NEIL YOUNG – AFTER THE GOLDRUSH

On September 19th, 1970, Neil Young’s third solo album, After The Gold Rush, was released and it was a huge success. Young was inspired by a movie script by Dean Stockwell and Herb Bermann, called After The Gold Rush. That inspiration was most apparent in the title song and Cripple Creek Ferry. The script was never turned into a movie and (unfortunately) has been lost over time. During the first sessions for the album Young used Crazy Horse, but only two songs made the album (I Believe In You and Oh, Lonesome Me). Later recordings took place at the basement of Young’s house with CSNY bass player Greg Reeves, Crazy Horse drummer Ralph Molina and a very young Nils Lofgren. Young was looking for a mix between CSNY and Crazy Horse. The album was released at the turning-point between the ideals and naiveté of the hippie generation and the harsher reality after the dream. Even then (!) the environment was in a bad shape: “look at mother nature on the run in the 1970s” sings Young in After The Gold Rush. Mind you, it is just 1970, the very first year of the new decade. A year later Marvin Gaye would more or less proclaim the same on his masterpiece What’s Going On. Also, the abrasive Southern Man was (just like Ohio) about important and painful stuff, racism in this case. Unfortunately still very relevant, maybe not confined to just the south of the US, as Neil Young states in the 2002 biography Shakey, but still. Thrown in together with Alabama from the succeeding album Harvest, it would inspire Lynryd Skynryd to write the song Sweet Home Alabama, which contains the lyric “Well I heard mister Young sing about her, I heard ole’ Neil put her down, well I hope Neil Young will remember, a Southern man don’t need him around, anyhow”. The south of the US wasn’t too pleased with Young’s attention. The album is filled with songs like these and beautiful, intimate love songs. Despite, or maybe thanks to, its diversity, the album is great. Steve Hensby – Guitar and Vocals Harry Mitchell – Piano Lee Jones – Guitar and Harmonica Elysia Murphy – Vocals Josh Dyson – Bass Ben Vanderwal – Drums