Cheap On the Beach (Music) (Neil Young) Price

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Customer Reviews of On the Beach

Sand Through The Hourgalss
Neil Young's 1974 release On The Beach is considered one of his classic albums, but for some reason the album was never released on compact disk. Finally, the album has made its way to the digital age and Mr. Young's fans can enjoy one of his most blisteringly savage albums. After his record label rejected his eulogy to two lost friends, Tonight's The Night, Mr. Young came up with the ragged edged On The Beach. The album opens with "Walk On", Mr. Young's rebuttal to Lynyrd Skynyrd's rebuttal of him as well as a rebuking of the press who criticized him during his 1973 tour. "See The Sky About To Rain" confronts a similar environmental topic as "After The Gold Rush" and has an eerie organ and a haunting steel guitar played evocatively by long time cohort Ben Keith. "Revolution Blues" is a dark and disturbing song about a cult and the terror they may inflict on the wealthy residents of the Laurel Canyon that is clearly inspired by the Manson family. The song's music belies the dark tone of the lyrics with shimmering guitars that undercut the subject matter. It is very good song, but Mr. Young would go onto to perform the song acoustically on the subsequent tour that would better capture the stark nature of the song. "For The Turnstiles" is a brilliant song that is driven by a stuttering, bluegrass banjo and was inspired by the stadium tour he had just completed with Crosby, Stills & Nash. Mr. Young was clearly disturbed by the fact that big business was starting to take over rock and roll and art was suffering for commerce. The song foretells of the selling out of musicians and the forming of corporate rock. "Vampire Blues" is a stinging commentary about the oil business. Both the title track and "Motion Pictures" are self-reflective songs, the former about sacrifices for a career and the latter about his relationship with actress Carrie Snodgrass. The album's final track, "Ambulance Blues" is one of Mr. Young's masterpieces. Clocking in at almost nine minutes long, the song tackles numerous subjects including some recurring themes of Mr. Young's music like the pillaging of the land and its native people, dirty politicians, depression and his childhood. The song is sparse and mostly acoustic. It is a loose tribute to a hero of Mr. Young's, an English folkie, Bert Jansch. The song actually clips its beat from a Mr. Jansch song. On The Beach has the mournful qualities of Tonight's The Night, but unlike its predecessor that offered only bleakness, this album finds Mr. Young beginning to find some light.

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Neil's greatest achievement
The first time I heard this on vinyl last year, I was blown away; I knew immediately it was (and remains) Neil Young's best album, barring even "Tonight's the Night." This album was the second in what came to be called the Doom Trilogy, bookended by "Time Fades Away" and "Tonight's the Night" (although "On the Beach" was recorded last), and these three albums, though no one thought so at the time, stand as arguably Neil's greatest work. Every song on this album is a classic:

"Walk On" is a jaunty swipe at the criticisms of "Time Fades Away," which was a radical departure from the pastoral "Harvest" and, before that, "After the Gold Rush." It's basically Neil saying "Take your opinion and shove it."
"See the Sky About to Rain" is pretty straightforward: a meditative song about life in general, in keeping with the despair the album conveys. This song had been considered for "Harvest" but, thankfully, was saved for this.
"Revolution Blues" is far and away the best track on the album, about Charles Manson and the mindset of those like him. It's black humor was not appreciated at the time, especially the line "I hear the Laurel Canyon is full of famous stars, but I hate them worse than lepers and I'll kill them in their cars."
"For the Turnstiles" is a stripped-down, banjo-laced swipe at the record company execs who "pimp" his (and others') music.
"Vampire Blues" is about the oil crisis that afflicted the world at the time; Neil assumes the persona of an oil magnate "sucking blood from the earth...I'll sell you twenty barrels worth." Again his satire is apparent in the line "Good times are comin', I hear it everywhere I go...good times are comin', but they sure are comin' slow."
"On the Beach," which kicked off the second side of the vinyl, is the first of three deeply medatative songs that close the album. Each is about the price of fame, in its own way, and Young does a good job keeping from falling into self-pity.
"Motion Pictures (For Carrie)," as the title suggests, is about his actress girlfriend Carrie Snodgrass (their relationship collapsed soon afterwards, however).
"Ambulance Blues" is an all-encompassing epic, along the lines of Bob Dylan's "Desolation Row." It covers topics from Richard Nixon to Patty Hearst to the general public who are just "pissing in the wind."
Final assessment: Buy this album NOW.

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Neil's masterpiece
Let me try to write a few notes on the album:
1) the album contains some of the greatest songs NY ever wrote, in particular "On the beach", "Revolution blues" and "Ambulance blues". These songs are just Neil Young at its best
2) this is not similar at all to Harvest or Rust Never Sleeps, this was written during a very bad period in which Neil was haunted by several demons (a friend had died, he had split form his wife, he was really too popular, and I think he was drinking far too much...)
3)the album was never released in CD until this year, this was a crime by Neil Young, who probably hated the record (or loved it too much). However some clever guy made a site on the internet with a petition by fans to release the record, I think he got a few thousand signatures on the petition (included mine) and probably Neil found out about it (at least I like to think this was the reason)
4)the record is interesting because it's not similar to anything else by Neil, in general the songs are a bit bluesy, with some ballads like "see the sky about to rain", "Ambulance Blues" and "for the turnstiles" who are more acoustic, and some very slow blues songs like "On the beach" and "Vampire blues". There is also a blues-rock piece, called "Revolution Blues", which is one of the best of the album, very aggressive both in lyrics and music
5) I rate it 5 stars because it's probably his darkest and more peculiar record, and to me his best, however if you never listened to NY you should start with Everybody Knows This is Nowhere or Rust Never Sleeps, or Zuma, this is a bit too difficult for beginners
6)Let's hope Neil keeps on rocking forever, and maybe he will give us another jewel like this.....