Customer Reviews

Sleeps With Angels

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is a definite candidate for Neil Young's best album ever; it is, quite simply, a beautiful, haunting melancholy masterpiece. It came as quite a surprise to everyone after the raging, upbeat Ragged Glory, did this gloomy series of death odes. Inspired no doubt in part by the suicide of Kurt Cobain - which occurred during the recording of this album; at least two songs (the title track and Change Your Mind) seem to be about the fallen rocker, who quoted one of Neil's songs in his suicide note - this album is a series dark, moving, extremely powerful vignettes that rank it among the most moving and amazing albums I have ever heard. This is surely the most diverse record from Neil to feature Crazy Horse: it's not the endless heavy jamming that you may well expect. The album is fairly musically diverse: the bookend tracks on the album feature beautiful, moving tack piano playing from Neil, and Prime of Life even features him performing on the flute. Tough-as-nails guitarist Frank "Poncho" Sampedro even turns in delicate performances on the piano on more than a handful of tracks. The set features one of Neil's most moving and harrowing set of lyrics ever - on par with Tonight's The Night, but perhaps even gloomier. Most all of the songs are overtly concerned with death (the light filler track Piece of [Junk] (undoubtedly included to lighten the mood after nearly an hour's worth of heavy listening) nonwithstanding), and Neil turns in some of his most beautiful, delicate vocals ever here. The vocal melodies from the band are quite great as well. Most all of the songs have haunting, beautiful arrangements and fine melodies. However, although the lyrics, vocals, and vocal melodies on this album are almost universally outstanding, the music matches the mood precisely, and is often great as well. Smack dab in the middle of the album is the 14-minute masterpiece Change Your Mind, featuring some of Neil and Crazy Horse's best soloing ever. This song is absolutely stunningly beautiful. Blue Eden is a harowing blues jam. Many songs feature soft, touching piano passages, and many other feature excellent soloing on the guitar in an emotional, moving way. Some of Neil's best songs ever are here as well. Aside from the ones already mentioned, there are others: the slow, spooky build-up of Trans Am, the wonderful ballad Train of Love, and the absolutely stunning closer, A Dream That Can Last. In a very dark, harrowing, and moving way, this is perhaps Neil's most beautiful album ever; it features a wonderfully moving melancholy beauty - on par, beauty-wise, with such wonderful acoustic work as Harvest. Quite simply, this is an essential purchase for any who calls themselves a Neil Young fan - or, indeed, of great music at all.

I hated to album when I first heard it, but I really didn't give it close attention. I expected something to reach out and grab me the way "Freedom" or "Ragged Glory" did, and my initial assessment was a sloppy, tired, boring failure. But over the years a lot of people have prodded me, telling me it's much better than that, and having given it a real chance, I have to admit I was wrong. It's one of Neil's most interesting albums, sonically and lyrically. The harrowing atmosphere has been compared to that surrounding "Tonight's The Night," but the sound is very different. Here, it's almost apocalyptic, with a heavy and occasionally experimental production that you won't find on Neil's more well-known albums.

"My Heart" is pretty strange and off-kilter song. On paper, the words could have come out of a Broadway show, but when you hear this song sung in a quivering, straining vocal, occasionally double-tracked in a way that feels slightly off, and played on that tack piano out of "Touch of Evil," it really gets under your skin after awhile. This pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the CD where just about everything has something disturbing about it. On the title track, the immediate impact and tremendous loss of Cobain's death on his wife is surrounded in the most oppressive sound to ever grace a Neil Young record. He may have achieved greater levels of distortion elsewhere, but the dirge-like lyrics with the desperate, off-key chorus occasionally surfacing throughout the song makes this even more harrowing, the aural equivalent of a Franz Kafka novel.
I could go on an on (the ominous throb of the strange road epic "Trans Am", etc.) if I had the space.

But it's not all doom and gloom. The pleading words and vocal on "Change Your Mind," the hope that comes through on the last track (though it's pretty desperate in itself) all offer or at least search for ways out of the depressing atmosphere that surrounds most of this CD. Not a 'fun' listen, and except for "Piece of Crap," not even rocking in a way "Tonight's The Night" or "On The Beach" rocks, but it is rewarding in its own way.

One more word on "Piece of Crap," yeah, it does break from the album's thematic unity, and I think one critic was pretty apt in calling it "the ecological 'Welfare Mothers,'" but taken by out of context, it's actually a pretty funny, stoooopid rock song. Not on the level of the Ramones or the Replacements, but you get the idea.

