Neil Young live!
Neil Young strolled onto the stage at the Chicago Theatre on Friday night as casually as a man entering a friendâs living room. He patiently surveyed the sparse surroundings, almost as if he was taking inventory for his two-night residency. But, as soon as he slipped on an acoustic guitar, he was all business.
Young will go into the history books as one of the greatest songwriters of his generation. Reminders came in the form of classics like âMy My, Hey Hey,â âHelpless,â and âDown By The River.â But the night wasnât about all about songcraft and trotting out the hits. In fact, it emphasized epic sound, sometimes at the expense of precision structure.
Youngâs most recent release, Le Noise (Reprise), is a collaboration with famed producer Daniel Lanois (U2, Peter Gabriel). Using a series of looping amplifiers and effects pedals, the duo created a tornado of noise using only a single guitar and Youngâs rich, expressive, and immediately recognizable tenor. It was this material that sparkled in the pristine confines of one of the cityâs finest venues.
The 65-year-old squeezed out torrents of melodic noise from a variety of sources. His lived-in acoustic did all the heavy lifting on âPeaceful Valley Boulevard,â enveloping the audience in a sonic blanket. âHitchhikerâ enlisted a black Les Paul and used the titular character as an autobiographical metaphor, the lyrics condensing decades worth of substance abuse and life on the road into a tone poem and a cautionary tale.
Along the way, some compositions even got reinvented. A pump organ transformed âAfter The Gold Rushâ into an eerie, horror-film soundtrack, and âI Believe In Youâ reveled in intimacy, with its anorexic frame plotted out on the back of a baby grand piano. Even the obscure âLeiaâ took a playful ride on a battered old upright.
But Young wasnât in the mood to play nice. The thunderous push toward the eveningâs finish line kept deferring to his phalanx of distortion pedals. A torrid âRumblin’,â and a feedback-laden âCortez The Killerâ soon gave way to a corrosive run through âCinnamon Girl.â This was music that was meant to be felt as much as heard, made all the more obvious when I placed a foot on a wooden panel in front of me and it kept my balcony seat from vibrating uncontrollably.
— Curt Baran
Category: Featured, Live Reviews, Weekly
