''Are You Passionate?'' is the 24th studio album by Canadian / American musician

Neil Young Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian-American singer and songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, joining Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Furay ...

, his only album to feature Booker T. & the M.G.'s, and his eighth with

Crazy Horse Crazy Horse ( lkt, Tȟašúŋke Witkó, italic=no, , ; 1840 – September 5, 1877) was a Lakota war leader of the Oglala band in the 19th century. He took up arms against the United States federal government to fight against encroachment by wh ...

, released on April 9, 2002 as a double LP and as a single CD. It represents Young's foray into

soul music Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in the African American community throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It has its roots in African-American gospel music and rhythm and blues. Soul music became po ...

, not sounding like anything he had previously released. Exceptions are rocker "Goin' Home", recorded with Crazy Horse, and the brooding "Let's Roll", a response to the

9/11 The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial ...

terrorist attacks. The album ends with "She's a Healer", an extended jam. The track "Gateway of Love" is listed on the back cover, but not included on the album. The song wasn't released until 2022 on the Toast album, but was played in concert with

during 28 of 29 dates of their European tour in 2001. A bootleg recording of the performance at Rotterdam Ahoy Sportpaleis, Rotterdam (July 24, 2001) exists in which the song runs 8:36 minutes.

Critical reception

''Are You Passionate?'' was met with "mixed or average" reviews from critics. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, this release received an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

score of 54 based on 17 reviews. In a review for

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

, critic reviewer

Stephen Thomas Erlewine Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance writer, occ ...

wrote: "Instead of sounding like a refreshing change of pace, it's a muddled, aimless affair from an artist who's had too many middling efforts over the last decade." At ''

The Austin Chronicle ''The Austin Chronicle'' is an alternative weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demogr ...

'', Raoul Hernandez admitted the "songs are too long, too slow, and they all sound the same." ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

'' called it the "great next step in Young's career but also the best album he could have issued right now."

Track listing

Personnel

*Neil Young - vocals, guitar, piano *

Booker T. Jones Booker Taliaferro Jones Jr. (born November 12, 1944) is an American musician, songwriter, record producer and arranger, best known as the frontman of the band Booker T. & the M.G.'s. He has also worked in the studios with many well-known art ...

- organ, vibes, vocals *

Donald Dunn Donald Dunn may refer to: * Donald "Duck" Dunn (1941–2012), American bass guitarist, session musician, record producer, and songwriter * Donald G. Dunn (1923–2021), decorated U.S. Army veteran of World War II {{hndis, Dunn, Donald ...

- bass, vocal on "Differently" *Steve Potts - drums, bongos, tambourine *

Frank "Poncho" Sampedro Frank "Poncho" Sampedro (born Manuel Francisco Sampedro de Victoria, February 25, 1949) is an American retired guitarist and member of the rock band Crazy Horse, known mainly for his longtime collaboration with singer-songwriter Neil Young. Samp ...

- guitar, vocals *Tom Bray - trumpet *

Pegi Young Margaret Mary "Pegi" Young (née Morton; December 1, 1952 – January 1, 2019) was an American singer, songwriter, environmentalist, educator and philanthropist. Music career After marrying Canadian folk rock musician Neil Young in 1978, her deb ...

- vocals *

Astrid Young Vendela Astrid Young (born August 16, 1962) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. She is the daughter of journalist, sportswriter, and novelist Scott Young and his second wife Astrid Carlson, and the half-sister of fellow musician Neil Young, who bou ...

- vocals Except "Goin' Home" (Neil Young & Crazy Horse): *Neil Young - vocals, guitar *Frank "Poncho" Sampedro - guitar, vocals *

Billy Talbot William Hammond Talbot (born October 23, 1943) is an American singer-songwriter and musician, best known as the bassist of Crazy Horse. Music career Born in New York City, Talbot started his musical career singing on street corners at the age o ...

- bass *

Ralph Molina Ralph Molina (born June 22, 1943) is an American musician, best known as the drummer for Neil Young's backing band Crazy Horse. Born in Puerto Rico Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth o ...

- drums, vocals

Charts

References

{{Authority control 2002 albums Neil Young albums Reprise Records albums Albums produced by Neil Young Albums produced by Donald "Duck" Dunn Albums produced by Frank Sampedro Albums produced by Booker T. Jones Soul albums by Canadian artists