Description

Neil Young’s ‘Archives: Volume II’ Is a Stunning Look Back at His Prolific Peak

The legend’s long-awaited collection features four years in the Seventies — packed with gems and rarities.

On August 26th, 1973, Joni Mitchell arrived at Studio Instrument Rentals in Los Angeles, where Neil Young and his band the Santa Monica Flyers were recording the boozy Tonight’s the Night. Joined by guitarists Ben Keith and Nils Lofgren, drummer Ralph Molina, and bassist Billy Talbot, Mitchell and Young tore through “Raised on Robbery,” soon to be released on her album Court and Spark.

If the Tonight’s the Night sessions were indeed a “drunken Irish wake,” as Talbot later recalled, this take on “Raised on Robbery” was the eulogy. Mitchell and Young, two Canadian Scorpios whose paths had crossed well before that night, joined together for the chorus, with Young’s slurred vocals trailing behind her. “Hey honey, you’ve got lots of cash,” she sang over the messy instrumentation. “Bring us round a bottle/And we’ll have some laughs/Gin’s what I’m drinking/I was raised on robbery.”

Mitchell’s visit to the studio has been steeped in myth since then, completely unheard until now. It’s one of the many, many gems off Young’s Archives Volume II (1972-1976),. 12 songs have never been released in any format, while 50 are previously unreleased versions of known songs.  Whereas the first volume of Young’s Archives project — released in June 2009 — spanned the years from 1963 to 1972, the second covers only four years. That period is widely considered the peak of Young’s career, a time when he was so prolific that he was churning out music faster than his label could keep up with. This version of the box set includes 10 CDs and oversized fold out Archives Poster, plus a 24 page booklet and is packaged in a cube shaped slip case box.