Review of a Steve Young Best of CD
07/18/1998
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Steve Young is a singer/songwriter whose work encompasses country/rock/soul/gospel. He describes his music as southern. Mr. Young is from Alabama but he was in California in the 60's and 70's and was part of the scene that included the Byrds, the Flying Burrito Brothers, Gram Parsons, Crosby, Stills and Nash and so on. This CD has samples of his early intense sound from that period. During the 70's Mr. Young became, intentionally or unitentitonally part of the country music outlaws with Waylon Jennings. This cd has a generous sampling of Mr. Young most commercially successful music of the 70's. If you want to hear a broad sampling of an iconoclastic "Southern" singer, this is a good bet."
The Lonesome Picker Returns
R. J MOSS | Alice Springs, Australia | 08/09/2005
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Together with Jesse Winchester and Sid Selvidge, Steve Young possesses one of the sweetest and pure sounding voices to emanate from the southern states during my interim of sifting the music waves of country rock. Like Winchester, Young pens most of his material. On this fabulous compilation of tracks from '68 to'78, one of the least effective is his cover of Dylan's,'Wheels On Fire' which found its finest framing with The Band. And yet one of the best is another cover, Utah Phillip's, 'Rock, Salt& Nails'from the brilliant '68 album of that name. It was,'Seven Bridges Road' that initially seduced me to the Young sound, its power leaving the Burritos, the Parsons, the Brownes, and Eagles out in the rain. Young's hypnotic voice seemed to be caroming from canyon walls in some mysterious, burnt country, to swirl in the dry thermals with the predatory birds he occasionally sang about.'Seven Bridges Road','Kenny's Song','Montogomery In The Rain','Renegade Picker',- all my favourites are gathered here in their lean glory. Thanks to Glenn Baker of Raven, yet again for helping an old codger rebuild his vinyl racks. Steve actually made it here to Alice in 1990,performing outside to a small and appreciative crowd at dusk. I don't think I'd truly gauged the vituosity of his guitar work until he stood before us. Nor the potency of that voice that curled about our ears without assistance of auditorium acoustics, to sit so well in that natural ampitheatre, beneath the pink sandstone hillock."