligible
to win cool Neil stuff!
No spam. We promise.
Thrasher's Wheat YouTube Channel
Can't donate? No problem.
"He Has Presence": 
Human Highway
Concert Review of the Moment
Clippings on A Rock n Roll Cowboy
Freedom ... For What It's Worth
This Land is My Land
FREEDOM In A New Year
*Thanks Neil!*
Here's Why We Need Your 
R.I.P.
(Rust in Peace)
![[EFC Blue Ribbon - Free Speech Online]](http://www.thrasherswheat.org/gifs/free-speech.gif)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Only Love Can Break Your Heart
The Unbearable Lightness of Being Neil Young
Pardon My Heart
"We're The Ones 
Thanks for Supporting Thrasher's Wheat!
This blog supports free speech!
(... he didn't kill himself either...)
#AaronDidntKillHimself
Sign the Release "Time Fades Away" Petition
Join The 10,000+ Who Have Already Signed
Neil Young Appreciation Society
Bands Covering Neil Young songs
The Bridge School Concerts 
So Who Really Was "The Godfather of Grunge"?
Willie Nelson & Neil Young
Neil Young's Moon Songs
Civic Duty Is Not Terrorism
Orwell (and Grandpa) Was Right
Speak not because it is safe, but because it is right.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) February 11, 2017
What's So Funny About 
32 Comments:
I love it, lyics are clunky, but the music is all Neil. Thanks Neil.
"And Starbucks"...Love it!
kind of a stupid girl/don't cry no tears to it. And something else. Loveit, gets better everytime.
The lyrics might've seemed a bit clunky on the page, but when sung I absolutely love them.
We were discussing it at work today, how he's singing about things we're already talking about. And in 'Big Box' too, very relevant lyrics...to my life anyway. (Both songs available for download when album is preordered, at a great price mind you for the deluxe bundle)
...I for one have always hated Starbucks, and I hate Consumerism... some great lines in Big Box
Don't think Pegi made onto any of the covers? The record lasts under 30 minutes - the jury is out - me thinks this is a passing phase.....Archives, Pono etc They are clunky lyrics.
My wife and I are big coffee fans and neither of us really like starbucks - more because of the taste than anything corporate though. I was just wondering if anyone can give some good coffee suggestions based on growing practices? To be honest, I feel a bit ignorant on this issue - I really thought all there was to coffee was growing the beans, then roasting them, grinding them and letting some boiling water drain through the grind. I assume that Neil and others are saying that we should be more informed by the companies selling the coffee about which chemicals were used as fertilizers to increase the coffee bean yields? Or is this because the plants that grow the beans are genetically modified to increase the yield? If that's the case does anyone know any good non-GMO coffee? Maybe a bean grown in Hawaii to support old Neil?
Thrasher, what do you drink to start off the day, or to keep you up at night when you're working on this blog?
Tom,
The song - with the very clumsy but direct lyrics - answers your question about his problem with Starbucks. Vermont passed legislation requiring that food be labeled to indicate GMO content. The Grocery Manufacturers trade association, ostensibly pushed by Monsanto, a major force within the organization, has sued, claiming such labeling would be burdensome. Starbucks is a member of the Association, though they claim to not be behind the suit. But they haven't apparently done anything to call off the dogs, either.
Big Box is great. Very relevant lyrics
and nice guitar interactions between Neil
and Lucas Nelson. Could be awesome live.
Very sad. This is not the work of a professional musician or songwriter.
Enough said (too much said).
Neil and Daryl -- American Gothic style -- on the cover, right?
FWIW, running time will be around 50 minutes, based on the song versions in the making-of documentary - the two tracks already released (out of nine) total more than 13 minutes.
Pegi is on the cover! You don't see her out in the field? Her and Ben are both right there in the field next to the Green Acres folks. Damn, that's a good painting. You can even see Daryl's plastic surgery.
I think Pegi's mixing up a little something to slip into Neil's drink! Star buck this!
cool album cover, click on it, and you can zoom in on it on the amazon site. All kinds of neat things on that cover.... Look at me hyping up an album cover. I'm that desperate. I hope the rest of the dang album sounds good.
