The video for the song "Light A Candle" by Neil Young is featured today in Hearse Theater on NYA
As we noted at that time back in 2009, "this is just so wonderful that words don't even begin to touch this."
(Note t-shirt: “The 2nd Big Bang. World Wide Web. Born From High Energy Physics.” thanks E! Slash those pearly gates. Also, that's Pegi in background.)
More on "Light a Candle" (performed live and lyrics) from the oft mistakenly maligned minor masterpiece (post 2000) album Fork In The Road.
#WT1sWBW4
Not only the best song on the album but one of his best songs ever.
ReplyDeletePeace 🙏
Love, love, love Neil - but Fork in the Road is certainly not a "masterpiece". In the list of all his albums this would clearly be in the bottom 25%
ReplyDeleteI love “Light A Candle” -a positive, optimistic, inspiring song. You can use it as a “cornerstone.” A song like this can save someone’s life, or a planet! True, the album may not be in the same league as his best work, it has 2 Rocking songs that are worthy of a speeding ticket. Fuel Line and Johnny Magic are fantastic, smokin’ songs. And the rest of the album reveals some hard truths: the Bailout ain’t for you (us)! It’s for the fat cats! This was a timely commentary post 2008 economic collapse. I can’t say it’s a great album I go back to often, but I take songs from it and use them for compilations of High Res music I want to hear on the go or at home. Neil has so much great stuff and a lot less albums with more sparse gems & classics.
ReplyDeleteJust singing a song is also a classic... true, despite what I said about “Light a Candle.”
DeleteLooking back 'Fork In The Road' was a stinker and a much longer road than we'd hoped for, I think he's still on it.
ReplyDeleteThis song reminds me a lot of Chris Rea's "The Road to Hell" , my favourite non-Neil album ever. Double pleasure!
ReplyDeleteAs for the rest of "Fork"... mistakenly maligned, yes, superior to most of the new music of that year, yes, but a "minor masterpiece", frankly not.
@ BTR - 2 things to clarify here on FITR & masterpiece.
ReplyDelete1st maybe not a "minor masterpiece" for NY but comparatively speaking for the era, yes.
2nd, for us here @ TW FITR is essential NY. why? the title track and the lines about blogging came to us at a very critical time.
for those around here at the time, you'll recall those post-LWW years and the absolute near chaos here in blog comments. this was before SocMed days of FB, TWTR, etc.
lastly, FITR is an album which is meant to be played while you're rolling down the open highway w/ speakers blasting. try it & it works really well as a road trip soundtrack.
sitting around the house on a Sunday morning? not so much.
I also like the opener When Worlds Collide, although when I first listened to it - and a fair number of the album's songs-I thought it sounded like Neil had hurried up and made an album. I thought many of the songs sounded too simple. But as time passed, like so many of his albums, it grew on me and became a classic. Just Singing a Song Won't Change the World is pretty Epic, truly. We get to sit back and hear him crack open the Heavens with Old Black. I love it. I want that song on my Afterlife soundtrack. Endles solos preferably. If you don't love Fuel Line, I can't understand why not. This is just a fantastic song, great riff, cool lyrics... He is placing Linc Volt front and center. Johnny Magic. This is a really cool song. Its impressive how hard can he can rock playing just a few notes! He tips his hat to the 50's background singing. Its a Punk Rock Alt-Fuel extraveganza. And for Neil to give Thrasher a boost at a critical juncture is so cool. I am so grateful that message came through from Artist to frustrated fan / blogger Thrasher; he might otherwise have quit! That was when Neil decided maybe this page serves a good purpose. He got over being pissed about having his setlists posted on the interent. He began to see that many of his biggest boosters reside right here where the chaff gets separated. This was a moment on the Neil timeline when I was not playing close attention. I had a 4 year old and a 7 year old at the time. I am sitting here listening to Cough up the Bucks, a song I didnt' care for that much at first, although I liked many of the themes. It has become a classic in my inner World. Get Behind the Wheel sounds good to me today. This is kind of what happens in general when I listen to Neil Young music. I am partial to the electric guitar. I like this album as much, maybe more(!), than Silver and Gold, possibly. That will send some of you fans reeling perhaps. What with Razor Love and all. I saw the tour and I loved it. I enjoy Silver and gold but I like his songs that have a bit more energy than some on S&G do. And then CSN took 3 from it and made them worse with syrup, to my ears. Blasphemy? There is no accounting for taste! An album I absolutely love is Le Noise. Some of you don't love that album? I will never understand that. I want Neil to do a Le Noise 2! Bring it on! Thanks for all the ear candy, Neil! Compelling music, the soundtrack to our lives. I would obsess on some other music if only it could hold my interest (for well over 3 decades). I feel like a lucky bastard to have snapped up all of these releases as they came out. As I sit here enjoying Hit the Road on NYA, it sounds like another classic, for sure. I love 80% of what he does. I like around 18% beyond that. Is there a Neil Young song I don't like? Usually for me its the ones that CSN is singing on. Oh, here's one I don't like: Welfare Mothers. I just always thought that song was in poor taste and not that intelligent. But so what! I still love to dive in and digest his Art. As Light a Candle leads me to bedtime, I pity the fool who undervalues this song. Yet another Environmental Anthem, and upbeat, heartfelt masterpiece. Alan in Seattle
ReplyDelete@ Alan: I have to admit that when Fork in the Road came out I played it twice and put it in the CD rack thinking it was perhaps a rushed endeavor. Then I bought it on vinyl as I prefer my music on that format, and played it twice and put it away. The majority of the record seemed to focus mostly on the Lincvolt project and the corruption of the bailout with a couple of gems mixed in. But after reading your assessment of this record that has received such strong condemnation from the fans, I will be revisiting it, as I may have been too quick to judge it.
ReplyDeleteAs for Le Noise, it is one of my all time favorite records from Neil. Having heard the songs live before the record was released may be why. I would love for Neil and Daniel to record together again. They created something truly remarkable. Le Noise is a masterpiece, both sonically and lyrically, and it stands apart from anything else Neil has released. And it truly shines on vinyl.
Peace 🙏
Alan, I really enjoyed your ideas. For me Fork in the Road is very funny. The video of the title song makes me laugh out loud. Even though the themes are serious and grim, there are comic elements. I can see why many think it is an inferior album by Neil standards and not a minor masterpiece or whatever, but a stinker? I don't think so, too many solid songs and just another wrench into the machine.
ReplyDelete