Feature of the Week (3/18/12) The Ditch Trilogy

[cortez the killer]

is our boy stills is wearing a louisiana state trooper uni?

Fuck Stills.

[Tequila Cowboy]

Cortez, this is one amazing FotW. A lot of stuff I didn't know. The only drag is I have a vinyl copy of Time Fades Away and I can't find it.

[Steve French]

was stephen Stills a Louisiana State Trooper?

[cortez the killer]

was stephen Stills a Louisiana State Trooper?

He was a fuckin' hippie!

[Bill in CT]

was stephen Stills a Louisiana State Trooper?

Not in real life, but maybe in his mind.
Good ol' "Sarge" himself!

[RustyBolts]

I'm sure glad I never knew about "honey slides," or my gray years would have been a lot more gray.

[dime in the gutter]

danny whitten dies and they hit the road 3 months later......and make a record. some funky shit going down on tape.

fucking context.

but a whole 3 records to get that vibe? prolly should have cherry picked and gotten the trilogy down to a single lp.

loving this thread.

[sactochris]

I've never been that big of Neil Young fan. Don't get me wrong now, I like him, and I have several of his records. I just haven't ever been as into him as so many other people I know who's musical tastes so closely resemble mine. That being said, I think Tonights The Night is pretty close to being a near perfect record, warts and all. I bought a copy of it on vinyl around 2000 or 2001 and even on first listen I was convinced that it was by far the best thing of his I had ever heard.

In 2004 when my mom died, I went back to East Moline for her funeral, and saw my oldest brother who I hadn't seen, or even spoken to in ten years. We had a falling out when he and I moved her back to Illinois after she retired. One of the first things I noticed was that in the ten years that we hadn't spoken we had both bought the same brand of speakers, and the exact same model Adcom amp. I guess blood is thicker than water I thought to myself. I walked over to his CD rack and looked for something to listen to, I grabbed Tonights The Night, and that album that's so full of death was strangely enough, very soothing to me, even as I was struggling to come to grips with the loss of my mother. He was really drunk on top shelf tequila, as he usually is by that time of night. As soon as the disc started playing he smiled real big and said " so what the fuck have you been doing for the last ten years" So now when I play that record I never think about the loss of my mother, I always think about getting my oldest brother back.

[tinnitus photography]

Cortez, this post is awesome. definitely my favorite trio of Neil records (i'd try to find a way to squeeze _Zuma_ into that trio somehow as well), and it was a great writeup...damn, you did your homework on this one.

i never realized TTN was recorded before OTB.


i could listen to all three of these records every day for the rest of my life.

[Steve French]

I've always said I hate fuckin Neil Young the fuckin' hippie. In spite of owning the live Rust Never Sleeps and playing it fairly often (I love Powderfinger/Sedan Delivery/Welfare Mothers) but a lot of it never clicked with me. I dont enjoy his singing voice that much I guess, or whatever.

I will, however give Tonights The Night an unbiased listen. At least as unbiased as I can be with this sort of ...............

I saw that movie too when I was young, that was pretty cool: the one wher he had Sand People as roadies. Maybe it was the film of that album? as you know, the louder and thrashier it is, generally the happier I am.

excellent work Mr Cortez you might just turn me into a freakin' hippie after all.

[Clams]

In 2004 when my mom died, I went back to East Moline for her funeral, and saw my oldest brother who I hadn't seen, or even spoken to in ten years. We had a falling out when he and I moved her back to Illinois after she retired. One of the first things I noticed was that in the ten years that we hadn't spoken we had both bought the same brand of speakers, and the exact same model Adcom amp. I guess blood is thicker than water I thought to myself. I walked over to his CD rack and looked for something to listen to, I grabbed Tonights The Night, and that album that's so full of death was strangely enough, very soothing to me, even as I was struggling to come to grips with the loss of my mother. He was really drunk on top shelf tequila, as he usually is by that time of night. As soon as the disc started playing he smiled real big and said " so what the fuck have you been doing for the last ten years" So now when I play that record I never think about the loss of my mother, I always think about getting my oldest brother back.

Good stuff, Sacto.

