NEIL YOUNG BRINGS LE NOISE

Posted in Independent Music, Music Video

There was a brief albeit muddled moment of musical clarity in college when I sold every last one of my Neil Young albums to a local record shop (Buffalo Springfield, CSNY included). Years of spinning “Cinnamon Girl” on endless repeat, Neil’s whiny depressing helpless, helpless croon bringing me down and “Sample and Hold”? (I wasn’t ready), had driven me to desperation. Against all sound judgment, even a friend’s final protest: “You are going to regret this, man”, I purged my life of Neil. Better to burn out than fade away? Obviously, this was a huge mistake. A southern man might not need Neil around, but I learned the hard way, I do. I spent a good part of my early twenties re-acquiring my Neil discography… which is amazingly still growing.

Neil Young may have 62 years under his belt, but is clearly not le tired in his old age. The prolific godfather of grunge is releasing a brand-new solo album, Le Noise, Sept 28th on Reprise. The eight-song album is a collaboration between the acclaimed rock icon and musician/songwriter/producer Daniel Lanois, known for his work with U2, Bob Dylan, Peter Gabriel, Brian Eno, Emmylou Harris, Willie Nelson, The Neville Brothers and many others. Le Noise features Young on acoustic and electric guitars with Lanois adding his trademark sonic textures, creating one of the most sonically arresting albums Young has ever recorded. No band, no overdubs, just “a man on a stool and me doing a nice job on the recording,” as Lanois puts it:

“Neil was so appreciative of the sonics that we presented to him,” Lanois says. “He walked in the door and I put an acoustic guitar into his hands — one that I had been working on to build a new sound. That’s the multi-layered acoustic sound that you hear on the songs ‘Love and War’ and ‘Peaceful Valley Boulevard.’ I wanted him to understand that I’ve spent years dedicated to the sonics in my home and that I wanted to give him something he’d never heard before. He picked up that instrument, which had everything — an acoustic sound, electronica, bass sounds — and he knew as soon as he played it that we had taken the acoustic guitar to a new level. It’s hard to come up with a new sound at the back end of 50 years of rock and roll, but I think we did it.”