Neil Young will release the “lost” album ‘Oceanside Countryside’ on February 14.
The collection is the latest in a long line of records that the 79-year-old singer-songwriter has decided to dust off from his archive.
The album was recorded between May and December 1977 and is a sister record to 1978’s ‘Comes A Time’.
It features the latter LP’s tracks ‘Goin’ Back’, ‘Human Highway’ and ‘Field Of Opportunity’.
Upon listening to the songs again after almost five decades, Young felt that, in hindsight, he should have released the album at the time.
He said: “This Analog Original album was recorded in 1977 and unreleased.
“These songs are the original mixes done at the time of the recordings in the order I planned for the album. I sang the vocals and played the instruments on Oceanside in Florida at Triad studios and Malibu at Indigo studio.
“I sang the vocals and recorded with my great band of friends, Ben Keith, Joe Osborn, Karl T. Himmel, and Rufus Thibodeaux at Crazy Mama’s in Nashville on Countryside. I hope you enjoy this treasure of an Analog Original recording, recorded by Tim Mulligan, as much as I do. Listening to it now, I think I should have put it out back then.”
‘Oceanside Countryside’ follows the release of ’70s-era records ‘Homegrown’, ‘Hitchhiker’ and ‘Chrome Dreams’, plus the likes of ‘Summer Songs’ (recorded in 1987) and ‘Toast’, which Young recorded with Crazy Horse between 2000 and 2001.
The news that ‘Oceanside Countryside’ will see the light of day comes days after Young confirmed he will be performing at this year’s Glastonbury Festival after reversing his decision to boycott the event.
Last week, he insisted he and his band The Chrome Hearts would not be playing Worthy Farm this summer because of the BBC’s involvement at the festival, but he swiftly made a U-turn and blamed “an error in the information I received” for his previous stance.
In a statement posted on his website, Young said: “Due to an error in the information received, I had decided not to play the Glastonbury Festival, which I have always loved.
“Happily, the festival is now back on our itinerary and we look forward to playing. Hope to see you there.”
It is not clear whether Young’s decision will mean that his set will be televised after he only allowed the BBC to screen a short portion of his two-hour headline set when he last played at the festival in 2009.
He previously suggested that he had turned down the chance to perform at the world-famous festival as he bemoaned how the event had fallen “under corporate control”.
He said in a note on his website: “The Chrome Hearts and I were looking forward to playing Glastonbury, one of my all-time favorite outdoor gigs. We were told that BBC was now a partner in Glastonbury and wanted us to do a lot of things in a way we were not interested in. It seems Glastonbury is now under corporate control and is not the way I remember it being. Thanks for coming to see us the last time!
“We will not be playing Glastonbury on this tour because it is a corporate turn-off, and not for me like it used to be. Hope to see you at one of the other venues on tour.
“LOVE Neil
“Be well (sic)”