NEIL YOUNG AND CRAZY HORSE
Crazy Horse at the Fillmore 1970
Reprise
· An incomplete, but powerful document of the Horse’s onstage power.
The first of Young’s performance series ( a vault-cleaning collection of live shows from across his entire career), Live at the Fillmore 1970 finds Neil stopping at the legendary Fillmore East in support of his first (and arguably still best) album with Crazy Horse "Everybody Knows This is Nowhere." Although the album consists of only six songs, it’s still an essential purchase for Young fans.
The presence of Danny Whitten, Crazy Horse’s original guitarist who died only two years after this show was recorded, is the biggest reason fans will want to pick this up. Like Young, Whitten was a guitarist who relied on feel instead of chops, and the interplay between him and Young on this set is revelatory. Centrepieces include a 12-minute performance of "Down by the River" and a 16-minute version of "Cowgirl in the Sand," which take up most of the running time. Rather than competing with each other, Young and Whitten lock in tight with the rhythm section’s loose, but insistent groove, and their interaction is a wonder to hear. Instead of escalating examples of virtuosity and aggression, the guitarists create a wall of churning, circular solos that are hypnotic in their primitive, grungy power. Another highlight is a version of "Baby Let’s Go Downtown," being performed several years before it would appear on Young’s gloomiest album, Tonight’s the Night.
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