Neil Young, Alabama Shakes at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, 8/6/12 (photos)

Neil Young, Alabama Shakes at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, 8/6/12 (photos)

By | August 7th, 2012 | 35 comments

Neil Young & Crazy Horse played their second of two shows at Red Rocks Amphitheatre on Monday night, with an opening set from rising soul-rockers Alabama Shakes.

Full photo gallery of Sunday night’s show.

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Evan Semón is a Denver freelance writer and photographer and regular contributor to Reverb. See more of his work.

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  • Bdajo55

    I was hoping to hear one of my favorite songs and was disappointed when I didn’t hear it.  Too bad for me. I have sooo many old favorites i sure would have liked to hear but didn’t. Otherwise, the show was hot. 

  • paul lehto

    So where’s the review…..the pictures are great, but I can get pictures of Neil anywhere….I want the review!!!!!!!!

    • http://www.denvereverb.com Ricardo Baca

      Hey, Paul. The tour didn’t issue any review tickets for either of the Red Rocks shows, but they did allow us a photo pass for each night. We wish we could have been there to write a review, alas. 

  • Kdennis

    Agree…epic fail on the part of Reverb not to cover a true rock and roll artist/icon/legend. Jeez, you guys review every Styx, Journey and Kansas concert that comes down the pike, but not the return of Crazy Horse for two shows?!?! Especially when their energetic, distorto-noise performances and set list have caused a minor controversy between the hard core and casual Neil fans. Oh well, I’m sure most of your readers are happier reading about Bombay Bicycle Club and Joe Pug (no offense to those fine but relatively obscure artists)…

    • http://www.denvereverb.com Ricardo Baca

      Hey, Kdennis. See above, but sadly the tour didn’t allow any review tickets for either Red Rocks date – otherwise we would have reviewed both nights. 

      • Michaelmarkwalthers

        Thanks Ricardo. I have been looking for a review all day and this explains it. That is a shame. Although the following link will not give a review, it at least gives the set list. I thought the two new unreleased songs, Twisted Road and For The Love of Man were both outstanding. Was a great show for sure.

        • http://www.denvereverb.com Ricardo Baca

          So, so bummed to have missed it, Michael! Sounds like a special night indeed!

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/CEZYFAPVC4K43VOT2ALGHOI3U4 Zoob

    I have seen Neil Young 3 times…This Note’s for You, Rockin the Free World (Red Rocks acoustic), and whatever this one was called. This was some HORRIBLE battle of the garage bands concert with the opening band just as bad. Neil Young has obviously lost it since his last big hit with Rockin the Free World tour. Why was this show reserved seating only? Reserved seating is just that…reserved because you don’t want to lose your seat when a famous person is performing. This was hardly the case as it was the WORST CONCERT I have ever attended. I saved up for a few months and was ripped off for $125 for 2 tickets and these were the cheap seats. I definitely want my money back. I used to be a huge fan because he wrote good music once. Now, like many ageing artists, they can’t write a popular song to save their lives. Neil has discovered he sells out concerts with his name only. I really feel sorry for Crazy Horse having to play that crap for the rest of the summer but like most musicians, they need the money. I recognized 5 songs and the rest was total jam-out grunge. I also noticed many women at the concert. They were not enjoying themselves at all and, like me, were in shock with all the heavy-metal garbage. Keep in mind Neil is a 66 year old writing music for 12 year olds. Having taken my wife, I was actually embarassed to have attended. I also noticed many vacant seats about half-way thru the show. I told my wife after the show as thousands walked quietly to their cars that I hope she didn’t think I actually liked that crap. It was like some kids got their first electric guitars and had learned 3 chords. When we got to the car, it was the only one left in the whole area. The others had left hours ago. They are still scraping the crap off the walls of Red Rocks. I WILL NEVER GO TO ANOTHER NEIL YOUNG CONCERT.

    • the dude

      you’re such a zoob

    • Countryguyatheart

      Very much agreed, absolutey an atrocious show. Not sure what neil young was thinking. Save your money folks, our expect to hear feedback for like 2hrs.

      • Dave9200

        That’s funny because I’m listening to a recording of the first show and it’s not feedback for 2 hours.

        Weird.

        • Countryguyatheart

          Also took him like 10 freakin minutes to end a song. Seriously, he could have played at least a couple more songs if weren’t for his ridiculous feedback at the end of the songs. Keep the acoustic guitar on neil…for the love of god.

          • Jim Voit

            Are you kidding me?  Neil has been playing this type of stuff with Crazy Horse for 40 years. 

