I’m not sure what has happened with Neil Young as far as his songwriting goes. It goes a long way back for me at this stage. But something went awry. There is no subtext, no nuance, it’s just “the sky is blue and it’s windy today”, or as you cite above in “let’s roll again.” Everything is just stated point blank, but maybe he feels that it is the best option to be understood? I really don’t know, but it’s been 25 years at least since I was moved by a song of his.
Have to agree with all of this. It's the first time I've stopped myself from buying one of his records in at least 10 years, and I've even paid ridiculously high prices for official albums that are just bootlegs in very poor quality that he's dumped on the market without improving the sound (and that I've owned for years and stopped listening to, since there were 20 better recordings from the same tour, etc.)
Wow. Too personal a review, I find this. Repetitively so, stating criticisms like you’re some fucking marriage and family counselor no one asked to give gratuitous opinions. You could have written that the album is mediocre and derivative and you did not like it in a paragraph and spared us the barbs. I give the review a thumbs down.
I’m not sure what has happened with Neil Young as far as his songwriting goes. It goes a long way back for me at this stage. But something went awry. There is no subtext, no nuance, it’s just “the sky is blue and it’s windy today”, or as you cite above in “let’s roll again.” Everything is just stated point blank, but maybe he feels that it is the best option to be understood? I really don’t know, but it’s been 25 years at least since I was moved by a song of his.
Have to agree with all of this. It's the first time I've stopped myself from buying one of his records in at least 10 years, and I've even paid ridiculously high prices for official albums that are just bootlegs in very poor quality that he's dumped on the market without improving the sound (and that I've owned for years and stopped listening to, since there were 20 better recordings from the same tour, etc.)
Wow. Too personal a review, I find this. Repetitively so, stating criticisms like you’re some fucking marriage and family counselor no one asked to give gratuitous opinions. You could have written that the album is mediocre and derivative and you did not like it in a paragraph and spared us the barbs. I give the review a thumbs down.