Barn Howl

A small series in which I try to sidestep my January blues by any means necessary, Part 5: Neil Young (not Satan, they were probably both in same school year though).

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Ah, old Neil. At his best he’s the best thing ever, sounds heavier than most metal bands just playing an acoustic by himself, you know the drill. Problem is for my money he’s been someone best enjoyed retroactively. Recently, he’s been banging out a steady stream of great music almost all of it dating from Gerald Ford’s presidency. Moments and odd tracks aside I haven’t thoroughly enjoyed one of his new albums since Clinton’s second term*.

Too often Mr Young comes across as your friend’s weird unkempt survivalist uncle, shouting mad shit into the wind, building alternate-universe iPods out of genuine US railroad parts and muttering dark truths about climate change whilst occasionally dropping his pants in public.

So, obviously I bought his new LP with Crazy Horse, Barn. I knew hoped it would be different this time.

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Recorded in some form of agricultural storage-based structure Barn is such a relief for wannabe believers like me, who had all but given up on him bending his strings with real intent and anger again. It isn’t an immediate unalloyed success but it is a warm, comforting album and a welcome spike of life.

What I will say for a kick off is that Barn is both perfectly sequenced and perfectly produced**, I suspect that’s the sort of thing that you can do when you’re on your 41st go around. Young toys with spontaneity and nostalgia throughout, particularly in respect to whether the latter is a help or a hinderance; nothing could be more relevant to the state of his nation.

The weather-beaten, gnarled edifice that Crazy Horse is/was has actually changed. Nils Logfren slotting in after the retirement of Frank Sampedro, has given the old horse a more flexible, agile, melodic quality, albeit at the expense of some, umm, horsepower^. At times I found myself thinking ‘hmm, too much folksiness’ but overall the songs come through.

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Oh yeah, music. There is some of that on Barn.

‘Song For The Seasons’ is a gentle introduction, a slightly wonky afterhours concoction with some (God help me am I really going to type this?!) nice accordion touches. As with a lot of recent Neil you kind of feel what he’s singing about as the lyrics are a bit so-so, but I don’t mind.

I prefer ‘Heading West’ and its’ peculiarly strident nostalgia and personal history all set to a delightfully ramshackle tune, almost but not quite collapsing under its own weight. It is just nice to hear him hit those strings with some real intent again. Although I’m no fan of the slightly pissed sounding ‘Change Ain’t Never Gonna’, too much harmonica man and buff up those words a bit; best thing about it is the This Note’s For You referencing opening line.

Then Neil gives Barn some weight with ‘Canamerican’ his take on his dual national feelings. Personally I think he missed a trick not calling it ‘Ameradian’, but that’s what I get for being Welshlish. Unlike what’s gone before it feels like a finished song and gains real punch for being over and done in 3:17. I am happy to report we get a rare sighting of goofy Neil on ‘Shape Of You’ which goes appealingly falsetto while rhyming ‘for the better’ and ‘sweater’. It’s fun.

The best track on Barn by far is the wonderfully unsettled, sketchy ‘They Might Be Lost’. Mr Young dropping us straight into a story about waiting for the boys with the truck, without any context at all. Could be something as banal as moving house, could be a deal, could be one of them fancy metaphor thangs for the American people. He outdoes himself here to the backing of a slow waltz time, uncertainty filling the inky blackness outside the radius of his porchlight. I can play this one through 5 times in a row, easily.

Crazy Horse come out all guns blazing for the second side opener ‘Human Race’; hey it’s a real barnstormer!^^ I find this one utterly irresistible despite the elementary school level lyrics about climate change. It is utterly thrilling to hear him get angry again and when he hits his solo … paradise. I really love how compact and punchy this track is*^. This is another repeater.

I baulked at ‘Tumblin’ Thru The Years’ when I first heard it, I felt it was trying a touch hard to reach heartfelt. I really dig it now, mostly because the delicate piano flicks and shading, played by a certain Mr N Young.

The only track that quite rivals ‘They Might Be Lost’ is ‘Welcome Back’, where the musical backing is so scaled back at times to be skeletal, in the manner of Dylan’s most recent. There is an air of unaffected affecting beauty to this tune, a masterclass of understated axe-wielding; I never cease to be amazed and moved by just how much emotion he can translate through those strings. At 8:27 ‘Welcome Back’ is the longest track here but it isn’t a second longer than it needs to be.

The kiss off from Barn is ‘Don’t Forget Love’ another grower. This time he preaches tolerance and reconciliation over regret, again more through the tone of that magnificent ruin of a voice than the words. The song teeters at the junction of trite and meaningful but pulls on through and sends the listener home with a fragile optimism.

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Barn is not a classic in the Young canon but it is a very substantial album, exceeding what I had hoped he could still make. It just radiates an integrity and purpose, both rare qualities these days, seeded with a very real awareness of mortality. There are some great and lovely moments here, a few that could have graced almost any LP of his and nothing too embarrassing.

Uncle kept his pants on.

1122 Down (on the farm).

PS: This is great beyond all my wildest imaginings. If you are a Neil-head you have to watch this:

PPS: I hope I haven’t written too much and outstayed my welcome.

*yes I know there are folks out there who’d go to bat for Prairie Wind and whatnot, but to me just stick Weld on and the rest is all just shown up as piss on a bush fire.

**by the Volume Dealers – Young and Niko Bolas.

^which is not to diss Mr Sampedro in any way shape or form, I love his playing, this is just different, more brittle.

^^thank you folks, thank you. I’m here ’til Thursday. Please don’t forget to tip your server.

*^you can imagine it dragging on for a full 19 minutes on Psychedelic Pill.