Pegi Young - Pegi Young Album Review

Photo By:Autumn de Wilde

Album Review

Shakey’s missus steps outta the shadows. Neil’s helping out.

When you’re married to songwriting genius Neil Young, it must’ve been a daunting task making your own record. Even more impressive is that Warner’s have boldly signed her, considering her lack of recognition as a writer in her own right. When listening to it, it’s a bit worrying that hubby is on board, but I suppose inevitable. He plays guitars, electric sitar, harmonica and vocals backed by a host of luminaries like Spooner Oldham. Living next to a state of the art studio on their Californian ranch, it was only a matter of time before she threw in her penny’s worth. Despite her lack of experience as a lead singer (she’s been backing Neil for 30 years) she makes a real fist of her debut, venturing very much into hubby’s musical landscapes adding some well done covers that ponder the tug o’war between love and independence. Many of the song were written more than three decades, not that that matters, six of which appear here.

Pegi says of her efforts,

I’ve been writing songs and poetry since high school. It was something I’d always wanted to do but could never make time for. There were other things that took priority.

What we get is a solid enough an album, but it’s not going to set the world alight by any means. Neil’s distinctive harmonica opens lightweight ballad Fake, after which Pegi’s often deeply soulful and smokey vocals kick-in, boosted by some fine pedal steel. Its Hold On that really stamps her writing potential, an achingly beautiful ballad, though her voice struggles on the higher notes. Neil’s twangy electric guitar drench the upbeat Love Like Water but it gets a bit messy on the quarter and half way points. When she hits the mellower ballads such as Key To Love and Sometimes she sounds like she’s in a better comfort zone adopting a lazier tone. One of her covers, Sometimes Like A River is a gorgeous interpretation, and predictably texturised by Neil’s subliminal harmonica, more deft pedal steel and bluesy acoustic guitar picks. Joe Sample and Will Jennings’ fun-packed I Like The Party Life brings a great bar-room blast which she handles reasonably well but a bluesy rasp would have sounded better, floating the vocals above the chugging shuffle and rough and ready backups. Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham’s country-gospel ballad I’m Not Through Loving You Yet is one of the album’s highlights.

File under : Getting there, but more work needed.

Elly Roberts