Music

Neil Young's new album is 98 minutes of live songs and animal noises

by Richard Howard

April 29, 2016

Neil Young's new album 'Earth' is a stoner's fantasy.

Neil Young is well known for eschewing trends, and often will go out of his way to challenge music and its industry’s status quo. Well, he may have managed to outdo himself once again with his new LP, Earth.

So-named as a result of the majority of the the songs’ environmentally-leaning subject matter, the live album consists of 10 previously released tracks, one new one – and seamlessly incorporated interludes featuring a host of our furry/scaly/feathered friends from the wild. Young explained the concept to Rolling Stone:

“It’s like nothing that I’ve done. It’s more like a giant radio show. It has no stops…Imagine it’s a live show where the audience is full of every living thing on Earth. And also they overtake the music once in a while and play the instruments. It’s not conventional, but it is based on live performance.”

Perhaps the best description of the album came from Lukas Nelson, who is the son of country great Willie Nelson and backed Young both on his last LP The Monsanto Years and its companion tour.

“One of the single greatest audio experiences I’ve ever had. Smoke some Willie Reserve [marijuana], sit back and listen to it. It’s as if After The Gold Rush was a piece of just one long song that is this Earth… It’s like listening/watching a Ridley Scott movie in your head, or like when I watched the original Star Wars or Blade Runner for the first time.”

Personally, I’m equally hyped about Young’s continued rebel attitude as I am do discover the Nelson apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Check out the studio version of “Wolf Moon” which also appears on Earth.