Our recent post on Silver & Gold: A Track By Track Commentary by Neil Young generated a treasure chest of comments from our dear readers. Here's another Comment of the Moment by Alan in Seattle:
A departed friend of mine taught me the phrase, "There's no accounting for taste."Thanks -- as always -- Alan in Seattle for your passion.
Its so true.
Whats perfection to some is ho hum to others. I like this album. But I love his latest 5 albums more. I love Le Noise More. I love Old Black and all the rest too.
But to me, Neil Young is still vital. In fact, he is more vital, in terms of his cutting social insight, now more than ever. He visited the DAPL pipeline project. He is an Environmentalist Warrior. And he still has the ability to blow it up live and in the studio.
I count myself lucky for each new release, whether Blue note cafe or whatever. More high resolution Neil Young killing it. I bought 5 vinyl NY records in the last 6 months: The Ditch Trilogy, Who's Gonna Stand Up single (+Live version with Crazy Horse), and Peace Trail.
Yes, as some Neil Young aficionados point out, his latest album is Fu*%ing INCREDIBLE. Don't get so caught up in the past you can't enjoy the present. I have seen him play live 18 or 19 times now since '88.
One of the very best was last Oct 3rd with Promise of the Real in Boise. Another one of the best was a year earlier, same band in Seattle. The fact that this Immensely talented and interesting musician is still tearing his heart open with pen and paper, crying out for Mother Earth, standing up for human rights, talking about Love, and killing it with Old Black and assorted instruments… leaves me with a great feeling of joy in my heart.
The world is a pretty messed up place, with Trump and Global Warming and endless wars, defunding of Meals on Wheels… election rigging. Bernie getting screwed by the DNC in a rigged primary.
But, we still have Neil Young! Thank the Gods! The great gig in the sky is later.
Long Live Neil Young!
-Alan in Seattle.
Yes, we still have Neil Young. But we no longer have Chuck Berry.
Silver and Gold was my first Neil Young album and it's still one of my favorites! Among 20 or 30 others I guess. I never really heard of him before someone let me borrow the CD and it blew me away like I've been blown away by him so many times since as I've discovered his catalogue one by one. I now have more NY vinyl than any other artist and he's my favorite and I too feel so lucky to be able to say that his new album is one of my favorites as well. So cool that he didn't drift off to just doing covers of old music from his childhood or lame rehashes of his early stuff like so many other once great artists did. I love NY.
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