Dear Neil: New Feature "Letters To The Editor" on Neil Young Archives (NYA)

"Letters To The Editor"
NYA Times-Contrarian

In a new feature on NYA, Neil Young is now publishing "Letters To The Editor" -- and actually responding?!

Most of the current letters deal with the Detroit solo show debacle. Other letter topics include NYA content and audio quality.

Really great to see how seriously fan input is to Neil.

But probably the best response so far is when someone writes that his letter will be "intercepted by his 'Yes' men" and Neil replies: "I don't have 'Yes' men. They're residing in your own mind."

That Neil.

For more on NYA Times-Contrarian posts see:

• Neil Young Archives: "Huge drop of unreleased tracks!"
• "Enjoy NYA - Still Free" Says Neil Young
• Membership to Neil Young Archives Opens June 1
• "Muddy Track": Movie Night on Neil Young Archives
• Song of the Day: New Feature on Neil Young Archives
• Neil Young Archives (NYA) Times-Contrarian Launches Debut Issue
• "FREE THE MUSIC": Update on Neil Young Archives (NYA) Times-Contrarian
• "Vinyl is KING" Says Neil Young
• Neil Young Returns To #1 On The Charts!
• Neil Young: Tech Giants Rip Off Artists

Neil Young Archives (NYA) Times-Contrarian - Song of the Day

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Courtney Barnett Covers "Houses", Elyse Weinberg's 1968 Song with Neil Young

Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile
Anthem, Washington, DC - November 7, 2017
Photo by thrashette

Courtney Barnett recorded a cover of "Houses", Elyse Weinberg's 1968 song with Neil Young.

The clip starts with “Charity” from Courtney Barnett's latest album Tell Me How You Really Feel. Elyse Weinberg's 1968 song "Houses" is a pretty obscure amongst Neil Young fans as we discussed when digital uploads started surfacing a few years back. (More below.)

Me n my band recorded a cover of 'Houses' (by Elyse Weinberg) a couple of months ago at Spotify Studios in NYC n now it’s available alongside a version of 'Charity' on @Spotify here. https://t.co/R8PveplBrW pic.twitter.com/0wowtZdALZ

— courtney barnett (@courtneymelba) August 15, 2018

In a statement, Courtney Barnett said:

Recently I found myself on tour with a night off.

My friend Janet invited me to her house for a home-cooked meal where we ate beautiful food, shared stories, and played with Mac the old dog. Late in the evening Janet pulled out a record titled ‘Elyse’. The artwork reminded me of Joni Mitchell’s Ladies Of the Canyon. I fell in love with this mysterious artist and in particular the song ‘Houses’.

Rumour has it Neil Young is playing the lead guitar line. I flipped the record over but couldn’t find his name in the credits. Elyse Weinberg once said of her life in music “the plan is to remember who i really am”.

I liked that.

So here's "Houses" by Elyse Weinberg and what we know.



From Elyseweinberg.com:

Back in the 1968, the California native released her self-titled debut to much success. The album hit #31 on the Billboard album chart and she appeared on Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show, in Newsweek and the L.A. Free Press, and at Shaffer Music Festival in NYC. Even Cher choose to use one of her song’s “Band of Thieves” or the soundtrack to her acting debut, the 1969 film Chastity.

However, a string of bad luck — and the fact that Cher for some reason instead credited the song to Sonny instead — led Elyse to experience only minor success in the years that followed before she drifted into seclusion and changed her name to Cori Bishop.

But then, some 30 years after the release of Elyse’s debut, Andrew Rieger of Elf Power got hold of a copy. The rest was history,

The Holy Grail.

That's how Andrew Rieger of Elf Power described the moment in 1999 when he first listened to Elyse's long forgotten 1968 self-titled release. Back in the late '60's, the album received quite a bit of attention - so much so that Elyse appeared on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show, in Newsweek and the L.A. Free Press, and at Shaffer Music Festival in NYC. She continued to write and record for Asylum Records. Cut to 30 years later when Rieger fell so much in love with her debut album that he contacted Elyse (now going by the name Cori Bishop and living in Ashland, Ore.).

The rest is history - Orange Twin rereleased the self-titled debut, along with two other of her songs from that era, one of which, "Houses," features Neil Young wielding his distinctively ripping guitar sound. Since, Elyse's story has become something of a rock legend - after the rerelease her album received massive amount of positive feedback in the press, and she was mentioned in Magnet, Time Out NY, Aquarium Drunkard, Creative Loafing (amongst others). Perhaps the most flattering result was two extremely successful indie bands, Vetiver and Dinosaur Jr. decided to cover "Houses" in the aftermath of the release.

