PEACE TRAIL
| Neil Young
PEACE TRAIL
Peace Trail is the 36th studio album by Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young, released on December 9, 2016 on Reprise Records. Co-produced by Young and John Hanlon, the album was recorded at record producer Rick Rubin's Shangri-La Studios. Described as a "primarily acoustic" album, Young recorded Peace Trail with drummer Jim Keltner and bass guitarist Paul Bushnell. WIKIPEDIA
Critic Reviews
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Pitchfork
2016 - The ten sparse protest songs on Neil Young's strange and scrappy new album address the dissemination of fake news, the mistreatment of America’s indigenous people, and the water crisis in Flint.
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RollingStone
2016 - Dakota Access Pipeline, trigger-happy cops, environmental destruction on songwriter’s mind.
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UCR
2016 - Peace Trail revolves around environmental themes, completing a mid-'00s trilogy of discontent and anxiety.
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The Guardian
Armed only with righteous anger, Neil Young punctures this knocked-together protest project with half-formed songs full of confused platitudes.
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CoS
2016 - The rock icon's latest hits and misses, but never stops swinging.
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LOUDER
2016 - The crusty old campaigner goes on the warpath on his 38th studio album.
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The Line of Best Fit
2016 - The best bits of Peace Trail’s uneven mess prove there’s gas left in Neil Young’s tank.
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Chicago Tribune
2016 - Young remains a treasure because he refuses to bow to convention, and his inherent distrust of studio sugarcoating or polishing has led to some of the rawest, most powerful music of our time. But it can also lead to slapdash projects such as this one.
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American Songwriter
2016 - While we give Young a pass for getting new music out, and worthwhile moments are scattered throughout these 10 tunes (that don’t break 40 minutes), just as often you’ll lunge for the track-skip button in exasperation of hearing a major talent and unquestioned cultural icon who has spread himself too thin.
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NOW
2016 - Now and then you get a glimpse of ideas that could’ve made the album more powerful if they’d been further explored. ... But the songs are so spiritless and phoned-in that those moments are too little, too late.
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UNCUT
2015 - Strange, stubborn, stripped-down: Neil Young continues on his own path.
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CLASH
2016 - While there’s nothing really here to ignite a flame of revolution, or indeed get fists in the air to be honest, Peace Trail sees Young doing what comes naturally, soundtracking tumultuous times with some confident and easy songwriting.
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The Observer
2016 - As with his last few records, Young’s horror at the destruction of the environment remains high in the mix, with a grab-bag of other themes (ageing, self-belief, the iniquities of tech) and a silvery hope that “something new is growing”, as he puts it on the freewheeling title track.
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popMATTERS
2017 - Young’s heart reaches out, but his music isn’t keeping up with it, no matter how quickly he records it.
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Boston Globe
2016 - Peace Trail is a hard record to get a hold of at times. The songs are so bare-bones--and, at times, meandering--that it feels a bit tossed-off.
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ALL MUSIC
2016 - All this adds up to one of Neil Young's genuinely strange albums, a record that's compelling in its series of increasingly bad decisions.
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INDEPENDENT
2016 - With Peace Trail, Neil Young slips into self-parody again, with a set of desultory peacenik songs too simplistic and patronising to be taken seriously.
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exclaim
2016 - What a mess. ... The album sounds more like a rehearsal than a completed record, with Keltner's pacing off, Young flubbing lyrics and Bushnell at times just guessing.
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Drowned in Sound
The temptation is to say Peace Trail is underdone, its ideas not fully explored in the way we know Young is capable of doing. But this feels churlish.
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USA TODAY
2016 - Peace Trail sees Young in Woody Guthrie mode, disinterested in beautiful turns of phrase, opting for spare arrangements and plainspoken storytelling.
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SPILL MAGAZINE
Had Young worked on these tracks a little longer, he may have had a great album on his hands. Their bare bones are all here, the songs just needs a little more fine-tuning.
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Evening Standard
2016 - The Canadian songwriter is back on angry, soulful territory.
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The FireNote
2016 - Neil Young is both focused and quirky.
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Vague Visages
2016 - Young, apparently, reads the newspaper, drinks a cup of coffee, then plucks out a few simple chords and adds some words. Rinse, lather, repeat.
