THE MONSANTO YEARS
| Neil Young
THE MONSANTO YEARS
The Monsanto Years is a studio album by Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young and American rock group Promise of the Real, released on June 29, 2015 on Reprise Records. A concept album criticizing the agribusiness Monsanto, it is Young's thirty-fifth studio album and the third by Promise of the Real. The group is fronted by Willie Nelson's son Lukas, and the album also features Lukas' brother Micah. The album was produced by both Young and John Hanlon, and is accompanied by a film documenting the recording process. -WIKIPEDIA
Critic Reviews
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RollingStone
2015 - a quick-and-dirty broadside against GMOs and corporations.
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Pitchfork
2015 - a screed against big agribusiness and the corporations that support it.
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SPILL MAGAZINE
The Monsanto Years is very seductive. The rhythm sways your soul and hypnotizes your senses.
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The Observer
2015 - quasi-punk love songs for the planet.
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UCR
2015 - He heard about agricultural biotechnology company Monsanto, got pissed off and hammered out nine songs.
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INDEPENDENT
2015 - Young lets rip at Big Agribusiness and loses the plot
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The Guardian
2015 - on angry, brilliant form.
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paste
2015 - Working with Lukas Nelson’s Promise of the Real, Young’s urgency is infused with youthful intensity.
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NME
2015 - Rousing, righteous anger on the legend's eco warrior battle cry.
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Under the Radar
2015 - The songs are tight, enjoyable, and lively.
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ALL MUSIC
2015 - If the individual message may wind up fading like yesterday's newspapers, the music will keep The Monsanto Years burning bright.
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exclaim
2015 - It's another album of Neil being Neil, and that's a good thing.
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popMATTERS
2015 - Young hits the equilibrium between songwriting and performance best when he brings his heart to the table through rebellion, and these nine tracks geared towards environmental ignorance at large do the trick.
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Record Collector
2015 - What could have been an embarrassment is a quiet triumph.
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NOW
2015 - For an undisguised, heavy-handed topical Neil Young record, The Monsanto Years is actually engaging and mostly effective.
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The Line of Best Fit
2015 - Neil Young’s righteous anger fails to fully ignite.
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American Songwriter
2015 - As it stands, it’s another entry in Young’s bulging catalog that, like Storytone, Greendale, Le Noise and others, you might play once or twice to see what he’s up to, then return to far more listenable classics like Rust Never Sleeps.
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CoS
2015 - The Monsanto Years, listenable but dusty, is no different; it’s music you’ve heard before with a new bad guy as its target.
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AV/MUSIC
2015 - It’s a collection of songs that winds up sounding like it could have been a series of blog posts or even tweets.
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SPIN Magazine
2015 - This is a concept/protest record about Monsanto, and unless your blood boils as intensely about the issue as Young’s, the protest element of that is handled so clumsily that it sinks the album entirely.
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Boston Globe
2015 - “Living With War,” his 2006 album about President George W. Bush, was a dud, and so is this new one.
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Tiny Mix Tapes
2015 - Because the album risks so much in its all-in politics, the songs on their own are more difficult to judge. For that reason, the album is enjoyable almost solely in small doses.
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SLANT
2015 - With no one on hand to quell his worst impulses, Young has gone preachy to the extreme, creating music that's morally precise, but sloppy in every other regard.
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The Quietus
2015 - Not only are the concepts themselves reductive and half-baked and the lyrics risibly clumsy, but the songs appear to have been composed in less time than it actually takes to perform them.
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DAILY NEWS
2015 - The new [album] sinks decent riffs and an earnest message in unlistenably didactic lyrics.
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The National
2015 - The Monsanto Years finds the 69-year-old Canadian livid with what he perceives as the despoiling of America at the hands of corrupt corporations and complacent politicians.
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Hifi Pig
2015 - The Monsanto Years is Young as I like him best – electrified, rocking, belligerent and rallying against all that he sees wrong in the world.
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No Depression
2015 - The Monsanto Years' isn't about career, but it is about legacy.
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Red Dirt Report
2015 - Let's hope the younger generation is listening to The Monsanto Years and taking notes. We need more powerful voices like Neil Young speaking truth to power, particularly in the realm of popular music.
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Speakers in Code
2015 - But Neil is Neil, and as an artist who thankfully still cares about writing original material, he's not interested in providing the luxury that is comfort.
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The INDEPENDENT Voice of Utah
2015 - Neil Young once again gives the finger.
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glide Magazine
2015 - this casual approach begs the question of how seriously Neil Young takes this project.
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Los Angeles Times
2015 - Young in electrified protest mode. Outraged. Frustrated.
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Lincoln Journal Star
2015 - “The Monsanto Years” is a protest album that finds Neil Young railing against GMOs, Wal-Mart, Citizens United and, of course, Monsanto.
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OFF THE TRACKS
2015 - I reckon The Monsanto Years is just fine. Young long ago earned the right to continue on doing whatever he fucking feels like. And this is that right now. Another blog from him to whoever cares to hear it. I care just enough.
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mxdwn.com
2015 - Young has made a record only he can get away with; it’s just unfortunate the message is given in such black and white terms.
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VINTAGEROCK.COM
Young churns up dust about these same issues without letting up.
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blogcritics
2015 - Young is always worth giving a listen or two, and you should definitely hear it yourself, listen to what the man has to say, and make up your own mind about the album.
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EMPTY LIGHTHOUSE MAGAZINE
2015 - Neil is the crazy uncle that you can't wait to hear rant at the Thanksgiving table.
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STEREOGUM
2015 - a concept album about corporate greed.
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ROCK ON PHILLY
2015 - Neil Young Calls Out Monsanto and Big Business on The Monsanto Years.
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THE SKINNY
2015 - There are fewer fish swimming in our oceans, and Neil Young ain't happy.
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SPECTRUM CULTURE
2015 - There’s no excusing The Monsanto Years, a 50-minute anti-Big Agra screed so tactless and grating it makes Toby Keith subtle by comparison.
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LEXGO
2015 - "It's a bad day to do nothin'," Neil Young sings with cranky assertion at the start of The Monsanto Years, perhaps the angriest and most topical album he has ever put his name to.
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Montgomery Advertiser
2015 - It’s easy to admire Young for taking a stand, for not taking the easy “greatest hits” route, but these songs would benefit from a subtler lyric approach.
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OUTLINE
2018 - This may be Young's best album since Ragged Glory, 25 years ago.
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FLOOD magazine
2015 - a barroom protest album fighting against the titular agrochemical company and its cohorts—and, unsurprisingly, these sanctimonious anthems can test even the most loyal Neil Young fan.
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NATIONAL OBSERVER
2015 - shows the veteran rocker as defiant as ever.
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wrongmog
2015 - Neil Young’s anti-GM, anti-Starbucks, generally anti-corporate album proves he is still a force to be reckoned with.
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junk food for thought
2015 - This is an important album that everyone needs to hear. It is the sound of this moment, right here and now.
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San Francisco Conronicle
2015 - basically a musical digest of that movie, fueled by crude, get-off-my-lawn lyrical outbursts in songs such as “People Want to Hear Songs About Love” and “Big Box.”
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HowGeneric
2015 - Neil Young here trains both barrels on Big Agribusiness and lets the corporate suits have it in the most direct and unsophisticated manner, with songs about “fascist politicians and chemical giants walking arm-in-arm”.
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