[beantownbubba]

In 2004 when my mom died, I went back to East Moline for her funeral, and saw my oldest brother who I hadn't seen, or even spoken to in ten years. We had a falling out when he and I moved her back to Illinois after she retired. One of the first things I noticed was that in the ten years that we hadn't spoken we had both bought the same brand of speakers, and the exact same model Adcom amp. I guess blood is thicker than water I thought to myself. I walked over to his CD rack and looked for something to listen to, I grabbed Tonights The Night, and that album that's so full of death was strangely enough, very soothing to me, even as I was struggling to come to grips with the loss of my mother. He was really drunk on top shelf tequila, as he usually is by that time of night. As soon as the disc started playing he smiled real big and said " so what the fuck have you been doing for the last ten years" So now when I play that record I never think about the loss of my mother, I always think about getting my oldest brother back.

Good stuff, Sacto.

x2

[Iowan]

I'm sure glad I never knew about "honey slides," or my gray years would have been a lot more gray.

I had the same thought.

[cortez the killer]

Postnapping:

One of my all-time favorites. I have a really cool book from Gary Burden, Neil's album cover designer in 70's (also did After the Gold Rush, On the Beach, and others). Here's what he says about the TTN cover:

This is one of the most interesting and deeply inspired packages I have been a part of making. It is filled with mystery and heavy drama that includes the death of a young man who was very close to Neil, the project, and all of us.

Bruce Berry was a long time roadie for Neil. He had been struggling with his addiction to heroin for some time and finally lost the battle and his life. Neil celebrates Bruce in the song Tonight’s The Night. For this record Neil was looking for a particular sound appropriate to the songs and he found it at a place called Studio Instrument Rentals, SIR, ironically owned by Bruce Berry’s brother. There was another Berry brother, Jan Berry of the group Jan and Dean and he suffered a horrendous fate when at the peak of his career he was paralyzed in a car wreck I digress. SIR was located in a very seedy part of Hollywood as dark as what was going on on the record. The rehearsal room Neil liked the sound of was way in the back and it was a hassle to set it up as a studio, run cables etc. So Neil had them knock a hole in the outside wall of the building, they pulled the remote recording truck up next to the building and ran all of the cables etc. through the new hole in the wall. Neil is nothing if not determined.

During the time Neil was recording the album David Geffen and Neil’s manager Elliot Roberts, with their other partners, opened a new club on the strip (Sunset Blvd.) The Roxy and On The Rocks. That was a wild night. Neil was the first artist to play the club. It’s still a famous rock and roll music venue. I saw one of the greatest nights of music ever when Bob Marley played there. The night Neil opened the club the backstage was wall-to-wall celebrities. Everyone from Jack Nicholson to Elton John. I shot super 8 movie film all night long in every nook and cranny of the club and in every notable face I could find. In line with the vibe in the air at the time I lost all of that film, hours and hours of amazing stuff that I never saw any of. Some of the mysterious elements in this package included a photo of Neil at Barney’s Beanery sitting inside one of the famous assemblage artist Ed Keinholz’s pieces, man with clocks for heads. There is a full-page spread of an article from a newspaper in Holland all written in Dutch, a photo of Mickey Rooney as Huck Finn and Neil’s very abstract rap about Waterface and Miami Beach, where, “Everything is cheaper than it looks”.

In designing the package and selecting the paper stock the first challenge Neil presented was that he wanted the package art to rub off and wear out in a short period of time. I researched and found that the most easily destructible paper, that would disintegrate the quickest, was blotter paper. Now, not many people print on blotter paper and a more experienced graphic artist would have known that, but being blissfully/purposefully ignorant I didn’t known the pit falls. When the printer got over his apoplexy and settled down I told him why and what we wanted to do. We ran some test on press and actually did one where we ran four color process on blotter paper! The poor printer was very frustrated because every time he would get up and running the blotter paper would be disintegrating and the blanket of the presses would get clogged up and he would have to stop and clean them before continuing. In the end we were able to give Neil what he wanted and later when I would see the cover in other people’s homes looking old, funky and worn out when it was only a few weeks old I got a big smile.


Corner of my office.....

[cortez the killer]

I've always said I hate fuckin Neil Young the fuckin' hippie. In spite of owning the live Rust Never Sleeps and playing it fairly often (I love Powderfinger/Sedan Delivery/Welfare Mothers) but a lot of it never clicked with me. I dont enjoy his singing voice that much I guess, or whatever.

I will, however give Tonights The Night an unbiased listen. At least as unbiased as I can be with this sort of ...............