In My Own Sweet Time

Now, after playing extensively over the past few years, which included a date at Montreal Pop Festival in 2008, Elyse has recorded a new album for the first time since the late '60's - the aptly titled "In My Own Sweet Time." Elyse's voice is still captivating - at once sweet and melodic, while also sounding edgy and ragged, brimming with a sense of hope and liberation. As Andrew Rieger said, it's scary and magical stuff, which is particularly captured in the album's first single "Anybody Out There?"

From Rusted-moon.com (in German, use translator on the sidebar):

This song is from Elyse Weinberg's unreleased second album titled "Greasepaint Smile" and was produced by David Briggs for "Tetragrammaton Records". That label was owned by Bill Cosby and went bankrupt just before the relase, The track with Neil was later included as a bonus on the cd re-release of her first album. "Greasepaint Smile" was re-released on vinyl 2 years ago..

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Something Different for Our TW Supporters and Detractors

Here's something different for all of our TW supporters and detractors.

Apparently, our recent posting on Neil Young's Big Decision On Archives: Facebook and Social Responsibility seems to have hit a nerve somewhere. So thanks for all the great comments -- both supportive and otherwise. We've responded on the thread.

But onto something different.

Why a Johnny Cash video? Why choose "God's Gonna Cut You Down"? What's this got to do with Neil Young?

Take a look at this extremely popular 2:49 video from 2006 -- with 76,463,534 views + 24K comments -- and the answer should be self evident. There are a lot familiar and not so familiar faces. Some still with us, some who are no longer and have departed. Quite an impressive roster for a video by a dying man. Even Graham Nash appears at ~2:20.

Artists include (in order): Rick Rubin, Iggy Pop, Kanye West, Chris Martin, Kris Kristofferson, Patti Smith, Terence Howard, Flea (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Q-Tip, Adam Levine (Maroon 5), Chris Rock, Justin Timberlake, Kate Moss, Sir Peter Blake (Sgt Peppers Artist), Sheryl Crow, Denis Hopper, Woody Harrelson, Amy Lee of Evanescence, Tommy Lee, Natalie Maines, Emily Robison, Martie Maguire (Dixie Chicks), Mick Jones, Sharon Stone, Bono, Shelby Lynne, Anthony Kiedis, Travis Barker, Lisa Marie Presley, Kid Rock, Jay Z, Keith Richards, Billy Gibbons, Corinne Bailey Rae, Johnny Depp, Graham Nash, Brian Wilson, Rick Rubin and Owen Wilson.

What we deal with here on TW on a daily basis is a very mild form persecution -- relatively speaking -- to what this video is all about. So, we'll just let this all play out in comments below for further discussion.

Lastly, there's a connection tying back to Neil Young's 2003 Greendale -- of course. Check Track #3.

"Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand
Workin' in the dark against your fellow man
But as sure as God made black and white
What's done in the dark will be brought to the light"

Lastly, we would be highly remiss in reminding everyone that Johnny and Neil go back -- way back to 1971.

God bless Johnny and all the children of destiny.

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Neil Young's Big Decision On Archives: Facebook and Social Responsibility

The NYA Dilemma?

Once again, Neil Young speaks truth to power as he faces a "big decision" on access to his Archives due to Facebook's lack of social responsibility.

In a recent posing on NYA Times-Contrarian, Neil Young writes that:

"Censorship is a big responsibility and the Social Media Giant is seemingly not up to defending democracy, at least not yet."

NYA Times-Contrarian

The issue of tech giants and censorship has come up previously and it appears to have reached a cross-roads -- not just with Neil -- but with virtually all things internet related. In February, Neil Young wrote that tech giants rip off artists, who are being forced to distribute their music in the digital world. (And this is just one more reason why we sing this song because we love the man.)

NYA Times-Contrarian

And our advice to Mr. Young?

Ditch Facebook.

Ditch Facebook before Facebook ditches you, Neil. You'll be glad you did.

Why?

We'll go into that below.

Thrasher's Wheat | Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/thrashers.wheat - Suspended Since July 2015

As long time Thrasher's Wheat readers know, we have had confrontations with Facebook over the years since being suspended in 2015. (See An Open Letter to Mark Zuckerberg, CEO FACEBOOK and An Open Letter (#2) to Mark Zuckerberg, CEO FACEBOOK.)

Facebook: An Epic Orwellian Fail

Image via 21st Century Wire

Tech Giants, we the people, do NOT trust you. You guys have blocked us, shadow banned us, de-monetized us, de-platformed us, memory-holed us, and harassed/trolled us relentlessly. But all of your efforts have failed -- we're still standing. Enough.

