Neil Young

Silver & Gold

Neil Young at his homely best

Review Score:

(10/10)
The fact is, there's no pleasing a Neil Young fan. You might dig your heals in and refuse to buy any unauthorised material, content simply to bide your time and wait for Young to get around to releasing his songs officially - but when he does, the version he chooses to present to the paying public isn't the one you want! Here's another fact for you: Neil Young is a stubborn old mule. He'll release what he darn well wants to release and everyone can shut up and live with it. But Silver & Gold has to be sung with harmonies, it certainly shouldn't be stripped right down to one man and his guitar. There's no pleasing some people. Truth is, it fits in perfectly with the whole experience that is Young's, what, 32nd, album?
Comparisons have inevitably been made with anything from Harvest to Comes A Time through Old Ways to Harvest Moon, but it differs considerably from all those releases. He has always promised a truly acoustic album, but somewhere along the line he has given in to plugging in Old Black, or he has drafted in some doohicky fiddle player to spice up the proceedings and belt the thing along a pace, but not here. Restrained, reflective, laid back. Neil Young, the man and his music, alone with his guitar and harmonica. He is joined by other musicians, but somehow you always get the feeling that this is just him, and it is quite fitting that he should keep the title track all to himself. He took eleven goes to get that song just right, he was never satisfied with the versions featuring extra musicians, and eventually settled with a low-key rendition, just him alone - no harmonies - and that is just the way it should be when the title track sums up the feelings that weave their way throughout all eleven songs: Our kind of love just never seems to get old, its better than silver and gold. Relationships are more important than material things. He's asked the question, he's found the answer, and they both amount to the same thing: Love. Love, friendship, family, that's what really matters, they're more important than riches, they're more important than this album.

Its not the first time Young has sung about love, not by a long shot. It's a word used in music in general with such abandon that any real meaning has been squeezed out of it long ago. But here, used in this context, it somehow sounds convincing. It must be because of Neil's years of marriage to Pegi and the experiences that he has lived through with her and their family. There is something warm and tender when words of love and affection are directed towards your betrothed and your kin. As the years pass by, events and memories begin to fade like the old photograph in Distant Camera, but love, love of this kind, will stand up to time. Here he has surrounded himself with his family and a few friends, and we can just be grateful to share in the results albeit from the other side of the great divide. The album is dedicated to his wife (who also took one of the photos), was inspired by Ben, and Amber is credited with the front and back cover photographs. The list of musicians is full of familiar and comfortable names. A poignant acknowledgement simply says, "thank you to all my friends".

Good To See You heads the album off in the right direction, being about "coming home after being gone a long time". It says very simply what needs to be said and because of that, and the overall concept of the album, it loses any sense of pretty sentimentality. It is not twee, it is just right. The songs are not all this lyrically simplistic. They are thoughtful and thought provoking, reflecting the feelings of a man fast approaching his sixtieth year just taking a moment to dwell on the past and consider the really important things in life. And he hasn't done this at the cost of the melodies. There is a lovely collection of songs here, some bright and cheerful - Good To See You and Daddy Went Walkin' - others, like Razor Love, tinged with sorrow. But it is an album that grows; it doesn't come together on the first listen and needs time for its whole worth to be appreciated. Gladly it doesn't suffer from being over-produced, and this is essential when it comes to Neil Young. He is at his best when he sounds raw and natural, and that is certainly the case with Silver & Gold. It is honest and intimate. Harvest Moon is unconvincing because the crisp, clean production only serves to nullify the desired emotion and alienate the listener. It seems to sound somewhat sterilised and spiritless. But not so Silver & Gold; it is warm and earthy and easy to listen to. It has the feeling of being spontaneous, this no more apparent than with Emmylou Harris' harmonies on Red Sun where the backing vocals are sung by a woman who is not entirely sure of what she's singing. And despite its over-all laid back tone, there are moments that really thrill - the first burst of acoustic picking on Buffalo Springfield Again when the drums come rattling up and the harp rushes in, is just wonderful. Horseshoe Man is a sweet and melancholy piano interlude, and Without Rings brings the set to a suitably brooding but unhurried conclusion; Young, basso voce, "I'm picking something up, I'm letting something go. Like a dog, I'm fetching this for you."

Commenting on his decision to let three songs go to CSNY's Looking Forward, Young said, "I had too many songs; they were all the same." You can see what he means on this album, but it is not wholly justified, and after two or three listens each of the songs forges a place of its own. But when all is said and done it is not about the songs, it is about people and the feelings associated with them. Relationships, real friends, and especially family, are more important than anything else. Put on Silver & Gold, sit back, close your eyes and let the ragged fingerpicking, acoustic chords, and the familiar voice of Neil Young just wash over you.

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