Loving “Living With War”

I really think this is Neil Young’s best album in years. Most of his later-career stuff, even good albums like “Harvest Moon,” seemed a little overthought. Even his last, well-received CD seemed a little all over the place. “Living With War,” on the other hand, is like one long primal scream of outrage. Without sacrificing melody (well, as much as the usual Crazy Horse album anyhow), Neil makes a mighty noise, hollering and stomping away while the band thunders along with him.

“Living With War” is like a full album’s worth of the rock & roll side of “Rust Never Sleeps,” crossed with the social agitpop of “Ohio” and “Rockin In The Freee World.” The addition of a hundred-voice gospel choir, used tastefully but to great effect throughout, also kicks it up a notch from the usual Crazy Horse pyrotechnics.

I’m telling you, this is Neil’s most focused, concentrated work in years. This CD is why God didn’t let that brain tumor kill him last year. There’s even a scathing sense of humor at work at certain points. “Let’s Impeach the President” includes choruses of self-contradicting Bush sound-bytes separated by raucous cries of “FLIP!” and “FLOP!”

When me and The Missus saw Neil with CSNY a few years back at the Duff Beer Megadome on the mainland, she kind of giggled at the dinosaur-like way Neil prowled the stage, even on songs where he was just rhythm guitar player. She thought he was playing rock and roll star. I tried to explain to her that sometimes stomping your feet in anger is the only appropriate response and anyhow Neil Young is a rock and roll star! Oh, it was an impassioned defense.

...but I digress.

“Living With War” is a must-have. It’s on heavy rotation here at the Lair (as is Kris Kristofferson’s sublime new CD, “This Old Road”). The rousing, respectful version of “America the Beautiful” that closes “Living With War” is bracing and uplifting, the perfect palate cleanser for all the concentrated wrath that precedes it. He leaves the second verse instrumental, so you can sing your own favorite over it.

My favorite additional verse is this one:

O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
Till nobler men keep once again
The banner of the free!