1. After the Gold Rush [1970] – After a
couple of years with Crosby, Stills and Nash, NY shows them what real
songwriting sounds like. There is not a
single bad song on this album. My
favorites are Tell Me Why, Birds, and When You Dance You Can Really Love [Crazy Horse’s last great cut
with Danny Whitten]. Southern Man needs no explanation.
2. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere [1969] –
The first album with Crazy Horse. Songs
include Cinnamon Girl, Down by the River, and Cowgirl in the Sand, classics all.
3. Rust Never Sleeps [1979] – The first
half is acoustic, the second half is with Crazy Horse. Rust
Never Sleeps is packed with great songs.
RNS is bookended by acoustic
and electric versions of the same song [My
My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)/Hey Hey My My (Into the Black)]. Pocahontas
is wacky with its references to Marlon Brando, the Astrodome and
television. Powderfinger is my favorite from this album. Sedan
Delivery and Welfare Mothers are
goofy, dumb songs that only NY & Crazy Horse can get away with. I hope he hurries up and releases the
remastered version of this.
4. On the Beach [1974] – If you want to
record an album while you’re stoned, this is what it would sound like. Revolution
Blues is NY’s ode to Charles Manson.
The title track is a woozy meditation on stardom. Ambulance
Blues is practically a note-for-note copy of Bert Jansch’s Needle of Death. The only bum song here is See the Sky About to Rain, a Harvest-era holdover. This record has a great vibe of doom.
5. Tonight’s the Night [1975] – This is a
tequila-fueled wake for Danny Whitten [Crazy Horse guitarist] and Bruce Berry
[CSN&Y roadie]. Guitars are
out-of-tune and vocals are off-key [Neil Young off-key? Say it isn’t so!]. Who cares?
This one keeps getting better with age.
6. Zuma [1975] – NY finally emerges from
the Tonight’s the Night ditch. NY’s first album with Crazy Horse since Danny
Whitten’s death. Frank Sampedro replaced
Whitten on guitar. Cortez the Killer is here. Danger
Bird is another good long song. The
rest are short and sound [dare I say] happy.
7. Comes a Time [1978] – It sounds like Harvest and Harvest Moon, but the songs are better [Goin’ Back, Comes a Time, Look Out for My Love, Lotta Love, Peace of
Mind, Human Highway]. Nicolette
Larson [RIP] is the female voice. Ian
& Sylvia’s Four Strong Winds
closes the album [a great song, BTW].
8. Freedom [1989] – The 1980s was a lost
decade for Neil Young, but he finally hit the jackpot at the end of the
decade. Like Rust Never Sleeps, Freedom
is bookended by acoustic and electric versions of the same song – in this case Rockin’ in the Free World. There's a lot of stuff in between that's very, very good.
9. Ragged Glory [1990] – NY followed Freedom with this – two excellent albums
in a row. NY was finally out of his
1980s funk. This is NY & Crazy Horse
at their garage-band best. I listened to
it over and over again when I was deployed to Saudi Arabia for Desert Shield.
10. Harvest [1972] – NY finds the middle of
the road in 1972 with Heart of Gold
and Old Man. Alabama
is the son of Southern Man, much to Lynyrd
Skynyrd’s annoyance. Here he also
cements his reputation as an acoustic folk hippie. He later said that traveling in the middle of
the road became a bore so he headed for the ditch. A rougher ride, but he met more interesting
people there.
11. Harvest Moon [1992] – The 20-years-later follow-up to Harvest, so you know what to expect. Standouts include Unknown Legend, From Hank to
Hendrix, and War of Man.
12. Mirror Ball [1995] – NY & Pearl
Jam. Four excellent songs [Song X, Act of Love, Downtown, Scenery],
one superb song [Peace and Love –
vocal cameo by Eddie Vedder]. These
Seattle guys provide the Crazy Horse vibe without the Crazy Horse sloppiness.
13. Sleeps With Angels [1994] – As I wrote in 2012, NY & Crazy
Horse decided to throw me and their fans a filthy breaking ball
with Sleeps With Angels. It is one of the most subdued performances
from them. It is one of the most
musically diverse albums Neil Young recorded with Crazy Horse. This album is a lost nugget in the huge Neil
Young discography.