On Amazon the running time for the music states 26mins 55 seconds - this video looks a tad false..laugh at anything Neil does or says?
I find the album cover distasteful and disrespectful to his current wife, whether he is divorcing her or not. Sure wish he had people in his camp letting him know how stupid and thoughtless he appears. Thrasher do you know who designed the cover? Next thing you know DUH will be singing with the band. I won't purchase this one in protest.
According to Lukas Nelson Facebook, his brother designed the cover.
FWIW the characters in the original inspiration for the cover art, "American Gothic" by Grant Wood, were intended to be a farmer and his daughter, though the actual models were the artist's sister and his dentist. Farmer John anyone?
More here:
http://www.americangothichouse.net/about/the-painting/
I love the cover art, I bought 2 tshirt/mug bundles. I've been a NY fan since I first started to listen to his records when I was 6 years old in 1988. Neil and Pegi are divorced, what is wrong with Neil moving on and enjoying his life?
You liked Neil's music when you were 6 years old???? Stop it.
Yep, My dad had a good vinyl collection and let me listen with headphones, I loved specially the albums, Harvest, Rust Never Sleeps, Live Rust and American Stars N Bars. I also enjoyed John Fogerty's Centerfield album, and some of Lynyrd Skynyrd's early albums.
I remember in 1992, I was in 3rd or 4th grade and it was music day and I bought in my cassette tape of Harvest Moon, the other kids in my class did not understand!
No matter what Neil says or does there are always
the naysayers.Don't like this don't like that.
I prefer to see how he is doing his part to make the world a better
place. Big Box may be one of his best songs in quite awhile too bad
not many appear to be paying attention.
I know of no other artist who has the guts to
go after politicians,corporations and oil companies.
I know of no other artist who has done the number of free
concerts benefitting groups and organizations who are
good things for the world.
I know of few other artists who have the music catalog
he has created over the years.
What Neil has given us is beyond measuring he is in
a class by himself
To all the Nay-sayers (and everybody else, too!): Imagine what a "Best of" we could make if choosing two songs from each of the latest albums.
Let's call it "The Whining Years":
Goin' Home (Are You Passionate)
When I Hold You In My Arms (Are You Passionate)
Bandit (Greendale)
Be The Rain (Greendale)
It's a Dream (Prairie Wind)
This Old Guitar (Prairie Wind)
Living With War (Living With War)
The Restless Consumer (Living With War)
Beautiful Bluebird (Chrome Dreams II)
Ordinary People (Chrome Dreams II)
Just Singing a Song (Fork In The Road)
Fork In The Road (Fork In The Road)
Love And War (Le Noise)
Angry World (Le Noise)
Oh Susannah (Americana)
Clementine (Americana)
Ramada Inn (Psychedelic Pill)
Walk Like a Giant (Psychedelic Pill)
Plastic Flowers (Storytone)
When I Watch You Sleeping (Storytone)
Tumbleweed (Solo Storytone)
Say Hello to Chicago (Solo Storytone)
People Want to Hear About Love (The Monsanto Years)
Big Box (The Monsanto Years)
It's not over!
It's All One Song! You'd have to go back to 1980 if you really want to define the "whining years". That would be a hell of a list!! Did you leave off "A Letter Home" on purpose? Probably just as well.
It's not over by a long shot!
Yeah, A Letter Home was left out... Although the songs were nice enough. Listened to it once.
Some people think the last good record was After the Goldrush, and the last good song was Like a Hurricane. Maybe "The Whining Years" should start 1972. Or maybe the whole catalogue.
My iPod playlist titled "Neil of the New Millennium" includes the following: Similar to yours Mikkirev. I had more songs but tried to pair it down a bit. Includes only songs written after 2000:
Differently
Bandit
It's A Dream
Living With War (instrumetal)
The Restless Consumer
Let's Impeach The President
Spirit Road
You Never Call (Live)
Love And War
Driftin' Back (Acoustic intro)
I'm Glad I Found You
When I Watch You Sleeping
If I Don't Know (Live w Stills)
And so many more.
