Album Reviews
Chrome Dreams II
8.5
30 Years after Neil Young recorded “Chrome Dreams”, one of the good man’s albums that was never officially released, there is now “Chrome Dreams II”. It’s made up of a couple of songs from that unreleased album along with a couple of new ones and if you don’t know it, it’s impossible to tell which song is from which period. That’s of course one of the strengths of Mr. Young. He has a way of writing timeless music. And whether you’re talking about the mellow country opener that is “Beautiful Bluebird” or the 18-minute long instant classic that is “Ordinary People”, Neil Young always delivers.
Just like on “After The Goldrush” Young uses different kind of songs on one album ‘to form a feeling’ (to quote the master himself). I’m not sure what that means exactly since I always feel something when I listen to Neil Young. So it doesn’t matter whether I’m listening to “The Way” which comes with a choir or to the rocking “Dirty Old Man”, it’s all good by me.
“Chrome Dreams II” might not be the best album Young has ever written but compared to a lot of other rock albums nowadays, this is still pretty friggin’ amazing and it will keep me good company until his long and eagerly awaited “Archives” boxset finally comes out!
Tom Dumarey
Lacking the talent to actually play in a band, Tom decided he would write about bands instead. Turns out his writing skills are mediocre at best as well.
