{"id":2017,"date":"2017-09-08T11:06:45","date_gmt":"2017-09-08T15:06:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nickzaino.com\/departmentoftangents\/?p=2017"},"modified":"2017-09-08T11:06:45","modified_gmt":"2017-09-08T15:06:45","slug":"neil-youngs-lost-classic-hitchhiker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nickzaino.com\/departmentoftangents\/2017\/09\/08\/neil-youngs-lost-classic-hitchhiker\/","title":{"rendered":"Neil Young’s Lost Classic – Hitchhiker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Man, does Neil Young sound, well, young here. And confident. As well he should. He recorded the ten songs on Hitchhiker,<\/em> out today, in one long session one night in 1976, just Young, his acoustic guitar, piano, and a harmonica, with producer David Briggs at the controls. This was supposed to be the follow up to Zuma<\/em>, but apparently, the record company execs didn\u2019t like it and it got shelved. Young went on to make American Stars n\u2019 Bars<\/em> instead, the only holdover being \u201cThe Old Country Waltz.\u201d <\/p>\n

But imagine what this album could have done at the time, opening with a one-two punch of \u201cPocahontas\u201d and \u201cPowderfinger,\u201d two certified classics. Maybe it\u2019s better this way. The public was introduced to Crazy Horse\u2019s powerful treatment of \u201cPowderfinger\u201d a few years later on the electric side of Rust Never Sleeps<\/em>. That\u2019s the definitive version of the song, Young\u2019s overdriven guitar at the point of breaking up and disintegrating into the air. But it\u2019s essentially a folk song, and the narrative loses nothing in this stripped-down setting. \u201cPocahontas\u201d got a slightly more robust arrangement on the acoustic side of Rust<\/em>, but it\u2019s more immediate here with Young\u2019s voice front and center. <\/p>\n

Young has been sifting through Hitchhiker<\/em>\u2019s remains for years, reclaiming the title track as recently as 2010\u2019s Le Noise<\/em>. It\u2019s worth isolating this version and the later one to gauge how far Young has come since then. Both versions feature just Young and his producer. In the case of the latter, Daniel Lanois captured Young singing with his electric guitar, surrounding him in a nest of feedback and loops. It accentuated the fluidity of memory, the idea that, no matter how public w trip was, his memory is a lonely place only he can inhabit. But that rough trip through substance abuse and sudden fame was still fresh in his mind in \u201976. It\u2019s bright, clear, and almost marching. There was always an old man hiding in Young\u2019s voice. He\u2019s grown into it now. There\u2019s more rumble to it, more frequencies. In \u201976, it was more piercing, as high and lonesome as his harmonica. <\/p>\n

“Hitchhiker” 1976
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