Barn

by 
AlbumDec 10 / 202110 songs, 42m 56s
Folk Rock Roots Rock
Popular

Neil Young recorded his 41st album—and 12th with longtime backing band Crazy Horse—at a restored barn high in the Colorado Rockies. “Made it just like it was in the old drawings and photographs,” he tells Apple Music. “It used to be a stage stop, so you’d see these pictures with the carriages and the horses and the ladies with their big dresses with the metal ring and everything.” The songs here are succinct, the sound folksy and (relatively) subdued: *Harvest* without the strings, or *Homegrown* without the drugs. The band is as powerful and primal as they were in the ’70s (“Heading West”), but their politics are sharper (“Change Ain’t Never Gonna”), and their tenderness more tender (“Don’t Forget Love”). And if the hushed volatility of the eight-and-a-half-minute “Welcome Back” doesn’t convince you that they think of their music as being just as nuanced and transitory as jazz, nothing will. As drummer Ralph Molina put it when the take was done, “Neil just did some heavy shit.” So they kept it. But it is amazing that it took them more than 50 years to record an album called *Barn*, if only because the music they’ve made feels so true to its title: simple, stoic, durable, timeless. Describing the recording process here, Young says he scheduled sessions so that he and the band—Molina, Billy Talbot, and longtime accomplice Nils Lofgren replacing the retired Frank Sampedro—could work in moonlight, after walking a couple of miles to the studio, “across the meadow, through the valley,” just him and his dogs. “The Rockies are everywhere,” he says of the scene. “And it’s just beautiful. I like that.”

6.8 / 10

Neil Young’s decision to prioritize immediacy over craft in his later years means these tunes arrive lovingly weathered, but rarely go anywhere in particular.

There’s a cracked and weary charm to the rock'n'roll veteran’s latest outing, an album that deftly navigates the personal and political

Review: Neil Young & Crazy Horse's 'Barn'

There’s nothing new about what Young and his trusty band get up to here, but fans will find comfort in the sound of Old Farmer Grunge cranking back into action

One of the great Neil Young stories concerns a visit to Young's ranch by Graham Nash.

7 / 10

There are two faces of Neil Young: Harvest-folkie and Zuma-rocker. But the truth is, he's at his best when he straddles both approaches and...

8 / 10

There is something special about a Neil Young and Crazy Horse album. You can’t quite put your finger on it, but they don’t really sound like

The veteran rocker and his powerhouse of a band let rip in a barn in Colorado on Young’s least frustrating album in a while

7 / 10

Neil Young's latest set resonates as fervently composed and heartfeltly topical, and the band are as committed as ever to authentic and vigorous performance.

7.7 / 10

Barn by Neil Young and Crazy Horse album review by Greg Walker. The full-length is now available via Reprise Records and streaming services

Their 14th album together sounds much as you’d expect – and that’s absolutely nothing to complain about

72 %

Album Reviews: Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Barn

68 %

Into their late ’70s, Young and his band have no intention of turning down the guitars

Hushed Horse epics rekindle sputtering songwriting

7 / 10