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Neil Young: Tonight's The Night 50th Anniversary Deluxe
by Doug Collette
Given the checkered history behind Neil Young's Tonight's The Night (Reprise, 1975), the 50th Anniversary Deluxe might well have been issued as a multi-disc package. An expanded collection of this third entry in 'the Ditch Trilogy'--along with Time Fades Away (Reprise, 1973) and On The Beach (Reprise, 1974)-- would accommodate the original recordings of 1973, the subsequent additions from different sources (overseen by Young's now-deceased manager Elliot Roberts), plus the (multiple and) final (sic) resequencing of the dozen cuts during ...
Continue ReadingNeil Young: Big Change Is Coming
by Doug Collette
Neil Young works in strange ways. That might well go without saying, but it deserves repeating if only because, with the release of a brand-new song with a novel lineup of musicians, the inscrutable singer/songwriter has once more tossed a sharp curveball. “big change is coming" (no caps intentional) may simultaneously delight and confound his loyal fanbase as well as the public at large (see his withdrawal from Spotify in 2022 and, a year later, an open letter ...
Continue ReadingNeil Young with Crazy Horse: World Record
by Doug Collette
In its own peculiar way, World Record is as confounding as the previous two albums by Neil Young with Crazy Horse. Yet it's far more compelling, this despite its comparably impromptu, borderline sloppy nature. This title might be heard as a progression from or an extension of Colorado (Reprise, 2019) and/or Barn (Reprise, 2021, except that the occasionally excessive air of spontaneity that permeates the material and the performances begs the question of how Rick Rubin contributed to this recording ...
Continue ReadingHarvest 50th Anniversary Edition (CD/DVD)
by Doug Collette
To hear and see Neil Young express such deep-seated personal contentment near the end of his film Harvest Time is to understand more fully why he would go to some lengths to curate a box set of the album upon which the movie is based. While some of the content enclosed on the CDs and DVDs in the 50th Anniversary Edition of the 1972 album has been in unofficial circulation for awhile, immersion in the collection vividly depicts the vagaries ...
Continue ReadingTom Petty: An American Treasure
by Doug Collette
In a direct, no nonsense gesture the subject of this anthology would no doubt appreciate, the earliest inclusions on the 4-CD anthology An American Treasure illustrate how Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers forged their own style of songwriting and playing from Bob Dylan, the Byrds and the Rolling Stones. “Surrender," “Listen To Her Heart," and" You're Gonna Get It" and, in one of the rare appearances in this set of a trademark tune in readily recognizable form, “Breakdown" also clarify ...
Continue ReadingJimi Hendrix: Otis Redding - The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Historic Performances Recorded at the Monterey International Pop Festival
by C. Michael Bailey
A short time after purchasing my first long-playing vinyl album with my own money, one Joe Cocker: With A Little Help From My Friends (A&M, 1969), I purchased my first and second live recordings, Mad Dogs and Englishmen (A&M, 1970) and Otis Redding -The Jimi Hendrix Experience--Historic Performances Recorded at the Monterey International Pop Festival (Reprise, 1970). I bought all of these records at Osco Drug Store in the University Mall in Little Rock, Arkansas. It was summer and fall ...
Continue ReadingNeil Young & The Promise of The Real: Earth
by Doug Collette
Ninety-plus minutes of performances recorded live on tour in 2015, then interspersed with sounds of the planet natural (birds and thunder) and manufactured (car traffic and trains), Neil Young's double-CD Earth documents his social concerns and the synergy he's developed with his most recent accompanists, Lukas Nelson and The Promise of the Real. A song selection spanning the rock icon's career, plus one unreleased number (an ode to the weed movement “Seed Justice" was originally and cryptically titled “I Won't ...
Continue ReadingNeil Young: Le Noise
by Doug Collette
On Le Noise, Neil Young collaborates with famed producer Daniel Lanois (Peter Gabriel, {Bob Dylan, U2) and it's a fascinating experiment to be sure. Yet, to whatever extent this pair of like-minded Canadians are successful,they have outwitted themselves in an all too-obvious attempt (as with the play on words of the title) to present the artist as a lone voice trying to communicate amidst the noisy interference of contemporary culture. Given Young's credibility, they overstate the obvious. Even ...
Continue ReadingTom Petty and The Heartbreakers: Mojo
by Doug Collette
Given the earthy currents of electric blues coursing through this Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers album, right from the start of the wailing harp on “Jefferson Jericho Blues," Mojo is an appropriate title indeed. It should be no surprise the group hearkens to the late, great Muddy Waters, because anyone who's heard them live understands that this band knows its roots. But it is mildly shocking, at least, to hear an album totally bereft of the craftsman-like pop ...
Continue ReadingFrank Sinatra: New York
by Mark Corroto
Frank Sinatra Sinatra: New York Reprise 2009
The true icons of American music, and there are only a few, include Louis Armstrong, Bob Dylan and Frank Sinatra. Their art changed the way we listen to music, and probably more important, their personal style made a deep impression on American culture. Of Armstrong, Dylan and Sinatra, it is without a doubt Sinatra, “Ol' Blue Eyes," who continues to be the epitome of style. ...
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