Homegrown/ Neil Young, country-rock

By Narendra Kusnur

Album: Homegrown
Artiste: Neil Young
Genre: Folk/ country-rock
Label: Reprise Records
Rating: *** 1/2

Canadian star Neil Young’s ‘latest’ album ‘Homegrown’ comes 45 years after its songs were recorded. Strangely, he chose to launch it on the same day that Bob Dylan's much-awaited ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’ arrived.

Whether that was a wise decision or not, time will tell. On its own, ‘Homegrown’ has a folk-country-rock sound that was very typical of Young in some of his earlier albums. There are shades of ‘Harvest’, ‘Old Ways’, ‘Comes A Time’ and ‘Harvest Moon’, though on a couple of track, he pumps up the sound like he did with his backing band Crazy Horse. What's, however, missing is that stand-out song that lingers in your head.

The album was written at a time when he was having differences with his partner, actress Carrie Snodgress. “I won't apologise, the light shone in through your eyes,” he sings on the opening ‘Separate Ways’, continuing, “Now we’ve gone our separate ways, Looking for better days; Sharing our little boy, who grew from joy back then”. The voice has that distinct nasal twang one has admired over the years.

On the next track ‘Try’, featuring back-up vocals by Emmylou Harris who hadn’t yet established herself, Young hints at reconciliation with Snodgress, talking of making amends and singing, “We got lot of time to get together if we try”. Then, on the short piece ‘Mexico’, he asks why it’s hard to hang on.

As he did with his pathbreaking ‘Ohio’, Young names some songs after cities, to create ‘Florida’, a spoken track which seems totally out of place, and the pleasant ‘Kansas’, where he says, “I feel like I've just woken from a bad dream, and it’s so good to have you sleeping by my side”. He also has ‘Little Wing’, featuring The Band guitarist Robbie Robertson, but this is totally different from Jimi Hendrix’s beauty with the same name. The pumped-up numbers include ‘We Don’t Smoke It No More’ and ‘Vacancy’, with their supple guitar lines played by Young.

Some of these tracks have been used earlier. The quintessential Young folk ballad ‘Love Is A Rose’ was part of a compilation, whereas the title track and ‘Star Of Bethlehem’ appeared on his popular album ‘American Stars & Bars’.

While the guitar, bass, piano and Young’s trademark harmonica appear regularly, one finds occasional use of the pedal steel guitar, lap slide guitar, dobro, Wurlitzer and even wine glass effects. As such, the sound is very typical of that era, with Young co-producing the album with different people. The presence of The Band drummer Levon Holm on some numbers adds to the celebrity guest quotient.

Yet, one gets the feeling that Young, whose last album 'Colorado' was released last year, has done similar stuff often before. He’s known for his versatility – besides country-rock and folk-rock, he’s also called the godfather of grunge, taking him into another zone. So coming this late actually acts as a disadvantage. It’s good to listen to in the background though, as long as one doesn’t begin the comparisons. Maybe one can treat it like an old album one has accidentally missed.