Throughout his career, Neil Young has shown little concern for keeping any kind of consistency from one album to the next. He is notorious for not giving his fans exactly what they want, but he always gives them something good. This rough edge to Young's career has left many critics baffled over the years. That is perhaps the inevitable circumstance for any artist who could follow up a viscious grunge album like 1990's "Ragged Glory" with the collection of subtle folk songs found on 1992's "Harvest Moon."

On "Sleeps With Angels," Young and his legendary grunge compatriots, Crazy Horse, deliver a collection of songs that brilliantly blend the mellow harmony of "Harvest Moon" with grunge. Pearl Jam's fans and critics have proven that they only see black or white. They want rock out grunge or nothing. Similarly, when Neil teams up with Crazy Horse, fans and critics expect it to follow the model of their past outings like "Ragged Glory" or 1975's "Zuma." Critics have almost routinely panned Pearl Jam's more recent output for not following the precedent they set with "Ten," and it seems that Crazy Horse suffered the same fate with "Sleeps With Angels."

It is therefore no surprise that fans and critics either love or hate this album. "Sleeps With Angels" ranges from gorgeous piano ballads like "My heart" to raucous grunge knockouts like "Piece Of Crap." And on the tracks in between, both styles are combined into some of the most palatable "grunge" ever put to tape.

"Prime Of Life" showcases Young in a harmonious struggle with the flute, while the band rocks to an even keel that is not commonly found on many other Crazy Horse Albums. Simply put, it is one of the Band's most solid songs since "My My, Hey Hey (into the black)" from 1979's masterpiece, "Rust Never Sleeps," though it is much quieter by comparison. "Driveby," "Western hero," and "Train Of Love" all lean towards the accoustic melodies of "Harvest Moon," but when least espected, either Young or Sampedro kick in with some elecric rhythm that always seems to belong. "Blue Eden" and, perhaps one of the album's most outstanding tracks, "Safeway Cart," are metallic wastelands of bleak, mellow emotion. "Piece of Crap" lays the smack down much in the vein of anything on "Mirror Ball" or "Ragged Glory," both of which are stunning examples of Young's genious for delivering masterful hard core grunge performaces, if that is what you are looking for.

Admittedly, the one noteable flaw of this album is the singing. The vocals are shaky and unambitious on almost every track. But like Bob Dylan, singing has never been one of Neil Young's more praiseworthy attributes. However, "Sleeps With Angels" has a spontaneous, raw sound to it; a sound in which perfect, silvery vocals may have actually seemd out of place.

No, this is not Neil Young rocking the studio to the ground with Crazy Horse. This is Neil and Crazy Horse looking for a newer sound; a sound that finds a wonderful balance between melody and rage. Frankly, by 1994, it would not have made sense for one of contemporary music's pioneers to deliver a grunge album that could not be told apart from anything by Nirvana, Pearl jam or Stone Temple Piolots. Neil Young is not called "the Godfather of Grunge" for making grunge albums, but rather for single handedly creating the genre long before the 90's came about. That is why Neil Young is credited as an innovator. Like any innovator, he takes risks, he reaches higher discoveries and, once in a while, creates a new breed of sound that is truly one of a kind. And we all know how fairly the world has treated those who dabbled in things that were before their time. Be different, take the chance that Neil took with "Sleeps With Angels." For those whose ears are mature enough, this CD will be a veteran of their home stereoes.

Lots of artists have tried to say something meaningful about the death of Kurt Cobain, but Neil actually succeeds here. Though not every song directly addresses Kurt, it obviously influenced the overall feeling. The lullabyes framing this album make me wanna cry myself to sleep. "Change Your Mind", a revisitation of "Cowgirl in the Sand" musically, stands alone as one of Neil's best songs in terms of songwriting and performance. The urban terror of Safeway Cart paints a terribly accurate portrait. If you liked the album Tonight's the Night or Lou Reed's Magic and Loss, then this should be right up your alley.

