1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: 99. Buffalo Springfield – Buffalo Springfield Again (1967)

 

This is a bit of a mixed bag, musically speaking. My original notes called it fairly Seventies-style polished country-rock, but there’s more to it than that. Given that the band features Stephen Stills and Neil Young, both of whom we will hear more of later, and how Stills moves towards the adult-oriented country rock while Young fluctuates between folk and grunge, it’s probably no surprise that it should be so. Reading the production history of this album, it’s one of those where each member almost did their own thing and then glued it together at the end, and pretty much anything with Neil Young involved seems to be feature him being an awkward nugget. He’s still doing it as I write, blowing hot and cold over playing Glastonbury 2025.

The Neil Young songs are pretty obvious once you’ve heard some of his other stuff, and the wandering acid guitar is already prevalent, if not quite as sketchy and grungy as he will later do with Crazy Horse. Mr Soul is a little like the Rolling Stones’ Satisfaction but a bit more raga, while Bluebird again features Young’s characteristic guitar break, followed by a powerful acoustic guitar section before turning into a banjo-driven bluegrass number – it’s written by Stills, however. More strange changes are present in Broken Arrow, which, with its three movements preceded by ambient sounds, is very proggy.

The Stills elements, meanwhile, are clear in the psychedelic Rock And Roll Woman and the chilled jazz of Everydays. Despite A Child’s Claim To Fame being the most pure country rock track on the album, that one was written by Richie Furay, listed as vocals and rhythm guitar. And somewhere in the middle, completely at odds to the rest of the style of the album, is the very soul piece Good Time Boy, also by Furay.

It feels a little like this one is on the list to introduce us to Stills and Young, who will crop up *a lot* going forwards, because the album, while perfectly fine, is a bit of a disjointed beast.

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