NEIL YOUNG & CRAZY HORSE: LOVE EARTH TOUR
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Critic’s Pick: Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Ameris Bank Amphitheatre — Years ago, 1985 to be exact, Neil Young played the Chastain Park Amphitheater with the International Harvesters. At the time, only two months before his 40th birthday, Young seemed to be facing a fork in the road. He had entered his “country” phase. At one point during the concert, he looked out over the audience and, with what seemed like a sense of resignation, observed, “rock ’n’ roll is a young person’s game,” as if he was going to hang it up — and leave behind the music upon which he built his legacy. Indeed, that concert found him meandering down a different musical path, one more laid back and full of twang rather than in your face and bombastic. Perhaps Young thought the music more befitting a person at that point in their life, entering middle age and, sooner than later, approaching the inevitable end of the road.
Thankfully, that was not the case. Young was born to rock, and for the next forty years of his life, he has kept on rockin’ in the free world, more aggressively and forcefully than in the days when he first left Sugar Mountain. With a new album, FU##KIN’ UP, Young returns to Atlanta May 7 with his long-time power surge, Crazy Horse. The album, recorded live in November, 2023, captures the band fiercely recounting lesser known songs in Young’s catalogue, giving them a new life and sense of urgency that reflects Young’s drive today, in what very well may be his prime of life.
Returning to the Crazy Horse fold are bassist Billy Talbot and drummer Ralph Molina, with Micah Nelson (yes, Willie’s son) replacing Nils Lofgren, who replaced Frank “Poncho” Sampedro, who replaced Columbus, GA, native Danny Whitten.
According to Rolling Stone magazine, the set list for the first shows of the “Love Earth” tour only drew from from songs written between 1969 and 1979, that is vintage Neil Young from the days that used to be. With Young and Crazy Horse stretching out on 15 minute-plus versions of “Cortez The Killer” and “Down By the River,” along with an extended “Powderfinger,” Nelson holds his own, offering the perfect foil to Young’s extended solos and piercing leads. — Tony Paris
$105+. 7:30 p.m. Ameris Bank Amphitheatre, 2200 Encore Parkway, Alpharetta, GA. 30009. 404-733-5010. Ameris Bank Amphitheatre at Encore Park
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