I saw that movie too when I was young, that was pretty cool: the one wher he had Sand People as roadies. Maybe it was the film of that album? as you know, the louder and thrashier it is, generally the happier I am.

excellent work Mr Cortez you might just turn me into a freakin' hippie after all.

Thanks Mr. French. To steal one of dime's phrases, Neil's got more arrows in the quiver than the hippie one. I believe the movie you are talking about is this one:

[ramonz]

Man, this thread is fantastic. I ignored it b/c I'd never heard the term "The Ditch Trilogy," but now I recall that quote and it all makes sense. Honestly, I thought it was some movie or tv show or book thread, along the line of those freakin' vampires that were so popular last year.

Thanks for this Cortez. Read it all last night and really enjoyed it. I went up in my attic b/c I thought I had TFA on vinyl, but it was JTTP that I was thinking of. I need to dig deeper into both of those. TTN and OTB are so damn good. I never even really knew of OTB until it (finally) came out on CD 5-10 years ago.....simply amazing.

BTW, you think Stills is crap? Music-wise or pain-in-the-ass wise? I really (really) like that first Manassas album.

[cortez the killer]

Man, this thread is fantastic. I ignored it b/c I'd never heard the term "The Ditch Trilogy," but now I recall that quote and it all makes sense. Honestly, I thought it was some movie or tv show or book thread, along the line of those freakin' vampires that were so popular last year.

Thanks for this Cortez. Read it all last night and really enjoyed it. I went up in my attic b/c I thought I had TFA on vinyl, but it was JTTP that I was thinking of. I need to dig deeper into both of those. TTN and OTB are so damn good. I never even really knew of OTB until it (finally) came out on CD 5-10 years ago.....simply amazing.

BTW, you think Stills is crap? Music-wise or pain-in-the-ass wise? I really (really) like that first Manassas album.

I'm a vampire, babe, sucking blood from the earth.

I remember clearly when four of the "Missing Six" were finally released. The "Missing Six" were the albums Neil had never released on CD - the soundtrack for Journey Through the Past, Time Fades Away, On the Beach, American Stars n Bars, Hawks and Doves, and Re*Ac*Tor. All but Journey & TFA were made available on disc in 2003. I remember when the shipment arrived I felt like an 8 year old at Christmas. I had bootleg copies of JTTP, TFA and Hawks as well as Stars n Bars on cassette, but I was so happy to get the official releases.

I'm very biased towards Stills. Much of what I've read about him makes him sound like a raging asshole douchebag. He comes off as a very petty, insecure, and paranoid dickwad. Unfortunately that clouds my judgement on his stuff. I have a copy of Manassas, but never really gave it a chance. I'll have to give it another listen with fresher ears. Here's a great story I read about Stills that gives you a sense for his misguided arrogance:

While CSNY were on "The Doom Tour" in 1974, Bob Dylan shows up at the St. Paul Hilton they're staying at. He winds up hanging out in a room with Stills and Tim Drummond. According to Nash, they won't let anyone else into the room. Dylan grabbed an acoustic guitar and proceeded to unveil much of the material for his upcoming album Blood on the Tracks. Nash, forced to listen out in the hall, recalls, "I'm listening to these songs through the door. I'm fucking dying." The moment Dylan left, Stills turned to Nash and said with a straight face, "He's no musician. He's a good songwriter . . . but he's no musician."

[dime in the gutter]

I'm very biased towards Stills. Much of what I've read about him makes him sound like a raging asshole douchebag. He comes off as a very petty, insecure, and paranoid dickwad. Unfortunately that clouds my judgement on his stuff. I have a copy of Manassas, but never really gave it a chance. I'll have to give it another listen with fresher ears.

pretty much this....but that manassas lp is a beauty.

cocaine is a hell of a drug.

[cortez the killer]

I'm very biased towards Stills. Much of what I've read about him makes him sound like a raging asshole douchebag. He comes off as a very petty, insecure, and paranoid dickwad. Unfortunately that clouds my judgement on his stuff. I have a copy of Manassas, but never really gave it a chance. I'll have to give it another listen with fresher ears.

cocaine is a hell of a drug.

Apparently inspired by Stills.

