''This Note's for You'' is the 18th studio album by Canadian-American musician
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian and American singer-songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, forming the folk rock group Buffalo Springfield. Since the begi ...
, released April 11, 1988, on
Reprise. The album marked Young's return to the recently reactivated
Reprise Records after a rocky tenure with
Geffen Records
Geffen Records (formerly The David Geffen Company from 1980 to 1992 and Geffen Records Inc. from 1993 to 2004) is an American record label, founded in late 1980 by David Geffen. Originally a music subsidiary of the company known as Geffen Pi ...
.
It was originally credited to "Young and the Bluenotes". Part of the album's concept centered on the commercialism of rock and roll, and tours in particular (the title track, specifically, is a hostile social commentary on concert sponsorship). The music is marked by the use of a
horn section.
In 2015, Young released a
live album
An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track or cassette), or digital. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th centur ...
from the album's accompanying tour, which he titled ''
Bluenote Café.''
Background
During the 1987 tour with Crazy Horse, Young began playing a short "blues" set between the standard acoustic and electric sets, featuring
Crazy Horse
Crazy Horse ( , ; – September 5, 1877) was a Lakota people, Lakota war leader of the Oglala band. He took up arms against the United States federal government to fight against encroachment by White Americans, White American settlers on Nativ ...
(with
Poncho Sampedro playing organ instead of guitar),
Ben Keith, and Young's guitar tech Larry Cragg on saxophones. The song "This Note's for You" was debuted at those shows. Young liked the results ("...
rowdwere going fucking nuts and no one was shouting for "
Southern Man" like they've done throughout my whole fucking career"), and following the tour conclusion he further expanded the horn section, dubbing the new band The Bluenotes.
Writing
Young wrote most of the songs on an old Gibson guitar owned by his wife
Pegi since she was a child. He recalls writing "Ten Men Working" in a contemporary interview:
Young remembers writing "This's Note's For You" while on tour: "I remember writing it in my bus, turning to my driver and saying, 'Jesus Christ, this must be the most idiotic fucking song I've ever written.' I still can't believe that such a dumb little song could have helped resuscitate my career the way it did."
"Sunny Inside" dates from 1982, the only song that wasn't written during the album's production.
Recording
The band made its live debut in November 1987 with a 10-date California club tour, playing mostly new material, influenced by classic
R&B and
big band
A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s and ...
sound, mixed with several old numbers dating back to Young's earliest band,
The Squires (such as "Ain't It the Truth"). The Bluenotes then entered the studio to start recording, however Young became dissatisfied with the performances of the Crazy Horse rhythm section; bassist
Billy Talbot was fired first, temporarily replaced by George Whitsell before
Rick Rosas was finally brought in, while drummer
Ralph Molina was replaced by Rosas's bandmate
Chad Cromwell. Most of the songs were then either overdubbed or redone from scratch with Rosas and Cromwell; only "One Thing" and rarity "Ain't It the Truth" still feature Whitsell and Molina's playing.
''This Note's for You'' was originally attributed to Neil Young and the Bluenotes (as can be seen on the early editions of the album), however, after musician
Harold Melvin took legal action against Young over use of the Bluenotes name, it became credited as a Young solo album.
"This Note's for You" music video
The
music video
A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...
for the title track was directed by
Julien Temple and written by
Charlie Coffey. The title itself mocks
Budweiser
Budweiser () is an American-style pale lager, a brand of Belgian company AB InBev. Introduced in 1876 by Carl Conrad & Co. of St. Louis, Missouri, Budweiser has become a large selling beer company in the United States. Budweiser is a filte ...
's "This Bud's for You" ad campaign.
The video parodied
corporate rock and the pretensions of advertising, and was patterned after a series of
Michelob ads that featured contemporary rock artists such as
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton (born 1945) is an English Rock music, rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is regarded as one of the most successful and influential guitarists in rock music. Clapton ranked second in ''Rolling Stone''s l ...
,
Genesis, and
Steve Winwood. The video also featured parodic inserts from
commercials
A television advertisement (also called a commercial, spot, break, advert, or ad) is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization. It conveys a message promoting, and aiming to market, a product, service or idea. ...
featuring impersonators of
Whitney Houston
Whitney Elizabeth Houston (August 9, 1963 – February 11, 2012) was an American singer, actress, film producer, model, and philanthropist. Commonly referred to as "Honorific nicknames in popular music, the Voice", she is List of awards and no ...
and
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Michael Jackson, one of the most culturally significan ...