This is the album that made me a Neil Young fan. I really don't feel like I can recommend it highly enough. The only low point is the aptly named "Piece of Crap". Such a simple novelty rock song as that one couldn't possibly be more out of place on this album. The rest of the album by far makes up for it, however. Personal favorites are the muddled and eerie "Sleeps with Angels", "Blue Eden", an extended guitar jam with only a few lines of mournfully called out lyrics, and "A Dream That Can Last", the beatiful closing tune accompanied by Neil's slightly off-time tack piano. Even the softer, folkier songs have Crazy Horse's trademark 'precisely wrong' quality. You get the idea that it took a lot of work to make these songs sound this disjointed. If you're scared of experimentation (quick quiz: is Harvest your favorite Neil Young album? )you may as well stay away. But if you appreciate Neil's more muddled side (more along the lines of Tonites the Night) then you're bound to count this amongst your favorite albums.

I had heard legends of how Neil's music is bipolar. Before I got this CD I owned After The Gold Rush, Harvest, and Silver & Gold. So I had only heard his soft music, which is utterly beautiful. At some point you are ready for something else though. When you get to that point, buy this CD. This music touched something primal in me. Now, please excuse me, I must go crawl on all fours for a while.

A strange, sometimes morose collection of songs, "Sleeps With Angels" is more musically diverse than most of Neil Young's albums with his legendary backing group Crazy Horse.
It is NOT the place to start building a Neil Young-collection; it just takes too long for this compelling but mournful record to really sink in, and it just might put you off Young for good.

But if you know what you're getting into, "Sleeps With Angels" is a worthy addition to Young's lenghty catalogue. It is not as accessible as most of his best-known 70s albums, and they weren't excactly lighthearted pop to begin with, but give it time and it will grow on you.
The music is straight out of the Crazy Horse songbook, ragged and unpolished, and Neil Young's fragile quiver of a voice seems even airier than usual. "Sleeps With Angels" opens with the sparse folkish piano-ballad "My Heart", and songs like the half-spoken "Trans Am" and the melodic "Western Hero" are from the same low-key mold. "Sleeps With Angels", "Blue Eden" and the epic 14-minute "Change Your Mind" are slow, gritty electric rock song with some smouldering lead guitar playing by Neil Young, and Crazy Horse generally sound a lot more mellow than usual. There are few up-tempo songs on this album, but the driving "Piece Of Crap" bristles with attitude and power chords, and even slow songs like "Driveby" and the wistful closer "A Dream That Can Last" have a lot of substance to them.

Again, I don't think one would be a good place to start, but it's an excellent stop to make along the way. It just takes a little time to sink in is all.

Neil Young and Crazy Horse never fail to amaze, and this album is no exception. This album is one of the darkest, if not the darkest ever released by Neil Young. I first heard this album when I was 12, but did not buy it until I was 15, and I am glad I did.

The majority of the album is comprised of electric songs, with two piano songs placed on the album as bookends. Here is a song-by-song analysis.

MY HEART: Great intro, simple but beautiful song. This song features Neil on tack piano.

PRIME OF LIFE: Features Neil on flute, great melody and lyrics.

DRIVEBY: Very slow, sad song, excellent track.

SLEEPS WITH ANGELS: This song was written when Neil heard of the suicide of Kurt Cobain. Very slow, dark, moody song.

WESTERN HERO: Classic Neil Young melody, great storyline in the lyrics. This melody creeps up later on another song on the album.

CHANGE YOUR MIND: Without a doubt, the best song on the album. Great guitar solos after every verse. This song is sort of a sister to "Cowgirl In The Sand" found on the album Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, released well over two decades before this. Not exactly sure what this song is about, but that doesn't matter. Chock full of great guitar solos and a beautiful vocal melody. One of the best songs he has ever recorded with Crazy Horse, definitely recommended. The songs clocks in at over 14 minutes long.

BLUE EDEN: Great jam. Very slow and bluesy.

SAFEWAY CART: This song is another slow one, very dark and eerie, yet soothing at the same time. Love listening to it at night with headphones.

TRAIN OF LOVE: Same melody as "Western Hero," see that song for more info.

TRANS AM: This is a classic Neil story-song. Quite dark, great chord progression.

PIECE OF CRAP: This is classic Neil Young and Crazy Horse at pure punk fury. Very angry song with angry lyrics, very enjoyable.

A DREAM THAT CAN LAST: Beautiful song, makes you feel like you died and went to heaven (pun intended). This is the other piano song on the album. Neil even plays a little harmonica here.

Well, there you have it. Sleeps With Angels is a classic NY&CH album. I recommend it to any Neil Young fan, or any rock fan. Buy this album and enjoy it for a long time to come.

Peace.