[sactochris]

I'm very biased towards Stills. Much of what I've read about him makes him sound like a raging asshole douchebag. He comes off as a very petty, insecure, and paranoid dickwad. Unfortunately that clouds my judgement on his stuff. I have a copy of Manassas, but never really gave it a chance. I'll have to give it another listen with fresher ears.

pretty much this....but that manassas lp is a beauty.

cocaine is a hell of a drug.

That Manassas record is superb. I've got a copy of that on Reel To Reel, Vinyl and a burned CD copy.


This past christmas my nephew, who just turned 18 asked me about cocaine. I told him, what in the fuck do you want with a numb nose? I said, if you ever want to do coke just hit youself in the face with a shovel and set fire to a pile of money, it's pretty much the exact same thing.

[bovine knievel]

I have been officially "schooled". This was/is an excellent persuasive piece of writing & posts without trying to be.

Sacto, thanks for sharing that story about your mom and bro.

[brknarw]

Speaking of honey slides, the Neil solo show from May 16, 1974 at the Bottom Line in NYC has Neil telling the story of honey slides as an intro to "Motion Pictures". This show previews the On the Beach material in a very intimate acoustic setting a few months before it came out. You can hear glasses being clinked in the audience. This may be my favorite Neil recording of all time. Here's a link to mp3s of the songs: http://ultrasoundlounge.wordpress.com/2010/01/10/neil-young-the-bottom-line-nyc-51674/

Great post Cortez

[Iowan]

I've never been that big of Neil Young fan. Don't get me wrong now, I like him, and I have several of his records. I just haven't ever been as into him as so many other people I know who's musical tastes so closely resemble mine. That being said, I think Tonights The Night is pretty close to being a near perfect record, warts and all. I bought a copy of it on vinyl around 2000 or 2001 and even on first listen I was convinced that it was by far the best thing of his I had ever heard.

In 2004 when my mom died, I went back to East Moline for her funeral, and saw my oldest brother who I hadn't seen, or even spoken to in ten years. We had a falling out when he and I moved her back to Illinois after she retired. One of the first things I noticed was that in the ten years that we hadn't spoken we had both bought the same brand of speakers, and the exact same model Adcom amp. I guess blood is thicker than water I thought to myself. I walked over to his CD rack and looked for something to listen to, I grabbed Tonights The Night, and that album that's so full of death was strangely enough, very soothing to me, even as I was struggling to come to grips with the loss of my mother. He was really drunk on top shelf tequila, as he usually is by that time of night. As soon as the disc started playing he smiled real big and said " so what the fuck have you been doing for the last ten years" So now when I play that record I never think about the loss of my mother, I always think about getting my oldest brother back.

I missed this story yesterday somehow. Great story Sacto.

[cortez the killer]

Well I got a little drunk my head was swimming
I had this dream and it was not about women
I saw this hippie and I think it was Neil Young
He said "I heard your song its already been sung"
Well then he handed me a mouth harp and a cold brain sandwich
Got in the ancient Cadillac and headed for the ditch
'Ol Neil got in the ancient Cadillac and headed for the ditch....See 'ya!

[dime in the gutter]

is there any video out there from times fades away or ttn tours?

[cortez the killer]

is there any video out there from times fades away or ttn tours?

Well tell me more,
Tell me more,
Tell me more
I mean was he a heavy doper
Or was he just a loser?

[bovine knievel]

just purchased a copy of TTN to complete the trilogy

[blessedcurse]

Outstanding stuff Cortez!!

Sounds like I may be fortunate to have a copy of TFA on vinyl. I now also understand why the TTN cover has always felt fragile in my hands. Just love this period of Neil, but would also try to find a way to include Zuma.

[cortez the killer]

Thanks blessed. I think Zuma is an excellent album and it might be my favorite NY record of all-time. Tinnitus also suggested that I should have included it, but the Rusties would hang me if I tried to pass it off as a 'Ditch' album.

[Bill in CT]

Thanks blessed. I think Zuma is an excellent album and it might be my favorite NY record of all-time. Tinnitus also suggested that I should have included it, but the Rusties would hang me if I tried to pass it off as a 'Ditch' album.

Zuma is a tremendous album. That said, it doesn't belong in the same group as the "Ditch" albums. Zuma is sort of the daybreak after the darkness of the previous 3 albums. David Briggs said in Shakey that the happiest he ever saw Neil was when he was making Zuma.