Eyes Wide Shut, Mouth Closed

"They" have tried to take us down by canceling our advertising partnerships, or blocking our ability to run Google Ads, or hacking our Twitter account, or filing fraudulent transactions on our PayPal account, or disrupting the ISP service of our partner WBKM.org and Thrasher's Wheat Radio, or screwing around with our Amazon partner links, or jerking us around about Willie for a Nobel, capping our LIKES below 30K and unsub'g folks automatically, throttled our once robust reader comments eco-system suspending the Gigs for the Gulf page based on false copyright infringement claims, trying to make exposing environmental crimes a crime, disrupting freedom of speech and assembly, or humiliating and mocking our efforts when we try and stand up, algorithmic censorship to lower our rank off of Top 10 Search results or gaslighting us with "fake Neil news", sending in all sorts of trolls and spammers to disrupt the Neil community, or making exposing a war crime a war crime or blasting us with near Stuxnet-like levels of crippling attacks on our servers, dropped from Google News as a legitimate (non-fake) news source and on & on...

Is that the best you got? We're still here. Just remember, TW has been around longer than Google, Amazon or Facebook. The corruption on the highest floors will cease and Justice will triumph. The Truth and The Light will always prevail and overwhelm the darkest of the Darkness of Corruption.

Social media can often be seen as serving as the direct prophecy of George Orwell's 1984 novel's "Two Minutes of Hate".



(Note, if you found the above clip puzzling, "Watch The Dystopian World of 1984 Explained" on YouTube @ https://youtu.be/GQxOKXEff4I.)

As usual, everyone supports freedom of speech -- as long as it aligns with their views and politics. It's an angry world but we won't quit...

Shattering "The Facebook Matrix"

ps - And "Thank You" Mr. Zuckerberg for suspending our FaceBook account, saving us from all of your FB troll-bot zombie hordes (not referring to rusties)! Or Mr. Z - Liar? Idiot? Or Both?.

"First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up, because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me."

~~ Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

No fear... never stand down ... The Big Shift crushes it... wake up and open the Tired Eyes...


'She was welded to the eagle's beak sun green leaned into that megaphone
and said, "truth is all i seek" '
~~"Sun Green" by Neil Young
ps - and if you still really want to know how we feel about all of this, we have all been here before, we have all been here before...

So don't do it Neil. Just say no to Big Brother.

peace & love,
thrasher and thrashette

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VICTORY: Monsanto Loses Landmark Roundup Weedkiller Case; Jury Awards $289M to Cancer Victim

The "The Monsanto Years" reign of toxic terrorism is finally nearing the end at long last.

In a major legal victory against Monsanto, a jury verdict in the case of Dewayne Johnson vs. Monsanto Co., awarded $289.2 million in damages to plaintiff Dwayne Johnson, a former school groundskeeper who, after being required to spray Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide, is terminally ill with non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Last week, in a demonstration of solidarity, Neil Young and Daryl Hannah attended the Monsanto Roundup Trial in San Francisco. The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) today issued the following statement in response to the verdict:

“This verdict proves that when ordinary citizens, in this case a jury of 12, hear the facts about Monsanto’s products, and the lengths to which this company has gone to buy off scientists, deceive the public and influence government regulatory agencies, there is no confusion,” said Ronnie Cummins, OCA’s international director. “This is a company that has always put profits ahead of public safety, and today, Monsanto has finally been held accountable.

“We hope that this is just the first of many defeats for Monsanto, and that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will pull this product off the market immediately. In the meantime, OCA looks forward to the next steps in our own lawsuit against Monsanto, for misleading consumers about the safety of Roundup for humans and pets. And we are grateful to Mr. Johnson for bravely facing down the 'most evil corporation' in the world.”

The New York Times reported that internal emails revealed that 'independent' research studies were written by employees:

The documents underscore the lengths to which the agrochemical company goes to protect its image. Documents show that Henry I. Miller, an academic and a vocal proponent of genetically modified crops, asked Monsanto to draft an article for him that largely mirrored one that appeared under his name on Forbes’s website in 2015. Mr. Miller could not be reached for comment.

A similar issue appeared in academic research. An academic involved in writing research funded by Monsanto, John Acquavella, a former Monsanto employee, appeared to express discomfort with the process, writing in a 2015 email to a Monsanto executive, “I can’t be part of deceptive authorship on a presentation or publication.” He also said of the way the company was trying to present the authorship: “We call that ghost writing and it is unethical.”

Plaintiff Dwayne Johnson

See more at ORGANIC CONSUMERS ASSOCIATION - CAMPAIGNING FOR HEALTH, JUSTICE, SUSTAINABILITY, PEACE, AND DEMOCRACY.

Full trial coverage at Neil Young and Daryl Hannah at Monsanto Roundup Trial by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Also, see more on Neil Young's "The Monsanto Years": Going Where No Musician Has Gone Before.



The Monsanto Years - Neil Young + Promise Of The Real
(Click here to enlarge/zoom)

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