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With this historic concert, the series of live shows that will see the light in Neil Young's Archives project kicks off, revisiting his career and adding a lot of material to his already substantial discography.
This first (but not speaking chronologically) milestone recorded in March 1970 over two dates at the Fillmore East presents us with the original Crazy Horse line-up, that is, with Danny Whitten on rhythm guitar, that Danny Whitten who would die a few years later due to heroin, throwing Young into a dark yet extremely creative period. The sonic power of this concert is disarming, and the age of the masters seems to further enhance the rust that Crazy Horse brings to the stage. The setlist is short due to the scarcity of recovered material, but those 6 solitary songs are worth diamonds.
First of all, the two rides of “Down By The River” and “Cowgirl In The Sand” (12 and 15 minutes respectively, or half the disc). Thanks to the virtuosic Young-Whitten duet, young and rampant crazy horses on stage, they shine more than the studio versions (album Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, Crazy Horse debut, 1969, just a few months after Neil Young's solo debut with the eponymous album).
Another two gems are “Winterlong” and “Wonderin’”. The former is present on the anthology "Decade" in an elegant studio version, but it pales in comparison to the passionate, emotional original version offered at the Fillmore. The same goes for the latter, present in a sparkly, rather undignified version on "Everybody’s Rockin’", and here enjoyable in its simple and raw birth (Young introduces it as a new song from their new album, “when we record it”; unfortunately, this never happened and the story jumps directly to “Zuma” in 1976 when 'the needle and the damage have already been done'). “Come on baby let’s go downtown” already appeared with all due respect in "Tonight’s The Night", in a very similar live version stemming from the same tour. Finally, “Everybody’s Knows This Is Nowhere”, which opens the CD.
Moral of the story: this CD is the testimony of the birth of a myth. Crazy Horse would have many other golden periods, like in '76 and '79, with Frank Sampedro replacing Whitten. But here we are at the origins, the dawns, the rust forming in the veins of Young & company, rushing wildly and transferring to the gigantic Fenders behind them. It is the rust that roars the primitive cry: start to rock in a free world. If you love Young, you know exactly what I mean. If you're not very familiar with him, this could be the best album to discover his wildly electric side.
Malcolm1985
Tracklist
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