In our minds we tend to remember a person the way they were the last time we saw them or the way the person looked the time when they played a big part of our life. Think about a high school friend who you have only seen once or twice since graduation. You will probably picture that person as the 17 or 18 year old friend you knew oh so many years ago. A snapshot frozen in time. The same holds true for our musical heroes. My mental image of Peter Frampton will always be the young, long haired rock god on the cover of Frampton Comes Alive, not the balding, older man recently featured on a Geico commercial. What about the artists that stay with you through your life time, that grow old before your eyes while continuing to put out great music? I would argue that for a rare few, we allow our mental images of those musicians to age as we ourselves add "experience" and milestone birthdays. These mental images and memories of those special few people evolve with us for the most part. I just finished watching the Johnathan Demme motion picture Neil Young Heart of Gold. I now have my lasting image of Neil, the way I will remember him from now until some sad day in the future when I hear the news of his passing. More on that to follow but first, back to the beginning of Neil for me...
Neil and I go way, way back. The first 8 track tape I ever bought was Live Rust and the first triple album I purchased was Decade. Certainly not popular picks for a 14 year old in the late 1970's but Neil's voice and variety of musical styles made me want to listen over and over. The liner notes inside Decade were hand scribbled by Neil and I read every word wondering what experiences had led him to write each song. "I wrote this song for my first car and my last girl" and it was obvious he cared deeply for both. Neil's music was a thread connecting me to acoustic rock, to folk, to blues, to garage band grunge, to country, to rockabilly, and to protest songs. From Neil I found CSN, Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, The Grateful Dead, Linda Ronstadt, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, Bob Dylan, The Band and countless others. I have seen him in concert several times, a couple of shows with Crazy Horse; twice alone with just his piano, organ, guitars, and harmonicas; and once with the Shocking Pinks during his rockabilly tour. Every show different, every show very good. Any of those moments could easily qualify as the image of Neil that I store away in my memory bank. Then I watched Heart of Gold...
The film which was recorded at the Ryman Auditorium in 2005 and released in June of 2006 is much more than a "concert film." Jonathan Demme directed this film masterfully. It is a highly personal set of songs delivered by Neil and a fabulous list of musicians and back up singers including Emmylou Harris (who has never looked better and is simply stunning), Neil's wife Pegi, Rick Rosas, Karl Himmel, Ben Keith, Spooner Oldam, Chad Cromwell and many others. Leading up to this project Neil had recently recovered from a life threatening brain aneurysm, he lost his daddy only two months earlier, and had just released the stellar and critically acclaimed CD Prairie Wind. The result is a deeply personal, truly heartfelt, and amazingly calming collection of performances that would be therapeutic to anyone experiencing trauma or a recent loss in their life. This is the folk and country side of Neil. It is all acoustic as he performs the entire Prairie Wind CD plus a fantastic selection of his classics that still have heart, legs, and a timeless feel including I Am A Child, Old King, Comes A Time, Old Man, Needle & The Damage Done, Harvest Moon, 4 Strong Winds, and The Painter. For the final song nearly forty musicians and singers gather on stage for an outstanding rendition of One of These Days, only to be topped by Neil all alone on stage with his guitar singing the hauntingly great The Old Laughing Lady as the credits roll. When he finishes, he packs up his famous old guitar once owned by Hank Williams Sr. and walks off the Ryman Auditorium stage as if to say "If this is it I am at peace with myself and my music." This is how I will forever remember one of my musical heroes, the amazingly talented Neil Young. Thank you for the music and the memories Mr. Young. Long May You Run.
4 comments:
Neil also holds a special place in my heart. I lost my virginity to Neil. Wait, that didn't come out right. The night I lost my virginity, we were watching a Neil concert (Rust Never Sleeps?) on HBO in my girlfriend's basement (1982?). "Oh, to live on Sugar Mountain..."
It's not too early for Neil.
Awesome! Talk about a bookmark in your life.
That movie was great... and sad. My friend and I saw it in the theater and snuck beers in like we were 18.
Outstanding review Brakeman - i saw this in the theatre with my lady and we were very moved by the film. Musically it is a tremendous concert - acoustic Neil, great band, emmylou - fantastic setlist - what more could you want. But the strong emotion of the film comes from knowing how close Neil was to passing away when writing that album - that gives those songs a little bit extra.
Incidentally, Prairie Wind has held up for me as the best Neil album since Harvest Moon in '91. i think those two Neil albums can be mentioned in the same conversation as any of his classics from the 70s.
All hail Neil!
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