Horse Crazy

Though he never really slowed down at any point, Neil Young stayed on an especially prolific streak as the 2010s bled into the 2020s. In addition to a steady rollout of archival material, official versions of long-bootlegged shows, and other miscellanea, Neil has produced albums of entirely new material at a rate unmatched by most artists in his age bracket who have been at it for as long as he has. World Record follows quickly behind the mellow rocking of 2021's Barn, and again finds Young ably backed by his longest-running comrades, Crazy Horse. This time around, however, the band worked with producer Rick Rubin, capturing everything live in the studio and sticking to an analog-heavy recording process. World Record is an album built of unlikely combinations that somehow work.

Neil Young's second solo album, released only four months after his first, was nearly a total rejection of that polished effort. Though a couple of songs, "Round Round (It Won't Be Long)" and "The Losing End (When You're On)," shared that album's country-folk style, they were altogether livelier and more assured. The difference was that, while Neil Young was a solo effort, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere marked the beginning of Young's recording association with Crazy Horse, the trio of Danny Whitten (guitar), Ralph Molina (drums), and Billy Talbot (bass) that Young had drawn from the struggling local Los Angeles group the Rockets. With them, Young quickly cut a set of loose, guitar-heavy rock songs – "Cinnamon Girl," "Down by the River," and "Cowgirl in the Sand" – that redefined him as a rock & roll artist.

Greendale ranks as one of the more elaborate projects Neil Young ever conceived, a concept album inspired by Thornton Wilder's Our Town which was accompanied by a film telling the record's story – the film was then used as a backdrop for a theatrical production featuring Young and Crazy Horse. Nearly 20 years after the album's 2003 release, Young revisited the project through the aptly titled Return to Greendale, a live effort capturing a September 4, 2003 concert held in Toronto just a few weeks after the August appearance of Greendale…

Return to Greendale is the next installment in Neil Young’s Performance Series and features a concert (audio and on film) from the historic and unique 2003 tour supporting the release of the Neil Young with Crazy Horse album Greendale. On the 2003 tour, Neil Young and Crazy Horse were joined on stage by a large cast of singers and actors to perform the story Neil Young wrote about the small town of Greendale and how a dramatic event affects the people living there. The ten songs from the powerful original album are performed in sequence, with the cast speaking the sung words - adding to the intensity of the performance.

Barn, the new Neil Young/Crazy Horse album was recorded in a remote, restored, 19th century log barn. This musical family has played together for a half century, yet they continue creating new music. Neil and the Horse fans have long shouted for “more barn” and here it is… 10 new songs that capture the wild, rock and roll spirit, the idiosyncratic raw sound and the lyrical beauty that epitomizes a classic NYCH collaboration. The last song appeared on the last morning and was recorded just an hour later during a pounding hailstorm and during the full moon.