Artistic freedom is a concept that appeals to all performers, musicians, and practitioners of the fine arts. Being a painter myself I can really sympathize with this aesthetic journey of one’s own design. A journey to do whatever you desire in your work. When your work embodies your vision, the feeling you get of knowing that it’s purely your design is majestic.
Sadly not everybody will experience this spiritual release with everything they labor over. Sometimes not everyone can relate to your mind’s eye and certainly nobody thinks like we artistic types do. We are a bit weird at times eh? And when they don’t think on the same wavelength as you do something horrific happens. Your work doesn’t sell. Your quest for individuality was a self-indulgent one, which yields no praise. Many artists fear this stigma and they do their work with other people in mind: Art for the public. They compromise their own dream for a chance at success.
Some artists however continue their “own” work no matter what the cost. Neil Young is one of these brave artists. His career is laden with examples of his disdain for those who try to chain his artistic freedom like his battle with Geffen and even the creation of this album, which Rolling Stone initially declared to be horrendously dull.
This album is far from dull. Though it contains a large amount of slow, piano based they sometimes serve as cool-down songs like
Till The Morning Comes and
Cripple Creek Ferry. Other tracks are emotionally proactive times for Young to share his introspective lyrics with his audience and play good old-fashioned music, without unnecessary distortion and experimentation.
I Believe In You is a frank and open piano ballad accompanied with Young’s trademark higher pitched nasally voice. His voice however carries through the track in a surprisingly comfortable manner and blends with the music.
Only Love Can Break Your Heart is almost identical but far less interesting.
Birds is haunting track about a break up, hidden in a creative metaphor.
Don’t Let It Bring You Down is a much more depressing song which follows a similar format. The lyrics are crushingly sad:
Old man lying
by the side of the road
With the lorries rolling by,
Blue moon sinking
from the weight of the load
And the building scrape the sky,
Cold wind ripping
down the allay at dawn
And the morning paper flies,
Dead man lying
by the side of the road
With the daylight in his eyes
The last three tracks can be viewed as the “standard” songs on this album and all three are very good. But they are completely daunted by the more signature tracks of the album.
Tell Me Why is a track with some nice guitar with Young’s best country twang to it.
When You Dance You Can Really Love is a great high-energy track with some of the “harder” guitar on the album. The lyrics take back-stage on this track and the musicianship on Young and co. Near the end of the track there is a total stop to the singing and the band just jams, with Young playing a quick solo, the piano becomes erratic, and it flows on in this manner until the songs final second. It’s a brilliant track.
Oh, Lonesome Me is a depressing song with some pleasant harmonica and a country feel to it. A VERY country feel…this is however not a bad thing and the song is actually one of the better ones on the whole album.
Among this whole album however stands to tracks of mammoth proportions. They are the tracks, which stand above all others on the album and as two of Young’s greatest songs period. Yes I am talking about
Southern Man and
After The Gold Rush. Southern Man is a monumental politically fueled song that lashes out against the racists and segregationists of the south with an acid tongue. He really unloads a shotgun blast at the hypocrisy and injustice of so-called god fairing men.
Southern man
better keep your head
Don't forget
what your good book said
Southern change
gonna come at last
Now your crosses
are burning fast
Southern man
Lily Belle,
your hair is golden brown
I've seen your black man
comin' round
Swear by God
I'm gonna cut him down!
I heard screamin'
and bullwhips cracking
How long? How long?
Even though I am from the South I still hail this song as Young’s greatest musical achievement and agree with the way he depicts the racism of the South. How can these men sleep at night while they go to work in the morning as preachers, lawyers, teachers, etc. and secretly carry clansmen hoods in their back pockets? How in God’s name can they justify that? I’m not religious either but I’m sure God doesn’t think that the African Americans are less than human. The hatred of men like George Wallace and Jim Crowe will forever be branded on the South, and I am sure that some of these good old southern boy racists are still alive today. Some may claim they are not responsible and that they were brainwashed like Nazi Germany. What a convenient excuse to free them from their shame. This song is strong musically as well, with plenty of impressive guitar solos to boot.
After The Gold Rush is another song with a heavy meaning behind it. It’s a tear jerking piano ballad sung in an abnormally high pitch, even from Young, about how we developed countries have raped the land for all it’s worth. Urbanization runs it’s course too quickly and leaves too many damaging ramifications to our planet. A good American example of this is our rampage to the western coast of the U.S. and how we mowed down land, ravaged wildlife, and annihilated the Indians in the name of “Manifest Destiny”, the concept to control our continent no matter what the cost. Thank god we stopped before we took over Mexico and Canada as well. On a side note, I am sure this song really spoke to the hippie nation of its time as well.
Yet even through this criticism Neil Young stands as an immensely successful artist who never compromised his vision. Even Rolling Stone finally yielded to this albums power and rated it as the 71st greatest album of all time.
