When the godfather of grunge laments the king of grunge !!
On August 16, 1994, Neil Young released his 20th album "Sleeps With Angels".
On November 8, 1993, Neil Young entered the studio with his backing band "Crazy Horse" to record his 20th album. Neil Young intended to try and recreate the atmosphere and music from the period of his 1970 album "After the Gold Rush".
Amid the recordings, Young receives the news of Kurt Cobain's death.
What's more, Young reveals that Cobain signed his suicide note with words from the song "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" from the album "Rust Never Sleeps", and so Cobain wrote before his death:
"I do not have the passion anymore ... And so remember, it's better to burn out than to fade away"
If you remember the review we wrote on the album "Tonight’s The Night" you probably know that Neil Young was greatly influenced by the deaths of two of his friends Danny Whitten, guitarist of "Crazy Horse" and Bruce Berry who was the stage worker of "Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young", Together and separately.
This time, too, Young did not remain indifferent to the tragic event. The atmosphere in the studio changes immediately and this is reflected in new songs written by Neil Young following the death of Kurt Cobain and in the melancholy atmosphere that hovers over all the songs on the album, just like in "Tonight’s The Night" album, Only Without Alcohol ...
Because some of the songs were written before the difficult event, the musical diversity on this album ranges from the broken piano of "My Heart", to the acoustics of "Train of Love" and to the ruff guitars of "Change Your Mind" which crosses the 14-minute mark. But what all the pieces have in common is the dark and melancholy atmosphere, except for "Piece of Crap" which features some punk touches.
Two songs on the album "Western Hero" and "Train of Love" share the same music only with different lyrics.
We talked about new songs written following the death of Kurt Cobain, so there is also one excerpt omitted from the album. The song "Gone To Hell" that young feared would link to Cobain's death found it's way out of the album. This song was supposed to be a complementary track to the song "A Dream That Can Last" whose original name was "Gone To Heaven" and whose name was changed following the omission of the song "Gone To Hell".
This album is a respectful and worthy obituary for Kurt Cobain who admired the grunge godfather so much. Neil Young summed up what was going on on this album perfectly as part of his autobiography "Waging Heavy Peace".
"I, coincidentally, had been trying to reach him, I wanted to talk to him. Tell him only to play when he felt like it..."
And now you have to listen to this beautiful album: Spotify, Apple Music