“NO NO NO NO NO!,” hollers Neil Young, bolting from from the piano, running up to take his mic. “I don’t wanna hear any jokes about being old!” He doesn’t sound like he’s kidding. For the last hour, this band of sexagenarians has been whooping it up like a bunch of ambitious and rabidly competitive teenagers, and Young doesn’t want to kill the buzz by being reminded what year it is. more ›

In the middle of the 1980s, Neil Young was having what many people perceived to be a mid-life crisis. Instead of getting himself a red sports car and a mistress, he’d show up one day with a new band and a new persona - one day embracing edgy German electronica, the next turning into Carl Perkins with a slick fifties haircut and sideburns and and the whole bit. Finally around the time he put a cowboy hat on and started jamming with Willie Nelson - “Willie Neil”, his associates called him - Geffen Records decided to stop financing what they saw as a hopeless, self-destructive binge and sued him for not sounding enough like himself, right around the same time that Fantasy was suing John Fogerty for sounding too much like himself. The eighties were a big decade for midlife crises (and lawsuits) among sixties rockers, but Young took the desire to mutate with the times and head into unpredictable territory much further than any of his peers. more ›

It was an interesting year for fans of the old guard. As time passes, our beloved dinosaurs are being forced to adapt or die, in an environment in which their only property of value - material recorded a long time ago - can no longer be sold for a profit. They have responded by creating box-set packages large and gaudy enough to appear to be worth something. more ›

With the publication of Long May You Run/ The Illustrated History, the long-standing need for a definitive photo journal of Neil Young’s career has finally been met. Though multiple books have been written about the man and his music - including one entitled The Man And His Music - this is the first truly comprehensive photo journal. Authors Gary Graff and David Durcholz have collected some real treasures, including childhood photos, iconic images of Crazy Horse, CSNY and Buffalo Springfield, and a host of concert posters, tour memorabilia and rare foreign 7-inch covers. more ›

About a third of the 82-minute running length of Neil Young’s latest Jonthan Demme-directed concert film is taken up by just two songs, “Ambulance Blues” and “No Hidden Path”. The former is played as a serene meditation performed solo on acoustic guitar and harmonica, while the latter serves as a springboard for eighteen minutes’ worth of frantic, explosive guitar soloing. Placed together in the middle of the film, they paint a picture of the subject at his most extreme. These aren’t songs that had any hope of finding their way onto radio, but to a certain part of his fanbase, they’re what makes him the real deal. There’s a certain fearlessness about doing a song for that long, a confidence that audience should be willing to follow wherever you want to go, which is what lets you go where no one else does. more ›

For a certain sub-section of filmgoers (e.g. people who fucking rule), the arrival of a new Noah Baumbach movie is cause for celebration. By most accounts, Greenberg is as strong as The Squid and the Whale. This, folks, is a very, very good thing. I couldn't get through the book, but The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has me intrigued. Don't be scared off by the subtitles, people! I'm sort of tired of Kristen Stewart so The Runaways is low on my list. Plus, Dakota Fanning is just terrible, right? Pass. I typically hate movies with and about kids, but Diary of a Wimpy Kid has Chloe Moretz (who should kick-ass in Kick-Ass). Consider it a maybe. more ›

Somebody must have sat on a scarab beetle, because the Egyptian hits the ground running this weekend! Friday, party with Native Wayne (formerly of KROQ, currently of Indie 103.1) and pour out a little Red Stripe in memory of Perry Henzell, whose 1972 classic The Harder They Come introduced the world to the heights of reggae more ›

After twenty years of missing deadlines on the Warner Bros. release schedule, Neil Young finally issued his long-promised Archives Vol. 1 1963-1972 set earlier this year, a mammoth collection of studio recordings both familiar and previously-unheard, along with four live shows from his early years. Fans have been eagerly awaiting the next live set in the series, which if we’re working in chronological order, should obviously be from one of the tours Young did in 1973, two journeys across America and the UK which found him at his most completely unhinged. more ›

At some point during the last twenty years, as Neil Young’s Archives set was pushed back another nine months on the official Warner Brother release schedule for the umpteenth time in a row, I became convinced that the whole thing was an elaborate hoax. Not the archive of unreleased songs itself, but the plans to release it. more ›

“She looks so beautiful with her top down / Let’s hop inside and take a ride to town.” more ›

Check out these clips from Neil Young's new album Fork In The Road, due out April 7. Archives be damned, it's time for a concept album about energy-efficient cars. Not content to write a song about it, he's gone and had himself a Lincoln Continental re-tooled for extra clean burning. You can also check out the car's very own blog at www.lincvolt.com. Tune in at the right time and you might catch ol' Neil driving around on the live webcam & get to check out what's in his grocery bags. more ›

It is the start of a new year and that means we're slouching towards Southern California's biggest music festivals, starting with Coachella in the middle of April. And, as usual, the internet is simply ablaze with line-up rumors. But this year, much like last, crazed fans have taken things a step further on the festival's message board, going as far as to contact bands directly for confirmation. more ›

December is list-making season. And for us music journalists, it is a time to look back on scores of albums, reflect upon the music and recapitulate our favorites. But this year, just like the last, we took this opportunity to flip that tradition upside down, asking the artists that influenced us what influenced them. The prompt was not limited to albums that came out in 2008. more ›

Welcome to Matt Gangi's extremely stylized yet vaguely recognizable world. Gangi's debut, A, acquires strength from not only the exemplary songwriting, but the vast array of musical personalities that the band displays. In a span of minutes, they could turn from Neil Young to Jethro Tull. And to that end, Gangi certainly shows signs of musical schizophrenia—juxtaposing various elements that shouldn't mesh, and yet somehow they do. more ›

