A few weeks back, I went to see Neil Young at the Academy. This represents quite a few firsts for me: although I’ve loved his stuff for years, this is the first time that I have seen Neil Young live, and likewise Crazy Horse. It’s also the first gig that I have been to for quite a while. I have never got over the sense of excitement of live music and this has only been increased by its rarity. I was definately looking forward to it.

Set against this, the Metro Arena is not my favourite sort of venue. Large venues such as this are fairly soulless places. The arena fits squarely into this category; like a football stadium, seats too small and uncomfortable. Moving around involves lots of shuffling around in big queues.

The stage set consisted of a Crazy Horse banner, some enormous packing cases, and video screens set in old style TV casing. All of this rather swamped Los Lobos, who none the less did a good support set.

The packing cases were the first sign of the melodrama of the evening; with the rather strange sight of roadies dressed up as mad scientists running around, these were lifted up to reveal the set of enormous amps familiar from Weld, backed by Day in the Life. This was a complete revelation; played loud over a big sound system with all the resonance of an arena, it’s a totally different song. Dramatic, exiciting; the John Lennon vocals in the second pattern were haunting, and the orchestral finale were stupendous, leaving the audience stunned.

This was followed by a slightly cheesy rendition of the national anthem, and then straight into Love and Only Love; this really summed the rest of the night up. It was loud, long and overblown. And, yet, somehow they get away with it. The songs are simple and direct. Despite the theatrics, at heart its just a bunch of guys on stage, hunched over their instruments playing in a way which cuts through all the messing, takes you into the music and carries you away. It’s live music and more over it is music that is at its best live. You need it there in front on your to appreciate it to its full extent.

There are times when, perhaps, it feels like one too many thudding chord changes too many, one too many feedback-laced false ending, but I didn’t care. I’ve been listening to some of these songs for 20 years now; the band is now all in their late 60s or 70s, and some of the songs over 40 years old. But, to me, it felt fresh; I dont know if I will ever get to see them live again, but I am glad that I have seen them once. A great gig for me.