I have a very, very meticulous way of working. Young also brought in the brilliant Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor to provide backing vocals to both Heart Of Gold and Old Man. Though David Crosby drolly commented, “Neil needs us about as much as a stag needs a coat rack,” he, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash provided deft backing vocals on Alabama, Are You Ready For The Country? and Words (Between The Lines Of Age). Young also convinced his bandmates from Crosby, Stills, Nash and & Young to appear on the record. The musicians brought a fine country-rock backing sound to songs such as Are You Ready For The Country? Mazer was instrumental in bringing four local backing musicians to the sessions: Ben Keith (pedal steel guitar), Tim Drummond (bass), Kenny Buttrey (drums) and Jack Nitzsche (piano), a quartet who became known as The Stray Gators. Young also recorded parts of Harvest at Elliot Mazer’s Quadrafonic Sound Studios, a converted two-storey house in Nashville’s Music Row. “He does things so fast… it’s done and it’s brilliant” When Young recorded his masterful live album at Toronto’s Massey Hall in January 1971, he road-tested, in stirring stripped-down versions, three of the songs that would appear on Harvest: Heart Of Gold, Old Man and The Needle And The Damage Done. “He’s really got an uncanny instinct to go for the throat”

The album, which took nine months to complete, was recorded in spurts in Nashville, London and California, in between tours, hospital consultations and a romance that would produce Young’s first child. It’s really fine, but that’s it.” The album, released through the Reprise label on 14 February 1972, provided Young with two hits – Heart Of Gold and Old Man – and became the best-selling album in the US for the entire year.Įight of Harvest’s ten tracks are acoustic, something that came out of necessity because Young, then just 25, was struggling with a debilitating back injury that would ultimately require complicated surgery. When Neil Young was asked about his seminal fourth album on its 40th anniversary, he said: “I think Harvest was probably the finest record that I’ve made, but that’s really a restricting adjective for me.

Old man neil young harvest