Live at Massey Hall

Reprise

Live at Massey Hall 1971 is the yang to the yin of last year’s Live at the Fillmore East. Where that 1970 Crazy Horse-accompanied show, the first release in Neil Young’s long-delayed Archives series, focused on his blistering electric side, the Massey Hall set spotlights the loner. Splitting his time between acoustic guitar and piano, the solo Young is at his most intimate for the Toronto audience, during one of the most creative spurts of his career. Even “Cowgirl in the Sand” and “Down by the River,” two of the crunchiest tracks on that first album with Crazy Horse, are laid bare here.

Listening now to these vintage performances of “Ohio,” “Helpless” and “Old Man” (the latter introduced as “a song about my ranch—I have a ranch now, lucky me”), so ingrained in classic-rock culture, it’s often difficult to reconcile that most of these songs, so fully formed, were still new, that some had not yet been recorded for albums. Two, “Don’t Let It Bring You Down” and “Tell Me Why,” had appeared on 1970’s After the Gold Rush, but five songs, including the harrowing “The Needle and the Damage Done,” would not be released until ’72’s Harvest, and others wouldn’t show up for anther year or two after that. Already, they felt like classics.

Pristinely recorded, Massey Hall presents a young Young, simultaneously upbeat and fragile, restlessly seeking, but already world-weary. In a recent interview, Bob Dylan praised Young’s omnipresent melodic gift and said, “There’s nobody in his category.” Even as far back as 1971, that was apparent.