Neil Young: Neil Young [REPRISE]

Why you'll love it

This 180g pressing was mastered from the original analog master tapes and comes in a gatefold jacket. It's also his first album with producer David Briggs, who went on to produce the vast majority of his records until 1995.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Mastered from the original analog tapes
• Gatefold jacket

About the album

Three albums with Buffalo Springfield taught the Toronto-born songwriter what he wanted to do next, and it was his own thing. After the band broke up, he hired Joni Mitchell's manager, Elliot Roberts, who set up a solo coffeehouse tour and a record deal with Reprise. Roberts stayed on as his manager until 2019.

Young later described the songs as gathered from the past and the future, mostly dreams, some fresh and some dating back to the Springfield days. "The Emperor of Wyoming" and "String Quartet from Whiskey Boot Hill" are instrumentals, the second a melody he later folded into the Country Girl suite on CSNY's Déjà Vu. "Here We Are in the Years" grew out of an earlier instrumental, "The Loner" became one of his signature songs, "I've Been Waiting for You" aches with longing, and "The Last Trip to Tulsa" is a long stream-of-consciousness tale with no plan behind it at all.

The album came out in November 1968 and was partly remixed the following summer. In Young's own words, there was no big pressure on him yet to top anything; that came later, and he's been answering it ever since, usually at considerable volume.

Also at Kops: more Neil Young on vinyl · browse CDN Pop / Rock

Tracklist

Listen

On Reprise (cat# 9362-49786-8), a reissue of the 1968 album.