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Neil Young and The International Harvesters: A Treasure

Reprise

Neil Young’s career in the early-to-mid-‘80s was a strange conundrum of musical experimentation and record industry politics. Faced with a lawsuit by his then-label Geffen for staving off his trademark sound in favor of hard left turns into new wave, rockabilly and traditional country, he hit the road in 1984 and 1985 without a new album to support but flanked by his most versatile backing group, the fiddle-friendly International Harvesters. A Treasure collects 12 tracks from various dates on this controversial tour, including countrified performances of such deep Neil nuggets as “Bound for Glory” from 1985’s Old Ways and “Motor City” off 1981’s Re-ac-tor along with a minor trove of long-unreleased tracks from the era, namely “Grey Riders” from an aborted Farm Aid benefit EP and “Soul of a Woman” from Young’s canned 1982 LP Island in the Sun. For fans of the guitar great’s most misunderstood decade, the title says it all.