444. Neil Young and Crazy Horse - Rust Never Sleeps (1979)

















Track Listing

1. My My Hey Hey (Out Of The Blue)
2. Thrasher
3. Ride My Llama
4. Pocohontas
5. Sail Away
6. Powderfinger
7. Welfare Mothers
8. Sedan Delivery
9. Hey Hey My My (Into The Black)

Review

This is Young's attempt to prove that he was still relevant in these post-punk days, and he does more than that. Young makes one of his best albums by doing much more than just "his thing". Actually this album was so relevant that Kurt Cobain was quoting from it in his suicide note, that infamous sentence of 'It is better to burn out than to fade away'.

And Young burns very brightly indeed here, the album is neatly separated into two halves, one is a beautiful collection of acoustic music, and the other is an angrier, electrical side which is his reply to the punk movement. Both sides are equally great in completely different ways, in a vinyl it would be easier to put one or the other side on depending on your mood.

This reply to punk is also a return to Neil Young's roots with Crazy Horse, it sounds more like Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere than any of the later albums... maybe with the exception of On The Beach. This is an amazing album by one of the best singer-songwriters ever and you owe it to yourself to get it. The Godfather of Grunge shows how relevant he was and still is here to magnificent effect.

Track Highlights

1. My My Hey Hey (Out Of The Blue)
2. Hey Hey My My (Into The Black)
3. Powderfinger
4. Ride My Llama

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The title is borrowed from the slogan for Rustoleum paint, and was suggested by Mark Mothersbaugh of the New Wave band Devo. In 2003, the album was ranked number 350 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

My My Hey Hey:



Hey Hey My My, presented by Dennis Hopper: