8. Tonight's the Night (Tonight's the Night, 1975; written and first performed in 1973)
The title track and best-known song of Neil's most successful concept album, Tonight's the Night tells the story of Bruce Berry, Neil's friend and roadie who died of a heroin overdose around the same time that Crazy Horse's Danny Whitten did. Those deaths prompted Neil to write this and a bunch of other songs about the dark side of 1960s and 1970s counterculture. Neil recorded two versions of this, opening the album with one and closing it with the other; this entry covers both as they are the same thing with slight differences in their arrangements.
Against a foreboding bass line, Neil hauntingly chants "Tonight's the Night" as if something evil lurks around the corner. The opener (identified as just "Tonight's the Night" on the studio album but labeled as "Tonight's the Night -- Part I" on Decade") with its slow buildup and piano noodling conveys the seediness and shadiness of the stories Neil is about to tell, while the closer (identified as "Tonight's the Night -- Part II" on the studio album) is harder rocking and its music cuts right to the point; I've always thought the arrangement and placement of this version was a way of telling us that if we band together and believe in what we're doing, we can beat these demons that haunt us.
It can reach pretty spectacular heights live. Versions with Crazy Horse such as those that appear on Live Rust and Weld take after "Part II" even though they are just labeled as "Tonight's the Night" on the live albums. The version I saw in 2000 with Neil's Friends and Relatives Band featured Neil on piano and sounded more like "Part I", and was equally fantastic. A college friend, who saw a show on the Weld tour the night after my show, said Neil that night finished with a Tonight's the Night that lasted about 30 minutes; I've never heard it so I have no idea if that's true (this would have been 2/6/91 in Philly), but it certainly sounds like something Neil can do, as this is one of those songs where he can really get lost in the moment while playing.
"Part I" is linked here, I'll put "Part II" in the next post.
The title track and best-known song of Neil's most successful concept album, Tonight's the Night tells the story of Bruce Berry, Neil's friend and roadie who died of a heroin overdose around the same time that Crazy Horse's Danny Whitten did. Those deaths prompted Neil to write this and a bunch of other songs about the dark side of 1960s and 1970s counterculture. Neil recorded two versions of this, opening the album with one and closing it with the other; this entry covers both as they are the same thing with slight differences in their arrangements.
Against a foreboding bass line, Neil hauntingly chants "Tonight's the Night" as if something evil lurks around the corner. The opener (identified as just "Tonight's the Night" on the studio album but labeled as "Tonight's the Night -- Part I" on Decade") with its slow buildup and piano noodling conveys the seediness and shadiness of the stories Neil is about to tell, while the closer (identified as "Tonight's the Night -- Part II" on the studio album) is harder rocking and its music cuts right to the point; I've always thought the arrangement and placement of this version was a way of telling us that if we band together and believe in what we're doing, we can beat these demons that haunt us.
It can reach pretty spectacular heights live. Versions with Crazy Horse such as those that appear on Live Rust and Weld take after "Part II" even though they are just labeled as "Tonight's the Night" on the live albums. The version I saw in 2000 with Neil's Friends and Relatives Band featured Neil on piano and sounded more like "Part I", and was equally fantastic. A college friend, who saw a show on the Weld tour the night after my show, said Neil that night finished with a Tonight's the Night that lasted about 30 minutes; I've never heard it so I have no idea if that's true (this would have been 2/6/91 in Philly), but it certainly sounds like something Neil can do, as this is one of those songs where he can really get lost in the moment while playing.
"Part I" is linked here, I'll put "Part II" in the next post.
Comment