Four stars because, well, 5 for the great, 2 for the bad, means 3.5, and let's give Neil the benefit of the doubt, because the good outweighs the bad and he's Neil Young and we love him. The ones you don't like, don't listen to them. The bad are bad...but who cares, if you're thinking about buying this you're probably die-hard Neil, like I am, so go ahead, you'll be glad you did. First, it's no real eulogy for Kurt Cobain. Much of the feel is definitely elegaic, expressive of mourning for the loss of that which was great, but in this case that seems to be the case more for America and its myths than for any one person. Western Hero and Trans Am chart that territory really well in their lyrics, even if they leave something to be desired musically. But they're OK. Despite that I think that lyrics are not enough without excellent music (read poetry if you want, there's lots of good stuff out there) I'm still touched by Young's tender presentations of the American past in all its violence and his representation of the historically shifting protagonist in its modern situation as untenable. This beautiful ideal got us here, and we're all messed up, and we deserve annihilation, it seems to say. Though in Trans Am, with its ending in two guys going out to do a job, it situates itself in working class American manhood trying to get by, humanizes itself, even in the ambiguity of violence and rescue in which the woman with the Trans Am north of Barstow's left in. The feminists might not like it, but it shows guys being guys, and I think we're OK, after all. Now the middle of this CD is the 5 part. Personally, I think Change Your Mind is Young's greatest composition. OK, I went out on a limb, but I love the shift between straight ahead lyricism to those tight choral Beatle harmonies (I do NOT like the Beatles) to thoroughly Young guitar playing which reaches the magisterial in its control and patience and improvisation. The solos bridge seamlessly back to the lyrics and then we're off again, each time more extended and exploratory, with the last solo bridge being ethereally ambient work. I can't say enough about this song, and if the rest were the total Piece of Crap (which I like, I smile at good straight on punk) some people say it is I wouldn't care. If you're a Young fanatic, or scholar, or groupie, whatever...you need to have this song. Blue Eden and Safeway Cart do basically the same with less complexity. Blue Eden is the good Young rawwkkkk ambience you've grown to love and Safeway Cart I admire for its simplicity and beauty and the growing sensation while listening that the song won't change. It's very grounding. It reminds me of John Cage, somehow, though I have no idea why. If Cage ever did anything like it I haven't heard it. Yeah, so, this is weird Neil Young, but buy it. Change Your Mind. Even the marimba stuff that book end the album is kind of cool.

I can't believe the people here saying that they expected a grunge or acoustic album from Neil! If you look at the mid 70s and the 80s, you should never *expect* with Neil. The people who put this album down are very closed minded. The album is a mix of acoustic and grunge, with a lot of the middle ground between these genres explored. My Heart is one of the best starts to a Neil album i have heard. Nothing else is needed except Neil, the piano, and shakey emotion. The track brings all your emotions to the fore. Prime Of Life is excellent and the flute line, although badly played (!) is very haunting and adds to the tone of the track. Driveby and Sleeps With Angels are both dirge-like and mesmerising, producing a heavy and cluttered sound yet still sounding crisp. Western Hero/Train Of Love are put down for being the same track etc, but that just adds to the continuity of the album as a whole. And when the track is a gorgeous and evocative as it is, to have it repeated (albeit with different lyrics) is fantastic. Change Your Mind is not worth writing about because it is so good. No words can describe the change in mood between the verses and the chorus.

Blue Eden and Safeway Cart take a while to get into. I think they are the worst songs on the album but they are by no means bad. They are both very slow and reluctant to start but in the end pull together well. Trans Am is another fantastic track which is very haunting. Piece Of Crap is a great track and moves from haunting/dirgey etc into humour/loud grunge/environmental stuff. I don't think it's out of place on the album because it lightens the mood for a brief period of time. A Dream That Can Last is very much like My Heart in the fact that it is Neil and his piano. The likeness of the two tracks bookend the album really well and make you feel that the album is meant to mean something (guess!!). Anyway, it's a very beautiful track and a great way to finish.

The best word to describe this album is mournful. If it was a eulogy to Kurt Cobain, I can't imagine a better tribute. This album is not for totally new Neil fans, yet not exclusively for the 'hardcore'. Get this album when you have listened to things like Harvest, After The Goldrush, Tonight's The Night, Ragged Glory, Everybody Knows.. and Zuma. I have about 25 Neil albums and I have to place this near the top, if not at the top, of the pile.