Neil Young - Harvest - Review

This is a difficult Album for me to review. Everybody knows most of the songs well and they still get a lot of airplay. They are sort of okay I guess but still... ! Neil and his band the Stray Gators go commercial here. Everything sounds smooth and polished and the public loved it. Both the Album and the single Heart of Gold (with Back-Up vocals from James Taylor and Linda Ronstadt) went to # 1 in the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972. And Heart of Gold  part II called Old Man also reached the Top 100. So the public loved it and much later Neil even told the press that Harvest was his best Album. But is it and did Neil really mean what he said? And what does a die-hard Neil Young fan like myself makes of this Album?
It´s mainly a country album with tunes like Out in the Country and Harvest. And they are quite nice actually. There are also two songs with the participation of the London Symphony Orchestra, namely A Man Needs a Maid and There´s a World. I´ve always cared for the words of the latter song but the arrangements are sweeter than Brazilian Sugar. Both Alabama with backing vocals from Stills & Crosby and the drugged out jam Words (Between the lines of Age) with backing vocals by Stills & Nash sound like Southern Man rip-offs.

All songs are written by Neil and they deal with a lot of his problems. With women, with drugs, with getting old. Don´t we all? Get old I mean.

Everybody knows The Needle and the Damage Done but listen once more to Till the Morning Comes on the Gold Rush album and tell me it´s not basically the same song. The whole album sounds a bit tired. Neil´s back problems at the time might have influenced that.

To me Harvest is the main stream version of After the Gold Rush. It worked commercially. It failed artistically in my opinion. Neil never recorded an album like this again. Even Harvest Moon, recorded some 25 years later sounds more authentic. But that´s still in the future.

In the present only Are You Ready For the Country holds the promise of Tonight´s the Night.

So yeah, most people will probably like Harvest but it is certainly not Neil's best album and although it's not bad, it ain´t my favourite!    

Songs: Out in the Weekend, Harvest, A Man Needs a Maid, Heart of Gold, Are You Ready for the Country, Old Man, There´s a World, Alabama, The Needle and the Damage Done, Words (Between the Lines of Age)

Type of Music: Mainstream Country(Rock)/Folk/Pop

Rating: ******* (7 out of 10)

Black = Good Songs

Green = Great Songs

Red = Could Be Better

Who should buy this Record: Everybody that likes Heart of Gold probably already owns the Album. It´s not really essential though.