6 ms·

Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s lost album, Human Highway

96 points by tintinnabula 5y ago

hobojones 5y ago
If you're interested in CSNY history, I highly recommend checking out the Best Show side podcast, "So Far," which recaps CSNY and related albums year by year. As someone who was aware of CSNY and knew some of the more popular Neil Young stuff, it's been a great way to explore their catalogs in a somewhat directed manner. https://thebestshow.libsyn.com/so-far-episode-one-19691970 https://thebestshow.libsyn.com/so-far-episode-one-19691970
patorjk 5y ago
I'm glad Neil didn't erase the recordings. Sometimes bands have gems that stay in the vault for a long time. I remember reading about Nirvana's "You know you're right" years before it was released. I still remember the excitement I felt when it turned out the recording was real. Audioslave is another band that apparently has some good stuff in their vault. What was going to be the first single off of Revelations was shelved after their drummer decided he didn't like the track - but everyone else apparently loved it. Hopefully one day that sees the light of day.
- jtanderson 5y ago
  I feel this. One of my favorite artists, Ray LaMontagne, has entire albums that he has apparently (due to essentially rumors and, at some point, wikipedia) worked hard to completely remove from the internet. They're from his early days and a little different in terms of his style and voice, but I never found anything definite about the reasoning. However, these albums have some of my absolutely favorite material of his, far more than what you can find on even YouTube now and I was fortunate enough to get some of the tracks digitally years ago and hang onto them. Some of them have even been covered more recently and become pretty popular.
  - cydonian_monk 5y ago
    So that's what happened to those. I knew I wasn't completely crazy and that I'd heard and/or "bought" some early Ray LaMontagne music, but last year when I was trying to find it the tracks I was thinking of were nowhere to be seen. Just "Trouble." A guy I knew in high school released seven or eight albums with a co-conspirator and also felt the same way about their early work. Some of it was admittedly a bit rough, but some was also very good. He eventually relented on his opposition to re-leasing any of it, and those early songs have long since made it onto iTunes (and basically every streaming service). So I can definitely understand artists not wanting to see or hear their earliest works, worried that people will hate it and judge them based on who they used to be.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      It's interesting that there are many different trajectories for musical artists, the ones that this particular narrative most applies to are the ones that become more polished as they get older but whose creative genius was spent in the early years. And there are quite a few of those. Listen to early recordings of 'The Police' and what they - and Sting - put out later for some nice examples of that. The early stuff was definitely rough, but it has so much energy and originality.
    - jtanderson 5y ago
      If you're still looking, drop me a line! Those recordings are, in my ears, solid gold :)
swader999 5y ago
I read somewhere that Neil could write a hit song almost everyday. Is there anywhere to hear these tracks that he released? I'm old, it's been so long since I've tried to buy music.
- anotherhue 5y ago
  Neil Young Archives. Like Netflix, but for Neil Young. https://neilyoungarchives.com/timeline?position=14.887570892243792 https://neilyoungarchives.com/timeline?position=14.887570892...
  - airstrike 5y ago
    This is worth a submission of its own!
    - mikeryan 5y ago
      If you want one - my team built it. There’s some stories to be told. (I’m still in the “credits” though another team has since taken over maintenance) The first version of the archives was a 20 disk interactive Blu-Ray set, that’s where the file-cabinet design first came from. My first meeting with Neil was at his manager place in Calabasas and he rolled up silently in the 1950s Lincoln he converted to electric years ago. Anyway it was a good meeting but at the end I had to tell him that the design wouldn’t work on mobile and that in fact these days most folks design “mobile first”. His exact words were “fuck mobile” so I sat my ass down and we glued on an app when we had to. Fun times ;-)
      - pstuart 5y ago
        > There’s some stories to be told. Do tell!
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - 52-6F-62 5y ago
        I’ve been subscribed for several years. It’s excellent. The general approach inspired something I’m working on now on the side.
o0-0o 5y ago
So, where's the link to the album?
iancmceachern 5y ago
One of my favorite CSNY factoids is that Jerry Garcia played the amazing pedal steel guitar part on "Teach your Children" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teach_Your_Children https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teach_Your_Children
- seandoe 5y ago
  And they helped the dead with vocal harmonizing during recording of working man's dead and American Beauty. Cool stuff.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Their vocal harmonies are out of this world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyquqw6GeXk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyquqw6GeXk
- scarecrowbob 5y ago
  That was the first thing I learned to play on the pedal steel guitar. I've been playing about 6 years now, and I'm stoked that things are opening up here so I can perform a bit. Right now I am working on Garcia's parts for Dire Wolf. He's not the best pedal steel player, but he's my favorite.
  - BeniBoy 5y ago
    Yes! An incredible "hippie player" (the derogatory term used by classical steelers for players that took the pedal steel outside of the classic country style). He really has a very unusual style.. He also was the first steel player of the New Riders of the Purple Sage, before leaving his seat to Buddy Cage, which is my favorite pedal steel player :)
- osullivj 5y ago
  Jerry is on Crosby's wonderful 1969 solo LP If Only I Could Remember My Name. The article mentioned Neil's early 70s solo output: Harvest and Goldrush. No mention of the brilliant stuff from Stills: Stills I & II, and two astounding Manassas albums. If you love the Stills tunes on CSN & Deja Vu, the Manassas LPs are a must. Finally, for Stills fans, here's the prototype for Southern Cross [1]: Curtis Brothers with Buckingham & Nicks on Seven League Boots in 75. [1] https://youtu.be/TNEpFrOWooE https://youtu.be/TNEpFrOWooE
readingnews 5y ago
Deja Vu moved the living crap out of me when I first heard it. Will, in 200 years, people go "eh", like I do when I hear Beethoven now?
- __mharrison__ 5y ago
  Are you referring to the song or the album? Both are great, but the song is one of my favorite CSN(Y) songs. The outtakes on the 50th anniversary are fun too.
- amanaplanacanal 5y ago
  Nah, you don’t have to wait 200 years. On the other hand, I really like both CSNY and Beethoven, so I guess it takes all kinds.
gedy 5y ago
Neil Young made an odd comedy movie with Devo, et al using the same name: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Highway https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Highway
- kulshan 5y ago
  In 1974. Really surprised this highly relevant fact never made into such an in depth story. The Into The Black in that movie is blistering...
tkdc926 5y ago
The Political Beats podcast has an excellent 3 part retrospective of Neil Young's career. Part 3 alone is over 4 hours long. Definitely worth a listen if you are a fan. And despite the name there are no politics. https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/political-beats/ https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/political-beats/