(whose hair catches fire), as well as popular characters such as a
Spuds McKenzie lookalike and models in the
Calvin Klein Obsession commercial.
"This Note's for You" was initially banned by
MTV after legal threats from Michael Jackson's attorneys, although Canadian music channel
MuchMusic ran it immediately. After it was a hit on MuchMusic, MTV reconsidered their decision and put it into heavy rotation, finally giving it the
MTV Video Music Award for Best Video of the Year for 1989. It was nominated for a
Grammy in the category of "Best Concept Video" of 1989 but lost to
"Weird Al" Yankovic
Alfred Matthew "Weird Al" Yankovic ( ; born October 23, 1959) is an American comedy musician, writer, and actor. He is best known for writing and performing Comedy music, comedy songs that often Parody music, parody specific songs by contempo ...
's "
Fat", a spoof of
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Michael Jackson, one of the most culturally significan ...
's "
Bad".
When ''
NME
''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming and culture website, bimonthly magazine, and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a "Rock music, rock inkie", the ''NME'' would be ...
'' challenged
David Lee Roth about his own corporate sponsorship (by
Toshiba
is a Japanese multinational electronics company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, elevators and escalators, electronic components, semiconductors ...
), citing "This Note's for You", the singer responded: "That's just hippy bullshit from the '60s. If your message is not strong enough to transcend a
soda-pop commercial, you got problems!"
Artwork
The cover of this album is reportedly a photo taken in the back lane of the 200 block of Main Street
Winnipeg
Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Manitoba. It is centred on the confluence of the Red River of the North, Red and Assiniboine River, Assiniboine rivers. , Winnipeg h ...
, which housed the Blue Note Cafe. Young was known to play unannounced in the Blue Note Cafe while in Winnipeg.
Other recordings with the Bluenotes
Young toured with the Bluenotes band (later renamed to Ten Men Workin' for the legal reasons noted above) throughout 1988, playing predominantly new material, including a number of unreleased songs. A live album from the tour, titled ''
Bluenote Café'', was planned at the time as a follow-up to the studio album but got shelved, although two songs appeared on compilation ''
Lucky Thirteen'' in 1993; it was eventually released in 2015 as volume 11 of Young's
Archive Performance Series.
Young also did more studio sessions with the band in 1988; three known songs that were recorded are "Crime in the City (Sixty to Zero Part I)", "Someday" (both songs would be included on next year's ''
Freedom
Freedom is the power or right to speak, act, and change as one wants without hindrance or restraint. Freedom is often associated with liberty and autonomy in the sense of "giving oneself one's own laws".
In one definition, something is "free" i ...
'') and "Ordinary People", an 18-minute song described as "'
Cortez the Killer' with horns",
which finally saw its release on Young's 2007 studio album, ''
Chrome Dreams II''. The horn section from the Bluenotes also plays on the
Stephen Stills song "That Girl" from the
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young album ''
American Dream'' (1988).
Track listing
Personnel
*Neil Young – vocals, guitar, production
The Bluenotes
*
Chad Cromwell – drums
*
Rick "The Bass Player" Rosas – bass
*
Frank "Poncho" Sampedro – keyboards
*Steve Lawrence – lead tenor saxophone
*
Ben Keith – alto saxophone
*Larry Cragg – baritone saxophone
*Claude Cailliet – trombone
*John Fumo – trumpet on "Can't Believe Your Lyin'"
*Tom Bray – trumpet on "Coupe de Ville"
with:
*George Whitsell – bass on "One Thing"
*
Ralph Molina – drums on "One Thing"
*Steve Onuska – tambourine on "One Thing"
Additional roles
*
Niko Bolas – production, recording, mixing
*Bob Scott, Christine Cragg – art design
*
Elliot Roberts – direction
*Tim Mulligan, Gary Long, Brent Walton, Tim McColm, Duane Seykora – engineering
*Doug Sax – mastering
Charts
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:This Note's For You
1988 albums
Neil Young albums
Reprise Records albums
Albums produced by Neil Young
Albums produced by Niko Bolas