Rage and hope in Neil Young’s album

At 73 years old, Neil Young could be reminiscing about his legendary past, but the classic rocker instead has his sights set squarely on the planet’s future with his latest album Colorado. The album sees Young, a long-time crusader for the environment, reunite with the loud, raggedy band Crazy Horse, which has recorded and toured on and off with the superstar for half a century.

The prolific Canadian-born artist gathered the latest iteration of Crazy Horse high in the Colorado mountains, where they shredded in between hits of oxygen to avoid altitude sickness.

The album opens with Young’s harmonica twang in Think of Me, on which he croons: “I’m gonna live long and I’m happy to report it back to you,” dispelling any notion that the septuagenarian with more than 40 studio albums to his name might slow down.

Young’s signature bleeding amp reverb persists throughout the rugged album, as the rocker’s singular oscillating voice rings out with a tender fragility on weighty themes like the climate.

The following track, Shut It Down, begins with chaotic guitar and a heart-pounding beat akin to battle march, as the chant Gotta shut the whole system down, loops throughout.

Near the album’s end, the track Rainbow of Colors

– a feedback-heavy song played in the romantic triple time of a waltz – hears the band sing the chorus as a unified voice.

The album’s recording in a secluded “recording studio in the clouds” outside of Telluride is documented in the companion film Mountaintop, which was released yesterday.