I don't know about you guys but I've been hearing about the Neil Young Archives forthcoming box set since I was too young to remember. But it wasn't until the label started releasing online trailers, and Young himself started doing interviews on the content that I started to believe it wouldn't be too long until I could buy it. Well a few years have passed, release dates come and gone, tears have been shed, and he's released 3 cd's of content that are going to be included in said box. Now in case you weren't aware Neil has been releasing what has deemed "important" live albums from the early period of his career and on the spines of these albums is a NYA and corresponding number, to indicate which # it is in the box set. Now the original idea was that these cd's would have an empty place in the box, you could buy these live shows on their own if you didn't want to spring for a 10 cd box set.
10 CD BOX SET? sounds crazy right? but the insane fan boy in me thought I could handle that no problem, I have every solo album he's released and there isn't a dud in the catalogue if you ask me. I think the man puts enough of himself in every song or tells a good story on enough of the songs on every album that even if his music starts to sound the same the lyrics get me off in a different way. Or I can listen to an album like "Landing On Water" and the production is so unique that it draws me in, And of course the album that was pronounced dead on release, that was given such horrible reviews upon it's initial birth that you just knew that the all the art kids would teach themselves to love it. When I was 19 I remember going to Vancouver to order it from the then gloriousness that was A&B Sound on Seymour. It was an import, which I thought was weird, the only distributor was from Germany, somehow it all seemed to makes sense. I was infatuated with the man then and my passion for the guy hasn't faded a bit since then. So 10 CD's wasn't a problem for me.
Then something I could only dream of happened, it was revealed that the 10 disc box set would only cover up to the early 70's worth of material. and that the Archives box would be released in 4 volumes, each with 10 discs! and according to the newest interviews it won't even be released on CD but on DVD audio and Blu-Ray disc. The remastering of the music has been so extensive that Neil only wants it to be released in the highest audio formats available. There will be "Easter eggs" hidden throughout the dvd's. There will be whole albums that were scrapped, including the infamous "Homebrew" album, plus rumours that "Tine Fades Away" would see it's first digital release in second volume of the Archives set. Now I ain't the biggest Neil Young fan in the world I am not one of those guys, I listen to a couple other artists as well.
As the next instalment of why the Archives need to be released will explain, after these are made available to me there may be nobody else I need to listen to.
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