Young notoriously bristled at this accessibility, writing in the liner notes of Decade that "'Heart of Gold' put me in the middle of the road. Here, he's heard as a folk troubadour and a shaggy rocker, a protest singer and an old soul, a hippie who wants to get back to the country - all personas he'd continue to explore and expand over the course of his career, and all presented here in a way that's welcoming, not alienating. At first, "The Needle and the Damage Done" doesn't quite seem to jibe with the rest of Harvest - it's a solo acoustic number recorded live in concert, an aesthetic that's far away from either the slick studio craft or downhome country-rock of the rest of the record - but its inclusion underscores how Harvest touches upon everything Neil Young had done to that point. "The Needle and the Damage Done," a lament for the late Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten that was recorded in concert, helps bring Harvest back to earth, offering open-hearted empathy that has lost none of its poignancy over the years. These are complementary approaches, with the raw immediacy of "Are You Ready for the Country," "Alabama," and "Words" contrasting nicely with the burnished, mellow simmer of "Out on the Weekend," "Harvest," and "Old Man." Where Harvest gets a bit odd is on "A Man Needs a Maid" and "There's a World," where the London Symphony Orchestra plays bombastic arrangements by Jack Nitzsche - arrangements so overwhelming, they threaten to knock the entire album off of its axis. Much of the music does indeed fulfill the rural promise of its title, either by relying upon the studio polish of Nashville cats or the ragged ramble of Young's jerry-rigged California barn. Its overwhelming success - thanks to the number one hit "Heart of Gold," a sun-bleached country-rocker that opened up the highway for the likes of America, and becoming the biggest-selling record of 1972 - camouflages its slightly misshapen structure. He had already received a boost from being recruited into Crosby, Stills & Nash, with After the Gold Rush climbing into the Top Ten months after CSN&Y's Deja Vu went to number one, but Harvest was something different, simultaneously slicker and more eccentric than its predecessor. Record Store Day Black Friday exclusive release with printed lyrics insert.ģ sided limited edition in gatefold sleeve, Side D has an etching of the album cover artwork.Harvest sits at the foundation of Neil Young's legacy, a blockbuster that turned Neil Young into a superstar in his own right.
The song " Harvest Moon" topped the AARP's list of "16 Songs Everyone Over 50 Should Own."
Matthew Greenwald of AllMusic described the melody of the title track as "positively gorgeous". The album continued Young's commercial and critical resurgence following Freedom and Ragged Glory, eventually outselling both of those records. Music website Classic Rock Review named Harvest Moon its album of the year for 1992. It earned the 1994 Juno Award for album of the year. 1970s-era analogue equipment was used instead of digital recording to achieve a "warmer" feel. Recovering from a case of tinnitus that had come about after the recording of Ragged Glory (1990) and its subsequent tour (which produced the 1991 albums Weld and Arc), Young returned to the studio with Ben Keith, picking up the acoustic guitar, piano and banjo that had dominated albums such as Harvest, Comes a Time and Old Ways. Many of the musicians appearing on it also appeared on his 1972 album Harvest. Harvest Moon is the 19th studio album by Canadian musician Neil Young, released on November 2, 1992.
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