Toast (2022)

Toast is the album Neil recorded with Crazy Horse before deciding to shelve it and then re-record three of the songs with Booker T. & the MGs along with seven others for the released Are You Passionate? Only one track featuring Crazy Horse would end up on Are You Passionate? Normally, I’ve put these both in a review and compare them somewhat. However, I’d never heard Are You Passionate? and still haven’t as of right now. Many reviewers are contrasting the two albums by comparing Toast with Are You Passionate? whereas I have the opportunity to look at these in the opposite, but perhaps more appropriately chronological, direction. I’ll get into that in the next post. For now, I can look at Toast without the baggage of Are You Passionate?

The music of Toast is about a relationship. There is a time in many relationships that go bad, a time long before the breakup, where it dawns on one of the people, maybe both, that it's over. This was that time. (Neil Young Archives)

So Neil put this album on the shelf because it was too sad and personal. He’s done this before (Homegrown). It’s more than likely this album is about troubles in his marriage and perhaps the first inklings that it was in trouble (despite Pegi singing on Toast). In Special Deluxe, his second memoir, he admits they were having problems at this time and it effected the recording. They would divorce 13 years later and Neil would already be in a new relationship with actress Daryl Hannah. Five years later, Pegi dies from cancer. It’s not unreasonable to surmise that Neil felt like he could finally release this album. This is a difficult subject because while it is a personal matter between two people, Neil is a musician (and Pegi was as well) who expresses his feelings publicly in lots of ways, not the least through lyrics. I don’t know what went wrong between them or how the transition to a new relationship happened. It certainly makes for a fraught backstory for Toast, though.

“Quit” sets the tone for what this album is, a soul-influenced plea to a wronged partner. This is one of my highlights from the album. I love the interplay between Neil and the backing vocals. Neil doesn’t quite reach the soul singer vibes he is going after, but otherwise the song feels enough like a modern take on 60s soul that it works. The lyrics are sad and desperate, fitting the sparse arrangement. It’s perhaps a bit repetitive but short enough that the vibe doesn’t wear out its welcome. That said, it feels quite a bit quieter than what comes next. “Standing in the Light of Love” crashes in at such high volume, I almost think there is a mastering problem. This song would be pretty great if it weren’t for the ever present Deep Purple riff that is too recognizable for me to put out of mind. I don’t really understand how you could so obviously bite one of the most well-known riffs in rock music for your serious album about a troubled marriage. As it is, it seems out of place on Toast to me.

The next two songs are perhaps the best on the album, the pounding “Goin’ Home” and classic Neil sounding “Timberline.” I particularly love the chorus of “Goin’ Home” where Neil sounds desperate to get back to some ideal circumstance he might have lost. The drums just pound and pound in the background, one of the more unique touches for Crazy Horse. The slightly Latin-tinged guitar is a motif that appears on Toast in some places, something Poncho credited to a short trip south during the recording of the album. The guitar solos are not among Neil’s best, but have just enough wild abandon to reflect his state of mind well. “Timberline” could have been a Ragged Glory or Broken Arrow track to my ears, despite it being pretty straightforward and without the jam elements those albums have (I’d take this song over “Farmer John,” though). In typical Neil fashion, he disguises the subject matter by putting himself in the shoes of someone unrelated. Here, Neil is equating losing faith in God with losing faith in a relationship. It’s effective and quite touching.

The second-longest song on the album, “Gateway of Love,” has elements that remind me of Freedom, particularly the lead guitar and theatrical atmosphere of the song. This also has the most Latin-influenced rhythms from Puerto Rican-born Ralph Molina. I like this song but feel it should have been a little shorter. The riffs and solos don’t warrant the extended length. “How Ya Doin?” is the saddest song on the album to me. The lyrics are all about losing love and not understanding why. Especially when Pegi and Astrid come in on the harmony (they do great work together on this album, by the way). It also has Neil’s most heartfelt guitar playing on the album, just pouring out the blues in his solos.

The strangely named “Boom Boom Boom” is like crawling out of the depression of “How Ya Doin?” in many ways, with a more confident and determined Neil ready to fight for love even when he doesn’t understand it. The music here also has a riff that reminds me of other songs, but feels more like Neil riffing on a standard. His guitar is at its rawest on this song, with quite a few blues solos, and even dueling with a trumpet towards the end. I really like the overall vibe of this song, but again it’s too long (the longest) for what’s here. It’s like a slowed down lounge take on blues that starts to fall apart the more it goes on. I’d maybe cut the middle down a bit and get to the his final solo quicker.

Overall, I think Toast is a decent Neil album but nowhere near the height of his work with Crazy Horse. I like that he is trying something different, pushing Crazy Horse in a new direction, and trying to create an entire work about a personal chapter in his life, but it’s possible he was a little too close to the subject matter to properly reflect it. Despite that, I’m glad it finally got a release, as there is always something to enjoy in Neil with Crazy Horse.

Top 3:

1. Goin’ Home
2. Timberline
3. Quit

Cut song: Standing in the Light of Love

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