Comes a Time

Comes a Time is the ninth album by Neil Young, and a return to the country/folk rock sound of Harvest (1972). "Comes a Time" is also the title song and a single release from this album. Originally, it had started out as a solo record, but when Young played it for Reprise executives they asked him if he wouldn't mind adding rhythm tracks to what he already had. Young agreed to this, and the end product was the Comes a Time that was released. Two songs had Young backed by Crazy Horse, resulting in them having a rawer sound than the smooth production of the rest of the album. "Human Highway" was written several years prior to its release, and originally presented to Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young in 1974 for a proposed studio album by the group which never came to be. Much of the album features harmony vocals from Nicolette Larson. She also shares lead with Young on "Motorcycle Mama".

For years, it was rumored that Young had purchased some 200,000 copies of the album because he was unhappy with the sound, owing to damage that occurred to the master tape during shipment to the mixing facility. The version of the album now available was personally remixed by Young from the safety copy of the original master. In a March 2014 interview with Rolling Stone, Young revealed that he in fact used the 200,000 LPs as shingles for a barn roof.

Neil Young

Neil Percival Young, OC OM (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian singer-songwriter and musician. He began performing in a group covering Shadows instrumentals in Canada in 1960, before moving to California in 1966, where he co-founded the band Buffalo Springfield together with Stephen Stills and Richie Furay, and later joined Crosby, Stills & Nash in 1969. He released his first album in 1968 and has since forged a successful and acclaimed solo career, spanning over 45 years and 35 studio albums, with a continuous and uncompromizing exploration of musical styles. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame website describes Young as "one of rock and roll's greatest songwriters and performers". He was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice, first as a solo artist in 1995, and second as a member of Buffalo Springfield in 1997.

Young's music is characterized by his distinctive guitar work, deeply personal lyrics and characteristic alto or high tenor singing voice. Although he accompanies himself on several different instruments, including piano and harmonica, his idiosyncratic electric and acoustic guitar playing are the defining characteristics of a varyingly ragged and melodic sound.

Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse (Lakota: Tȟašúŋke Witkó in Standard Lakota Orthography,IPA:tχaʃʊ̃kɛ witkɔ), literally "His-Horse-Is-Crazy"; c. 1840 – September 5, 1877) was a Native American war leader of the Oglala Lakota. He took up arms against the United States Federal government to fight against encroachments on the territories and way of life of the Lakota people, including leading a war party to victory at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in June 1876.

Four months after surrendering to U.S. troops under General Crook in May 1877, Crazy Horse was fatally wounded by a military guard, using his bayonet, while allegedly resisting imprisonment at Camp Robinson in present-day Nebraska. He ranks among the most notable and iconic of Native American tribal members and was honored by the U.S. Postal Service in 1982 with a 13¢ Great Americans series postage stamp.

Early life

Sources differ on the precise year of Crazy Horse's birth, but they agree he was born between 1840 and 1845. According to a close friend, he and Crazy Horse "were both born in the same year at the same season of the year", which census records and other interviews place at about 1845.Encouraging Bear, an Oglala medicine man and spiritual adviser to the Oglala war leader, reported that Crazy Horse was born "in the year in which the band to which he belonged, the Oglala, stole One Hundred Horses, and in the fall of the year", a reference to the annual Lakota calendar or winter count. Among the Oglala winter counts, the stealing of 100 horses is noted by Cloud Shield, and possibly by American Horse and Red Horse owner, as equivalent to the year 1840–41. Oral history accounts from relatives on the Cheyenne River Reservation place his birth in the spring of 1840. On the evening of his son's death, the elder Crazy Horse told Lieutenant H. R. Lemly that his son "would soon have been thirty-seven, having been born on the South Cheyenne river in the fall of 1840".