After we saw Neil and Crazy Horse in Chicago in Fall of 1986, I figured the
next album was going to be great. And I was ready for a great Crazy Horse
album, too. Here's what I heard that night and thought was coming:
Too Lonely - simple but fun
Eldorado Town - couldn't hear the lyrics well in that barn that is/was the
Horizon, but the riff sounded great
Inca Queen - this blew me away live
Around the World - I think maybe this was played, I remember there being
another new rocker.
Mideast Vacation
Long Walk Home - a great one/two punch, intriguing lyrics
Prisoners of Rock n Roll - this was a great closer - a rededication, I thought
So there we had in 7 songs the beginnings of a great album. Add a couple
more great tunes and you have a classic, but when Life came out I was
somewhat underwhelmed. Why?
Studio tinkering messed up good songs - like others have said. I didn't
like the middle section of Around the World. I didn't need the bombs in
Long Walk Home - more subtle in concert in 1986, though they included the
bomb sounds in 1987. I also didn't like the monkey sounds in Inca Queen.
Ultimately, what did in Life for me was that the song order didn't flow
well. Prisoners is an opener or a closer and sounded out of place in the
middle. We lost Eldorado Town and gained one good rocker (Crying Eyes) and
2 slow tunes. With the ballads on the end the album ended with a big bag
of downers. The two songs weren't bad, as such, but they didn't sound good
on the end, and they were only good not great songs.
When I recorded my albums to tape in the late 80's I broke up Life to use
as filler for among other things the superstars in concert radio broadcast.
Recorded during the same tour, the show didn't include any of the new
songs, so it made sense to me to put live sounding Life tracks there.
I've got it on CD now, but I do wish it had been done differently. Not
bad, just fumbled, IMHO. Maybe it should have been done as a live album
like Time Fades Away. Oh well ...
Joe
