In addition to the three Topanga discs and Early Years (1963-65), I’ve been listening to the Buffalo Springfield disc quite a bit from Neil’s Young’s recently released Archives Box Set.
Disc 1 in the 10-disc set, which I have in DVD format, is titled Early Years (1966-68) and is dedicated to the mid-to-late ’60s group that many of its fans lament over for its short tenure on the rock scene, about two years.
The Springfield were truly one of the great rock groups of the ’60s, but let’s face it, it had too many creative forces within, if that’s possible: namely Stephen Stills, Richie Furay and Young. It made for a powerful combination — but only for a while.
The Springfield made two memorable albums, their self-titled debut and Buffalo Springfield Again, during which the group started to fracture. As Young says in a radio interview included on the disc, the third record Last Time Around was not a Buffalo Springfield album at all. It does contain two notable songs from Young, I Am A Child and On The Way Home, which he doesn’t sing lead on, but it’s disjointed.
It’s kind of amusing hearing Young rip Jim Messina, the Springfield’s second bass player, for ruining the mix on the album, since he would shortly use Messina and George Grantham, both of Poco, to record his first solo album. And Young adds that he and Stills really had nothing to do with the album at all. So Disc 1 is culled mainly from the first two Springfield albums with I Am A Child the only track from the third.
The disc opens with Young’s demo version of Flying On The Ground Is Wrong in mono, a charming mid-tempo tune that sounds clean and full in this rendition with Young in fine voice. This as well as three other tracks on the disc are taken from the Buffalo Springfield Box Set from 2001 that contained quite a bit of previously unissued material and is getting harder and harder to find.
In another interview on the disc, Young reveals the song was inspired by Roy Orbison’s Blue Bayou and that you can hear pieces of that melody in Flying. Neil is always candid about where he takes things from as he later talks about the riff from Mr. Soul coming from the Rolling Stones’ Satisfaction with a few minor — literal and figurative — changes. Of course, Satisfaction came from Martha and the Vandellas’ Nowhere To Run. And so it goes.
Tracks two and three are taken directly from the album Buffalo Springfield, Burned and Out Of My Mind, both in mono. The first is a familiar uptempo blend of country, folk and rock Springfield-style as Young takes the lead vocal with proficient support from Stills and Furay. What a vocal blend. This was one of the cornerstones of the group, three lead singers, three strong songwriters. It’s what made them so fascinating.
The folk ballad Out Of My Mind is a majestic sounding vocal montage among the three singers with Young again taking the lead. An interesting composition that points to quite a few Young songs down the road. When you play the set with a monitor or TV connected you see visuals for each song, usually of a record player turning or tape deck spinning, sometimes with background photos. As one commenter on a popular music discussion board wrote recently, it’s about as exciting as watching a yule log.
This one is semi-amusing though with a Buffalo Head nickel riding on top of a phono cartridge to keep the the record from skipping as it spins. Oh, I’ve known some guitar players who did just that as they learned parts from records, digging into the same grooves over and over with the arm weighted down by a coin until there was nothing left to the band when the vinyl was returned to you. Brings back memories. Bad ones!
Next is one of the highlights of the disc, a previously unreleased demo of Down, Down, Down, which is an early version of what would become Young’s piece de resistance from Again, Broken Arrow. With just an acoustic guitar and voice, the listener can revel in the beautiful melody and chord changes that would become a classic in four movements.
The Hawaiian sounding Stills-Young instrumental Kahuna Sunset, also from the Box Set, is followed by the rocking opener of Again, Mr. Soul in potent and driving mono, the same version as on the Box Set but taken from a superior acetate. Young’s solo, slightly different from the LP version, still retains the backward sounding guitar tone near the end of the solo with a middle eastern flavor.
The previously unreleased and almost Stones-sounding Sell Out, recorded in early 1967, is followed by Down To The Wire, which features Dr. John on piano and a non-Springfield rhythm section, from a fine Young double-disc compilation Decade. Young’s other masterpiece from Again, Expecting To Fly, an atmospheric musical flight graced with a compelling melody, soaring female choir and full orchestration is next. Young discusses the song in two interviews on the disc. Interestingly, he is the only Springfield member on the track.
The previously unreleased 3/4 guitar-driven country instrumental Slowly Burning, which actually had lyrics written for it and was recorded at the same sessions as Expecting To Fly, and an acoustic version of One More Sign, again from the Box Set, set up the closers, Broken Arrow, which was daring and experimental for 1968, and I Am A Child, a gentle and flowing country classic.
The hidden tracks are a little difficult to find on this disc. Most in the set are indicated by feathers on the song listings and that’s where you’ll find the album track of Flying On The Ground Is Wrong, sung by Furay. Why is that a hidden track? Do I Have To Come Right Out And Say It, also from the first album, the single For What It’s Worth and “This Is It!” a montage of Springfield’s last live appearance are available on the Timeline, where you see push pins.
The last is nearly 15 minutes of the worst sounding audio on the disc and is perhaps most memorable for the MC’s repeated admonishment to the crowd, in between Rock ‘N Roll Woman and A Child’s Claim To Fame, that “The Buffalo Springfield will not perform, unless you go back to your seats” over and over. A seven-minute excerpt from the instrumental portion of Bluebird closes the montage, which is only mildly effective. It has some moments but not many. The montage as a whole is somewhat interesting but won’t lend itself to repeated listening because of the quality, which is as stated awful.
The Springfield don’t sound particularly in tune either, but that’s difficult to judge since the poor audio may have something to do with that.
Also, there is a plethora of additional material, as mentioned, in entertaining and candid radio interviews, raps from live gigs, a video performance of Mr. Soul on the ’60s TV variety show Hollywood Palace, and even a Dick Clark video interview with Springfield producers Brian Stone and Charlie Greene, of whom Young says “They really produced us, all right.” Stone and Greene practically gave Young a complex over his voice, which is the reason many of his early songs were sung by Furay. Of course, neither of those guys were musicians. Figures.
In all, one of the better discs in the Archives. Although a lot of the material has been available before, it has never been produced with this consistently high level of sound quality, exceptions noted.
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