96 points by tintinnabula 5y ago

If you're interested in CSNY history, I highly recommend checking out the Best Show side podcast, "So Far," which recaps CSNY and related albums year by year. As someone who was aware of CSNY and knew some of the more popular Neil Young stuff, it's been a great way to explore their catalogs in a somewhat directed manner. https://thebestshow.libsyn.com/so-far-episode-one-19691970 https://thebestshow.libsyn.com/so-far-episode-one-19691970

patorjk 5y ago

I'm glad Neil didn't erase the recordings. Sometimes bands have gems that stay in the vault for a long time. I remember reading about Nirvana's "You know you're right" years before it was released. I still remember the excitement I felt when it turned out the recording was real. Audioslave is another band that apparently has some good stuff in their vault. What was going to be the first single off of Revelations was shelved after their drummer decided he didn't like the track - but everyone else apparently loved it. Hopefully one day that sees the light of day.

jtanderson 5y ago
I feel this. One of my favorite artists, Ray LaMontagne, has entire albums that he has apparently (due to essentially rumors and, at some point, wikipedia) worked hard to completely remove from the internet. They're from his early days and a little different in terms of his style and voice, but I never found anything definite about the reasoning. However, these albums have some of my absolutely favorite material of his, far more than what you can find on even YouTube now and I was fortunate enough to get some of the tracks digitally years ago and hang onto them. Some of them have even been covered more recently and become pretty popular.
- cydonian_monk 5y ago
  So that's what happened to those. I knew I wasn't completely crazy and that I'd heard and/or "bought" some early Ray LaMontagne music, but last year when I was trying to find it the tracks I was thinking of were nowhere to be seen. Just "Trouble." A guy I knew in high school released seven or eight albums with a co-conspirator and also felt the same way about their early work. Some of it was admittedly a bit rough, but some was also very good. He eventually relented on his opposition to re-leasing any of it, and those early songs have long since made it onto iTunes (and basically every streaming service). So I can definitely understand artists not wanting to see or hear their earliest works, worried that people will hate it and judge them based on who they used to be.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    It's interesting that there are many different trajectories for musical artists, the ones that this particular narrative most applies to are the ones that become more polished as they get older but whose creative genius was spent in the early years. And there are quite a few of those. Listen to early recordings of 'The Police' and what they - and Sting - put out later for some nice examples of that. The early stuff was definitely rough, but it has so much energy and originality.
  - jtanderson 5y ago
    If you're still looking, drop me a line! Those recordings are, in my ears, solid gold :)

swader999 5y ago

I read somewhere that Neil could write a hit song almost everyday. Is there anywhere to hear these tracks that he released? I'm old, it's been so long since I've tried to buy music.