Last night, the frontpeople for five of the best bands in the local indie music scene, Evan Way from The Parson Redheads (MySpace), Sarah Negahdari from The Happy Hollows (MySpace), Timothy James from The Movies (MySpace), Andrew Spitser from Radars To The Sky (MySpace), and Mikel Jollett from The Airborne Toxic Event (MySpace), participated in the inaugural edition of My Little Underground at Bordello (MySpace) in Downtown LA. more ›

Yesterday, Little Radio's Summer Camp series Downtown continued with performances from local bands The Parson Redheads (MySpace), The Henry Clay People (MySpace), and Film School (MySpace). more ›

Last night we checked out What Made Milwaukee Famous playing to a small crowd at Spaceland. Simply put, amazing. We're shocked that more people were not there. Lucky for us, luck for you, they have four more shows within the next nine days here in LA starting Thursday at the Silverlake Lounge. more ›

I've always been intrigued by other "best of" lists, but this year I decided to take it to a whole new level. I e-mailed a handful of bands that I've seen this past year in order to unearth what exactly captivated them in '07. As music listeners, it is our duty to take a keen interest in our favorite musician's influences. After all, they rocked our little world, might as well see what rocked their little world. Therefore, this is an act of paying it forward to those hardworking, underpaid musicians who truly made a difference within the music scene this year. more ›

For this evening, a selection of gentle acoustic guitars to assist in warming your bones by the fire. Acoustic instruments made of wood just fit the theme - the yule log, the Christmas tree, toy horses, and now, the wood stove where Sufjan Stevens' presents end up - oops! more ›

I've always been intrigued by other "best of" lists, but this year I decided to take it to a whole new level. I e-mailed a handful of bands that I've seen this past year in order to unearth what exactly captivated them in '07. As music listeners, it is our duty to take a keen interest in our favorite musician's influences. After all, they rocked our little world, might as well see what rocked their little world. Therefore, this is an act of paying it forward to those hardworking, underpaid musicians who truly made a difference within the music scene this year. more ›

I've always been intrigued by other "best of" lists, but this year I decided to take it to a whole new level. I e-mailed a handful of bands that I've seen this past year in order to unearth what exactly captivated them in '07. As music listeners, it is our duty to take a keen interest in our favorite musician's influences. After all, they rocked our little world, might as well see what rocked their... more ›

I am thankful for… Thanksgiving - even though I think it’s a stupid holiday, and I pretty much hate all the food associated with it - for giving me the opportunity to spend the day with family that I love and actually enjoy being around. I am thankful every day that I am able to make a living being creative and doing something I love. (Except for when I’m on strike) I am thankful... more ›

The day after Neil Young’s first show at the Nokia Theater, I was having trouble believing I hadn’t dreamed the whole thing. I got pictures, but they’re kind of blurry. My friends seem to remember the same things happening, but I could have dreamed them up too. It just seemed like too much. As you may have guessed if you read my earlier review of Chrome Dreams 2, I’m a big fan. Long time... more ›

My heart wasn't saying Bruuuuuuuuce, it was booing. The biggest cliche in amateur criticism is to say "I liked his older stuff better". Bruce Springsteen is supposed to be held on the same level as Bob Dylan, Neil Young, or Johnny Cash. However, if one is to keep it real, the songs The Boss released after the mid '80s don't hold up to contemporaries like Tom Waits or Tom Petty. Seriously, after the Born... more ›

Bruce Springsteen & Neil Young - "All Along the Watchtower" We can't recall a more star-studded Tuesday night in rock in LA in a long time. We realize that many of you might be preparing to head out tomorrow night, but friends, tonight is the night to rawwwwwk! And Neil if you're reading this... if you feel like recreating this moment from 2004, the Sports Arena is just a freeway away from the Nokia...... more ›

LA Times staffer and Buzz Bands blogger Kevin Bronson's story "Taking the L.A. indie rock scene personally" hit stands last Thursday. By means of an intimate portrayal, Bronson set forth his pick of indie rock up-and-comers for L.A.'s indie rock scene in 2008. While I completely admire that he would put his neck out there for three rather small, entirely worthy bands (The Airborne Toxic Event, Castledoor, and The Deadly Syndrome) at the forefront of... more ›

Artist: Neil Young Album: Chrome Dreams Two Label: Reprise Records Release Date: October 23, 2007 “An ambulance can only go so fast”, sang Neil Young thirty-three years ago in the stony career meditation “Ambulance Blues.” “It’s easy to get buried in the past/ When you try to make a good thing last.” It’s kind of funny to think about guys like Pete Townshend and Eric Clapton making records about the perils of aging at... more ›

On Sale Saturday at 10am Tool @ Nokia Theater, 12/10 Aimee Mann @ El Rey, 11/30 Mary J. Blige @ Nokia Theater, 11/20 Suagarcult @ House of Blues, Anaheim, 12/20 On Sale Now Neil Young @ Nokia Theater, 10/30 Regina Spektor @ Grove of Anaheim, 10/31 Neil Young @ Nokia Theater, 11/3 Yo La Tengo @ Ivar Theater, 11/3 Gwar @ Glass House, 11/24 Shonen Knife @ Glass House, 12/8... more ›

on the Johnny Cash Show, 9/23/70 more ›

Beirut - "In the Mausoleum" from The Flying Club Cup Instead of playing in someone's apartment (as seen above) they're going to play at your favorite record store (as you will see tonight at 6:30pm). Called a variety of things from Blogrock (because sites such as Stereogum and Pitchfork "discovered" them before the MSM did) to "the poor man's Arcade Fire" (because clearly any band that has the audacity to have a violinist, interesting... more ›