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Rating: The solo debut of Neil Young is generally considered an intermediate album. A step – moreover, lacking significant market impact – in the journey between the glorious adventure of the Buffalo Springfield and the beginning of the successful partnership with Crazy Horse, with whom Neil would produce the archetypal “Everybody Knows this is nowhere.”
This assumption is partly true, confirmed by the fact that Young himself – by recruiting Danny Whitten’s band – radically changed his musical spectrum, embracing the rough electricity that would constitute one of the poles of his music.
But Neil Young is not just any musician, and even his intermediate album is essential. We are in 1968: Neil has freed himself from the yoke of Stephen Stills in Buffalo Springfield. He finally has free rein, enjoying already enormous prestige. Probably feeling insecure, he decides to continue the collaboration with Jack Nitzsche – reminiscent of the masterpiece “Expecting to fly.” Nitzsche's sumptuous arrangements adorn much of the record. In some cases, however, weighing down the gentle folk melodies that form its heart, for example in the instrumentals "The Emperor Of Wyoming" and "String Quartet From Whiskey Boot Hill", or in the Beatles-like “Here we are in the years”. But more often, the sound manages to be at the same time majestic and sparse, as David Bowie once said: for instance, in tracks like “I’ve loved her song long” and “If I could have her tonight”.
Attributable to the Canadian's masterpieces is the iridescent psychedelic ballad “The old laughing lady,” enlivened by a surprising soul vein. Neil also throws down three aces that enroll the record in the album of the must-haves. First of all, “I’ve been waiting for you,” boasting a riff even more memorable than “Cinnamon girl.” A track that boasts several reworkings, from Pixies to Bowie himself. Then comes “The loner” – a cornerstone of many Young-esque ballads – as well as the most fitting epithet for Neil in the following years. But it’s in the concluding episode that Neil reaches his creative zenith: “The Last Trip to Tulsa”: a challenge to Dylan on his favorite ground, the “stream of consciousness” ballad à la “Desolation row”.
Even more memorable than ‘The End’ by the Doors or ‘Heroin’ by the Velvet Underground. Neil unravels in 9 minutes of just voice and guitar all the paranoias of his generation, supported by visionary lyricism and a voice at times tender, at times desperate.
In other words: Neil Young on a journey to the source of poetic inspiration.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
02 The Loner (03:53)
He's a perfect stranger,
Like a cross of himself and a fox.
He's a feeling arranger
And a changer of the ways he talks.
He's the unforeseen danger
The keeper of the key to the locks.
Know when you see him,
Nothing can free him.
Step aside, open wide,
It's the loner.
If you see him in the subway,
He'll be down at the end of the car.
Watching you move
Until he knows he knows who you are.
When you get off at your station alone,
He'll know that you are.
Know when you see him,
Nothing can free him.
Step aside, open wide,
It's the loner.
There was a woman he knew
About a year or so ago.
She had something that he needed
And he pleaded with her not to go.
On the day that she left,
He died, but it did not show.
Know when you see him,
Nothing can free him.
Step aside, open wide,
It's the loner.
04 I've Been Waiting for You (02:35)
I've been looking for a woman to save my life
Not to beg or to borrow
A woman with the feeling of losing once or twice
Who knows how could it be tomorrow?
I've been waiting for you
And you've been coming to me
For such a long time now
Such a long time now.
I've been waiting for you
And you've been coming to me
For such a long time now
Such a long time now.
07 Here We Are in the Years (03:27)
Now that the holidays have come
They can relax and watch the sun
Rise above all
of the beautiful things
They've done.
Go to the country take the dog
Look at the sky without the smog
See the world laugh
at the farmers feeding hogs
Eat hot dogs.
What a pity
That the people from the city
Can't relate to the slower things
That the country brings.
Time itself is bought and sold.
The spreading fear of growing old
Contains a thousand foolish games
That we play.
While people
planning trips to stars
Allow another boulevard to claim
A quiet country lane
It's insane.
So the subtle face is a loser
This time around.
Here we are in the years
Where the showman
shifts the gears
Lives become careers
Children cry in fear
Let us out of here!
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