anotherhue 5y ago
Neil Young Archives. Like Netflix, but for Neil Young. https://neilyoungarchives.com/timeline?position=14.887570892243792 https://neilyoungarchives.com/timeline?position=14.887570892...
- airstrike 5y ago
  This is worth a submission of its own!
  - mikeryan 5y ago
    If you want one - my team built it. There’s some stories to be told. (I’m still in the “credits” though another team has since taken over maintenance) The first version of the archives was a 20 disk interactive Blu-Ray set, that’s where the file-cabinet design first came from. My first meeting with Neil was at his manager place in Calabasas and he rolled up silently in the 1950s Lincoln he converted to electric years ago. Anyway it was a good meeting but at the end I had to tell him that the design wouldn’t work on mobile and that in fact these days most folks design “mobile first”. His exact words were “fuck mobile” so I sat my ass down and we glued on an app when we had to. Fun times ;-)
    - pstuart 5y ago
      > There’s some stories to be told. Do tell!
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - 52-6F-62 5y ago
      I’ve been subscribed for several years. It’s excellent. The general approach inspired something I’m working on now on the side.

o0-0o 5y ago

So, where's the link to the album?

iancmceachern 5y ago

One of my favorite CSNY factoids is that Jerry Garcia played the amazing pedal steel guitar part on "Teach your Children" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teach_Your_Children https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teach_Your_Children

seandoe 5y ago
And they helped the dead with vocal harmonizing during recording of working man's dead and American Beauty. Cool stuff.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  Their vocal harmonies are out of this world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyquqw6GeXk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyquqw6GeXk
scarecrowbob 5y ago
That was the first thing I learned to play on the pedal steel guitar. I've been playing about 6 years now, and I'm stoked that things are opening up here so I can perform a bit. Right now I am working on Garcia's parts for Dire Wolf. He's not the best pedal steel player, but he's my favorite.
- BeniBoy 5y ago
  Yes! An incredible "hippie player" (the derogatory term used by classical steelers for players that took the pedal steel outside of the classic country style). He really has a very unusual style.. He also was the first steel player of the New Riders of the Purple Sage, before leaving his seat to Buddy Cage, which is my favorite pedal steel player :)
osullivj 5y ago
Jerry is on Crosby's wonderful 1969 solo LP If Only I Could Remember My Name. The article mentioned Neil's early 70s solo output: Harvest and Goldrush. No mention of the brilliant stuff from Stills: Stills I & II, and two astounding Manassas albums. If you love the Stills tunes on CSN & Deja Vu, the Manassas LPs are a must. Finally, for Stills fans, here's the prototype for Southern Cross [1]: Curtis Brothers with Buckingham & Nicks on Seven League Boots in 75. [1] https://youtu.be/TNEpFrOWooE https://youtu.be/TNEpFrOWooE

readingnews 5y ago

Deja Vu moved the living crap out of me when I first heard it. Will, in 200 years, people go "eh", like I do when I hear Beethoven now?

__mharrison__ 5y ago
Are you referring to the song or the album? Both are great, but the song is one of my favorite CSN(Y) songs. The outtakes on the 50th anniversary are fun too.
amanaplanacanal 5y ago
Nah, you don’t have to wait 200 years. On the other hand, I really like both CSNY and Beethoven, so I guess it takes all kinds.

gedy 5y ago

Neil Young made an odd comedy movie with Devo, et al using the same name: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Highway https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Highway

kulshan 5y ago
In 1974. Really surprised this highly relevant fact never made into such an in depth story. The Into The Black in that movie is blistering...

tkdc926 5y ago

The Political Beats podcast has an excellent 3 part retrospective of Neil Young's career. Part 3 alone is over 4 hours long. Definitely worth a listen if you are a fan. And despite the name there are no politics. https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/political-beats/ https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/political-beats/