      • Jim Voit

        Obviously you aren’t a Crazy Horse fan.

    • dagnabit

      And yet you stayed for the whole thing…

      “a popular song,” that’s funny too

    • Kdennis

      The 66-year old writing music for 12-year olds debuted a new song both nights called Ramada Inn (aka Every Morning Come The Sun). It’s details a decades long marriage slowly unraveling due to apathy, inertia and heavy drinking, while also offering a sliver of hope for the future. Pretty adult stuff for a teenager.  Another new tune, Walk Like A Giant, seemed to be about a generation that, as younger adults, felt they could change the world. “We came so close” is the humbled acknowledgment delivered with resignation. Yep, just the kind of musical sentiments the kids are buying these days!  

    • Powderfinger

       You must be new to Neil Young.  You seem to have gotten on board this bus right after his experimental years with Geffen records (since you say your first show was This Note’s For You).  Neil doesn’t care what the audience WANTS to hear, he plays what he wants to play.  You want to hear his hits, listen to Decade.

    • Powderfinger

       You must be new to Neil Young.  You seem to have gotten on board this bus right after his experimental years with Geffen records (since you say your first show was This Note’s For You).  Neil doesn’t care what the audience WANTS to hear, he plays what he wants to play.  You want to hear his hits, listen to Decade.

  • BlueShift

    Exactly what Zoob said: WORST CONCERT I HAVE EVER SEEN.
     
    Unfortunately, my husband and I paid more than $125 for two tix. $233, to be exact. By the end of Neil’s 15-minute rendition of what was apparently supposed to be a giant walking a marathon, he had completely lost his audience. We hung in until ”Cinnamon Girl”, which was the 5th or 6th song, hoping he would take a hint and start delivering the classic goods. It was not to be. He immediately regressed back into another sloppy and insanely interminable jam session. We made a beeline to the parking lot.
     
    A guy at our hotel this morning said that about a third of the audience had left halfway through the show and from that point on there was a steady stream towards the exit.

    • Dave9200

      Over half the songs he played were ‘classics,’ and then you were also treated to new Neil Young & Crazy Horse songs.

      Imagine that, a band touring new songs.  Kind of like Neil has done his entire career.

      Don’t think Neil Young is for you.  That’s okay, plenty of music to go around.

      • Countryguyatheart

        Empty seats don’t lie. No matter how you try to justify that big mess, it was truly hard to listen to. The good songs were good, but they were few and far inbetween.

        • Dave9200

          It was truly hard to listen to?  Then why am I having an easy and enjoyable time listening to the recording of the show right now?

          I enjoy the fact that you hated the show so much that you had to go online and look up a review/pictures of the show you hated so much.  So dramatic.

        • Jim Voit

          Big mess……..LOL.

          If you had any knowledge of Neil and his history with Crazy Horse, you’d expect to hear improvised, raw and amazing jams like you heard.  I listened to the entire show that you reviewed so negatively and was blown away.

          You either get it or you don’t…apparently you don’t…and that’s fine.

  • the dude

    what a bunch of zoobs

  • Eblaw9

    Zoob must have been at a different show than me Monday night. It was incredibly great, as were the acoustics. Alabama Shakes was also fabulous. And no, a third of the audience didn’t leave early.

  • bchlvr

    Sorry, but I have to agree, this was my worst Neil Young concert, and unfortunately, the negative comments are accurate.   I think the variety of opinions given here here show the diversity of musical taste, and that’s OK. 

    • Dave9200

      Glad to hear someone speak realistically about diversity of opinions.

      Reminds me of what Neil Young said back in the early 90s when he started playing his Harvest Moon material:

      “It was good for me to realize how completely fuckin’ out of touch with
      the audience I was. I went out there and played all new stuff – songs
      that really meant somethin’ to me – and they were still lookin’ at
      fifteen, twenty years ago, even though they were teenagers. These young
      people who wanted me to do my hits. Wanted me to do Ragged Glory, wanted
      me to do ‘Rockin’ In The Free World’. They wanted me to get out there,
      get real intense. They didn’t understand that I don’t always do that.

      They didn’t get what they wanted – but I got what I wanted.

      Because I went out and did the songs and got in touch with what its
      like to play and communicate to an audience just with guitar, with songs
      they don’t know that well. That’s really where it lives. To get out
      there with new songs that no one knows and make them known, make them
      hear them. That’s the challenge.”

      Neil’s the same as he always was.

  • Kdennis

    Ricardo – thanks for the update, and my apologies for assuming the lack of a review was an editorial choice rather than a logistical one.
     