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Los Angeles Times
2016 - The new album's combination of poetic grace and sonic fury makes it one of the most invigorating of his long career, demonstrating anew that Young has no intention of going quietly into the night.
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No More Workhorse
2016 - The first thing you can say about Peace Trail is it’s a little light on production, sounding a little rough and not too far removed from a demo.
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MUSIC CRITIC
2016 - The crusty old campaigner goes on the warpath on his 38th studio album.
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the current
2016 -The performances captured on Peace Trail are ragged and raw.
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Cecil Whig
2016 - typically political affair, complete with criticism of the Dakota Access Pipeline, Islamophobia and, maybe most refreshingly, himself.
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The National
Peace Trail is quirky, soulful and poignant.
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13th Floor
2016 - There are enough interesting moments to keep long-time fans happy but I myself would like to see Neil taking a bit more time to craft his songs.
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courier journal
2016 - Peace Trail' is disastrous.
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Soundblab
2016 - Peace Trail is Neil Young at his absolute best: thoughtfully concise songs that place Young himself, warts and all, front and center.
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The Advocate
2016 - Prolific rocker Neil Young is at his curmudgeonly best on "Peace Trail," bemoaning his place in the current generation while standing up for his decades-long commitment to fighting for the underdog.
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Renowned for Sound
2016 - incredible recorded outcome playing as a humble awakening into a contemporary conciseness both raw and earnest.
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Financial Times
2016 - Album combines gentle folk-rock with clenched-fist sentiments and voice software-distorted vocals.
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Vintage Rock
an album ripe with politics and humanity, many referencing the Standing Rock protests, the environment, oil and water, sparse and minimal in production and presentation.
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POP CULTURE BEAST
2016 - Peace Trail will no doubt satisfy long-time Neil Young fans. But the album’s approach is idiosyncratic enough that I would be surprised if it snagged very many new listeners.
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The EDGE
2017 - Young is known for not caring what the critics think, continuing to do it all just for the music. Peace Trail exemplifies this entirely, doing exactly what he does best – and we’re lucky to still have such a legendary artist who is as enthusiastic about recording new songs as he was when he first began.
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Newsday
2016 - A passionate, but uneven, collection of protest songs.
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Rock The Body Electric
2016 - a bizarre mix of what makes Neil so fascinating and frustrating, a true muse who never stops.
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BLACKFIRE
2017 - songs devoted to issues like the Flint water crisis, and the circulation of fake news on the Internet.
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mySA
2016 - Reviewers have been focusing on the fact that Young has made a protest album, which is true enough but not really remarkable.
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abc NEWS
2016 - It’s not a great record, but if you are up for its experiments, it is strangely satisfying.
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It's Psychedelic Baby Magazine
it’s not a comfortable album, it’s certainly not a party album, it’s designed to remind you of what’s happening, that the ever present government eye is watching, and that if we don’t take care of each other no one will.
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Newcastle Herald
2016 - NEIL Young sounds tired. Damn tired on his 37th album Peace Trail. Not necessarily because he’s 71, but because he’s exhausted by the political and social landscape in the US.
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FLOOD Magazine
2016 - Neil has put forward an honest and open series of stories on the state of the day that, instead of inciting rage, offer a gentle listen encouraging self-reflection.
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The Waster
2016 - He takes listeners on the musical equivalent of a rollicking, mountainside drive on winding roads. The whole thing leaves you reassured and mellow, yearning to get in touch with nature.
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beat
Peace Trail is intended as a more stripped back, acoustic effort; more in line with his ‘70s material than the louder and more experimental LPs of late.
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Barely Bros. Records
2017 - Based on the habits of the populace, maybe this album isn’t for everyone. Neil Yong fans should give it a listen though.
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Some Diurnal Aural Awe
2017 - The songs on Peace Trail are certainly more folk than rock, and I’d say languid rather than ‘desultory’.
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Spirituality & Health
Neil Young’s latest release is as rustic and lo-fi as you’d expect from an album recorded in just four days.
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Brooklyn Vegan
2016 - He’s singing for 2016, but the sounds are timeless.
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Robert Christgau
Anything but "predictable," these political ditties rank among the strangest songs of his career.
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The Irish Times
2016 - Cantankerous Young takes the lesser road travelled.
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