It should also be noted that The Restless Consumer may just be one of the best songs Neil's ever written. And in terms of power of performance, I can't think of a studio recording that has that much...power. An acoustic live version of Crime In The City has a similar sustained power. And I realize all his songs have a strength of energy that most performers can't produce, but The Restless Consumer to this day is the only song of his that has given me chills every single time I've ever listened to it. Those first few chords get my spine all a-twingle.
Watch the documentary video of that recording, pretty sure they nail that thing first take. Pure post-2000 Neil at his best.
There are no GMO coffees, at least not in mainstream production. The coffee genome was only sequenced last year. Now milk is a different story, and Starbucks uses a lot of GMO milk. That said, I think Neil missed the mark with this one, given that there's no evidence Starbucks had anything to do with the lobby against vermonts GMO labeling law. Starbucks has a history of being pretty progressive and open with their customers. Shame their coffee sucks. :)
The issue of GMO foods is way more complex than "letting farmers grow what they want to grow". There's a lot of people here on earth, and feeding them all is a priority. Now I'm all for being anti-Monsanto, as they have consistently used their powers for evil, but I can't get behind being anti-science. Humans have selected and cross bread plants and animals for desirable traits for as long as there has been agriculture, genetic engineering is just a more effective way to do the same thing.
That may be true Nate, but I think he's really just asking for transparency and labeling.
Plus it is a song, it's not meant to be factual. Many of Bob Dylan's 'true' songs include untrue facts. Songs like Hattie Carroll, George Jackson and Hurricane all include key lines that weren't actually true. Like, after beginning to write it, a song becomes it's own animal, and the song controls where it wants to go. And in a case like Hattie Carroll the song will end up outliving the truth by many a generation. Will probably happen to Hurricane too.
I know with Neil most of his songs are emotion based, even a song about Monsanto. He's not a reporter, he's an artist, he can say whatever he wants in a song and it surely doesn't need to make sense. It's his emotional reaction to something, he's not researching and fact checking for a song. Now Bruce Springsteen seems quite capable of researching a song and ending up with very successful results, great songs. But Neil doesn't write that way, probably can't, he's the most instinctive songwriter I know of.
That being said, his songs are still filled with many truths.
Agree with Mikel and Joseph -- strongly
I've listend to the song four or five times in the last few days and it's been growing on me. Musically and in terms of subject matter, this project is reminding me of Fork in the Road. Neil has describe the album as an "upbeat commentary on the situation", or words to that notion, and this selection certainly bears that out. It's obviously not taking itself too seriously and I think it succeeds in being funny. I'm interested to hear what the entire album will sound like, as well as how this topical novelty number plays in that context. At the moment, I'm just happy to dig the whistling. It reminds me of the hokey-pokey: "You stick your left foot out…" At least it seems like no one is surprised that it's somewhat off the wall. That's an improvement from the past, where some posters actually seemed surprised that Neil Young follows his heart and soul, sometimes leading him into goofy and occasionally even bizarre experimental directions (A Letter Home springs to mind). I have a hunch that this will be another in a long line of Neil records destined for some maligning, but I'm optimistic that it'll be a fun record if nothing else. Taking on corporate power in America is always a guaranteed good time for all.
Sorry if I'm reposting something that's already been up, but I was researching into this album and this came up:http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/watch-neil-young-tear-into-the-monsanto-years-at-anti-gmo-event-20150526
Plenty of embedded links as well. Neil and the Nelsons perform "Mansanto Years", the title song. It appears to be a gentle acoustic number with an interesting arrangement. Unfortunately, it doesn't' seem like they're mic'd that well, so the lyrics can be difficult to make out. As to the continued carping/harping on Daryl Hannah, from day one, I wasn't even interested in looking at Storytone in the shadow of Neil's personal life. It's a conviction of mine that you can appreciate an artist's work independent of such "real world" context and I'm sticking to that.
Great, fun Neil music.
Clunky lyrics. Forget if you agree or not on the safety of GMOs or what farmers "want to grow.." And Neil may be on shaky ground there. The lyrics are just clumsy, don't fit the music. They are just.... Crappy. It is an old man ranting with a Neil Young album on in the background.
Post a Comment
<< Home