Fork in the Road

Neil Young has once again surprised everybody

Neil Young is a unique phenomenon and it is enough just to look at his list of albums, collections, live shows recordings and numerous singles to make sure of that. This man is never tired of writing new songs getting inspired with any events happening in the world. During the pauses between the new creations Young periodically releases his old compositions of which he always manages to find just the necessary number as to make up another album. Thus taking into account the fact that the old songs collection Chrome Dreams II was released last year and the recording Sugar Mountain: Live At Canterbury House 1968 saw the light of the day last year it is high time for the original material today. The album Fork In The Road is the one to represent it. One could only guess what this creation would be about and it turns out that Neil Young has once again surprised everybody. The thing is that besides his beloved guitar he has some other hobbies in life one of the main of which are the cars. It is to them that the record Fork In The Road is devoted to as well as to all the car industry of the North America, gasoline, roads and everything that any driver cannot imagine his life without.

Fork In The Road makes one think of the important questions

It is a well known fact that Neil Young is not only a talented musician but a no less gifted film director. His new project is a documentary about the electro car technology and the record Fork In The Road is just about that. This ode to the road and cars offers ten songs each of which touches upon a certain aspect of a driver’s life often making the listener think of the important life questions. Compositions When Worlds Collide and Fuel Line do not only please with Young’s vocals which have by no means worsened but also with the amazing guitar hooks that underline it. The song Just Singing A Song is a more up-tempo number with a splendid solo, a memorable chorus and a deep meaning: the singer realizes that not everybody in the world is going to get his message and is only left to regret it. Perhaps the album’s most romantic track is Johnny Magic on which the joy of traveling in the car can be compared only to the joy Young gets playing his guitar. The artist turns to the economic problem on Cough Up The Bucks, and the theme of a true love for one’s own car unfolds on Get Behind The Wheel. The ballad Off The Road is remarkable for a complicated tune and filled with the feeling of exhaustion because of a night long driving whereas the track Hit The Road covers not the most positive sides of the man’s using cars such as for instance air pollution. The album closes with the title composition Fork In The Road once again reminding that the musician is concerned about the economic crisis problem and wants the others to take it more seriously.

The artist is more sincere than ever at his age of 63

No matter what Neil Young sings about he never lets us forget why he is considered the founder of many a rock direction. Such styles as grange, garage rock, classic rock and rock’n’roll meet on Fork In The Road. Yet whatever stylistic variety this work can boast its content is by no means less interesting. On the whole the automobile topic has always interested the musician and there are quite a number of hits devoted to this man’s friend in his collection. Yet it is the first time that an entire album is about it and soon a new video project is going to be ready. Neil Young will present his own reconstructed Lincoln Continental 1959 as a live example of his ideas how to make automobiles much less harmful for the environment and he is about to drive it to Washington DC to demonstrate it to the high and mighties. As for the songs on Fork In The Road, on the one hand they make us understand what exactly Neil Young would like to change in the sphere of automobile construction and on the other hand are contagious with the clear affection to driving as it is because the artist is more sincere than ever at his age of 63.