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The first and most fertile period of Young’s musical legacy.  I have outlined the releases from this era below.  Please note what I deem to be the ESSENTIAL releases.1966 - Buffalo Springfield - Buffalo Springfield: Young finally hits the big time…  Unfortunately the band wasn’t so keen on letting Young sing his own songs.  What [...]
The first and most fertile period of Young’s musical legacy.  I have outlined the releases from this era below.  Please note what I deem to be the ESSENTIAL releases.

1966 - Buffalo Springfield - Buffalo Springfield: Young finally hits the big time…  Unfortunately the band wasn’t so keen on letting Young sing his own songs.  What you have is 5 songs written by Young but only 2 sang by him. 
1967 - Buffalo Springfield - Buffalo Springfield Again: This time the band let Young sing a few more songs.  Young became frustrated with the in fighting and left the band after the recording of this release.   
1968 - Buffalo Springfield - Last Time Around:  Young decided to reunite with the band for a short time before they completely fell apart.  He contributed only 2 songs to this record. 1969 - Neil Young - Neil Young: The continuation of the work that Neil was doing with Jack Nitzsche, whom he had collaborated with on some of the more complicated arrangements on the second Buffalo Springfield record.  A very strong debut, with glimpses of what was to come. 
1969 - Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere: The debut of Neil’s backing band Crazy Horse (formerly The Rockets).  If his debut was a polished jewel, this was a rough gem of beautiful country tinged rock n roll. ESSENTIAL 1970 - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - Deja Vu: Young reunites with Stills in his new group including former members of The Hollies and The Byrds.  Other than lending the group some much needed rock n roll credibility, Neil sings only two songs on this record, one of them the wonderful “Helpless”.  
1970 - Neil Young - After The Gold Rush: Originally supposed to be a soundtrack to a film that actor Dean Stockwell (best known for his role in TV show Quantum Leap) had written, when the film never happened Young released this landmark recording.  ESSENTIAL 1972 - Neil Young - Harvest: Neil had fallen in love with actress Carrie Snodgress and was stricken with serious back problems during this period.  He  was in Nashville for a performance on Johnny Cash’s variety show and decided to enlist some Nashville session players and a couple of stars that were also in town for the show (James Taylor & Linda Ronstadt) to help him record what was to become his most popular record.  Definitely more polished than his work with Crazy Horse but absolutely brilliant in its own right.  ESSENTIAL Neil Young Archives releases from this era: 1968 - Neil Young - Sugar Mountain: Finally released in 2008 this acoustic solo performance  captures Young doing some of his great early songs.  Some of which were usually sung by other members of Buffalo Springfield.  ESSENTIAL 1970 - Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Live At The Fillmore East: A rousing rock set from Neil and Crazy Horse while guitarist Danny Whitten was still alive, including the prerequisite 12 plus minute rendition of “Down By The River”. 
1971 - Neil Young - Live At Massey Hall: Another great solo acoustic show, this time in Toronto featuring some songs from his then recent albums and some peaks at wonderful tunes yet to be released. 
Check out the upcoming release of Neil’s long awaited Archives project.  Volume One 1963 - 1972 has finally gotten a solid release date of June 2nd.  See details here.

Here is a playlist I have put together featuring my favorites from this era.  I tried to stay away from the most well known tunes but also included those that appeared on the recordings of Buffalo Springfield and CSNY.  If you can not see the playlist below, please follow this[url=#/playlist/Neil_Young_1966_1972/7674078]link[/url].

 



Posted originally: 2009-03-28 19:28:12