Neil Young issued an apology for the delay in releasing the 1975 album Homegrown, calling it “the one that got away.” He's finally putting out the LP this year.

Just before its original scheduled release date, he decided to issue Tonight’s the Night instead. He later described Homegrown as “a very down album” and “the unheard bridge between Harvest and Comes a Time." It was recorded during a period when he was having marital problems as well as personal issues with his Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young bandmates.

“I apologize,” Young wrote on his website. “This album Homegrown should have been there for you a couple of years after Harvest. It’s the sad side of a love affair. The damage done. The heartache. I just couldn’t listen to it. I wanted to move on. So I kept it to myself, hidden away in the vault, on the shelf, in the back of my mind … but I should have shared it. It’s actually beautiful. That’s why I made it in the first place. Sometimes life hurts. You know what I mean.”

He noted that Levon Helm and Emmylou Harris were among the artists who recorded with him and that the album carries “a narration, several acoustic solo songs never even published or heard until this release, and some songs played with a great band of my friends.”

Young said Homegrown would be his first release of 2020, though he didn’t provide a date for its arrival. “This is the one that got away," he added. "This album, in vinyl, displays the beauty, feeling and depth of music record in the analog domain, before digital. It’s the perfect example of why I can’t forget how good music used to sound.”

 

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