    Neil Young is the most cantankerous 66 year-young rock artist out there. The show was obviously a surprise to those who have not been following his career and public utterances over the past few years (I’m guessing those who came for a radio hits show are among those). Before the tour began Neil said the Crazy Horse shows would be roughly equal parts new stuff (Americana), unheard stuff (the twenty-minute plus Walk Like A Giant is brand new) and classics (Powderfinger, Mr. Soul, Cinnamon Girl, Needle And The Damage Done and more).
     
    And he is famous for upsetting expectations – it’s a mantra with him. So we got no Americana songs on Sunday! If you only know Young from his bigger commercial successes like Decade, Harvest, Rust Never Sleeps or the Greatest Hits, you are only getting a sliver of the artist. Crazy Horse is a teenage garage jam band, have been blasting that way for over thirty years now. So why was the show a surprise to some? As an earlier post said most succinctly, Neil Young is an ever-morphing artist, not a brand, not comfort food, not a jukebox. BTW, nobody seemed to be leaving early during Sunday’s sold-out show. My thirteenth Neil Young show, and, along with his April 2009 show at Magness Arena, one of the best.  

  • Grover

    I have seen Neil in his various forms 20 times or so. My best guess is that the reverb/feedback focus was a tribute to the late Link Wray who passed recently, I have to admit it was a bit over done.  Love of Man, Twisted Road, Walk Like A Giant & especially Ramada Inn, awesome, unexpected and the reason I won’t ever miss a Neil show.  Red Rocks (coming from Chicago) was icing on the cake!Dave9200 nailed it “Over half the songs he played were ‘classics,’ and then you were also treated to new Neil Young & Crazy Horse songs.
    Imagine that, a band touring new songs. Kind of like Neil has done his entire career.
    Don’t think Neil Young is for you. That’s okay, plenty of music to go around.”
    Neil:  Keep on rockin’ in the free world……  but you don’t have to play it every time! 

  • Kjtlandscaping

    Badjo, Cortez the Killer would have been killer, but you got to admit Neil Young can jam.

  • Mark Colorado

    I was at the Sunday Neil show.  First, very few people left as it was packed throughout the concert so the poster saying “empty seats,” or “people left,” probably is projecting onto this board and others his/her dissatisfaction.  I’ve seen Neil and Crazy Horse @ Red Rocks 1987, 2000 (on DVD), 2003 (2 encores of 5 songs a piece equaled the whole 10 songs of Greendale concert he played that night.  I’ve also seen Neil in 85, and in 2007, and with him and Crazy Horse in 1996 at old Fiddlers Green.  Neil & the Horse jammed out!  If I was disappointed, it was because of some of the 3 hour shows I saw him do and on this night it was more around 105-120 minutes with only one encore song.  Given my past experiences and Neil’s love for Red Rocks (2003 = 10 song show, + 5 song encore, + 2nd 5 song encore, I perhaps had higher expectations.  Also the Sept 2000 show which is on DVD is incredible. Neil is 66.  Wish it would have been longer. Yet like good chocolate, it still jammed out.  Just wish it had been longer, but stop the Neil bashing. How many people put out stuff each year and still sound so good and have so much enthusiasm? Thanks Neil & Crazy Horse and Alabama Shakes!!!

  • Lalpeduezz

    Neil Young with Crazy Horse is expected to be garage band sounding but his over indulgent attempts at max feedback and distortion, as well as his protracted song endings were rediculous. It was cool the first couple of times (just like when I discovered how to make my Marshall’s hum) but pulling this out for most every song made for an obscure, unentertaing show.

    • Dave9200

      Listening to the recording of the show right now.  He doesn’t have protracted song endings of feedback/distortion for every song, and really the only long outro of distortion/feedback was ‘Walk Like a Giant’.  The remainder, including the older songs, are played just like they usually are in terms of guitar feedback.

  • Anonymous

    Interesting comments because at the exact same time as Neil was “disappointing” some……his former brethren (Crosby Stills and Nash) were rocking in Minneapolis at the Orpheum theatre.  To a guy who has seen CSN (and sometimes Y) nearly 20 times…..this Minneapolis show was simply OUTSTANDING !!  Great stuff.  Actually thought about checking them out 4 days later in KC.

  • Fantastic Freddy

    Zoob . . . glad to hear you won’t be attending any more of Neil’s concerts. We don’t need you there and we don’t want you there. My guess is that you are a yuppie who thought it would be nice to spend the money to brag to your friends and go to be seen. Zoob, you’re a boob.