14. Neil Young [1968] – The solo career
after the demise of Buffalo Springfield begins here. Classics like The Loner and The Old
Laughing Lady are found here. I’ve Been Waiting For You is a good one
as well.
15. Psychedelic Pill [2014] – So far, this
is the last one with Crazy Horse. On Psychedelic Pill there are two kinds of
songs – short, pleasant songs that might get played on the radio, and monster
epic jams, of which there are three. As
with all NY & Crazy Horse albums, the less NY sings and the more the band plays,
the better the album. Walk Like a Giant is the NY & Crazy
Horse song I’d been waiting on for two decades.
16. Broken Arrow [1996] – NY & Crazy
Horse’s first album without producer David Briggs. Three really long songs and a few short ones.
17. Le Noise [2010] – NY goes completely
solo. He’s the only musician on the
album.
18. Prairie Wind [2005] – This is another
album cut in the Harvest mold. It’s not bad, but it isn’t great either.
19. American Stars & Bars [1977] –
Three words: Like a Hurricane.
20. Chrome Dreams II [2007] – This is a
sequel to a NY album that never came out.
There’s a pretty good eighteen-minute version of Ordinary People from the This
Note’s For You era. No Hidden Path is a fourteen-minute
Crazy Horse-ish workout. The first two
songs [Beautiful Bluebird, Boxcar]
would not be out of place on Harvest.
21. Re-ac-tor [1981] – Two excellent songs [Southern
Pacific, Shots], one good song [Motor
City]. There’s a bonehead of a song
called T-Bone. The whole song is the line No mashed potato/Ain’t got no T-bone
repeated over the same monotonous riff – for nine minutes.
22. Hawks & Doves [1980] – Mostly
acoustic. It sounds like the country
album Old Ways should have been. Not bad, not essential either.
23. Trans [1982] – NY’s first album for
Geffen Records. Synthesizers and
vocoders are everywhere. This is an
interesting work and the songs don’t suck, but this is one you can listen to
maybe once a year.
24. Greendale [2003] – A concept album
about a fictitious small town in Northern California. Themes include environmentalism, corruption
and mass media. Some songs are pretty
good, others are just “meh.”
25. Fork in the Road [2009] – NY sings
about cars. I like the title song, which
is a rant against MP3s [“sounds like shit”].
There’s a song that decries social activism [Just Singing a Song]. Too
bad he didn’t take his own advice.
26. Americana [2012] – A non-essential
warm-up for NY & Crazy Horse before Psychedelic
Pill.
27. This Note’s For You [1988] – NY tries
his hand at big band “power swing.” The
all-digital production sucks the life out of these songs, which sound much
better live on the newly-released Bluenote
Café. This spawned a great video
that spoofed Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Spuds McKenzie, and excoriates
big company sponsors.
28. Silver & Gold [2000] – An acoustic
snoozer.
29. Are You Passionate [2002] – Recorded
with Booker T & the MGs [minus Steve Cropper]. NY tried and failed to record soul
music. There’s one good song, and it’s
with Crazy Horse [Goin’ Home].
30. Landing On Water [1986] – Two good
songs – Touch the Night and Hippie Dream. Shitcan the rest.
31. Life [1987] – This album has two
redeeming features – the hilarious Mideast
Vacation and Inca Queen. The rest of this album is indescribably bad.
32. Old Ways [1985] – NY was pissed off at
his record company because they sued him for making music that wasn’t
commercial enough and not “representative” of past NY music. He made this pseudo-country record after he
did the computer record [Trans] and a
1950s pastiche [Everybody’s Rockin’]. Run away from this one screaming!
33. Everybody’s Rockin’ [1983] – This album
has no redeeming social value – none.
34. Living With War [2006] – NY bashes you
over the head about the Iraq War until you cry “uncle.” He and CSN were genuinely surprised that not
everybody in their audience agreed with them.
I might like this album if the songs were better, but this is a
42-minute tirade. I hate this album.
Not Rated [I haven’t
heard them]
1. A Letter Home [2014]
2. Storytone [2014]
3. The Monsanto Years [2015]
