What we have here is easily Mr. Young's finest work in years, one that erases the memory of his well-intentioned but anemic 2006 protest album, Living with War. Recorded using analog gear, with Crazy Horse drummer Ralph Molina, pedal steel guitarist Ben Keith, and Rick Rosas on bass, CD2 manages to sound both home-grown and experimental. It's the work of an artist still not afraid to take chances, who also knows what his strengths are and doesn't stray too far from them. Trainspotters will note that three of the ten songs were written but never released before, while we all might puzzle over the title. Chrome Dreams is the name of an unreleased album from 1977. So, why is this Chrome Dreams II? Is it a similar case to 1992's Harvest Moon, when Young went back to the virtual land of his 1972 hit Harvest to write more material in that vein? As the original was reportedly lost in a fire, we may never know. Chrome Dreams II offers up gorgeous, plaintive laments and country-tinged numbers sung in that achy breaky, heart-on-sleeve voice of Young's, as well as ragged barn-storming rockers delivered with a growl. There's even an 18-minute dirge that excitedly mixes R&B back-up horns with searing electric guitar leads! Wow. --Mike McGonigal

I'm not a Neil Young completist by any stretch but when I first put this CD on I felt the urge to email a friend to tell him I'd discovered the best Neil album since "Rust Never Sleeps". But at that point I'd only listened to the first three songs and I thought it might be prudent to wait til I'd heard the entire album. Naturally the CD is front-loaded with the best songs but this is still a good album.

Definitely better than "Sleeps With Angels", and for my taste preferable to "Prairie Wind" or "Harvest Moon", though your mileage may vary.

The long and the short of is that if you lined up every recording artist who had or started a legacy in the 1960s, Neil is #1, the top of the pack when it comes to still being relevant in the 21st century, with David Bowie's 90's renaissance bringing him in at #2. If only there was a 6CD box set containing "Decade II", "Decade III", and "Decade IV". If you like "Comes a Time" or "Rust Never Sleeps" you'll enjoy this album.

Excellent mix of slow classic Young tunes with Crazy Horse type rockers.
Nothing more to say.

If you like Neil, and have $10 to spare, this might be worth your money. Check it out!

I hadn't really got on board with Neil Young for a number of years before his Living With War album. I was pretty pumped up when that one came out, and I think it enabled me to get into the other one released within the same year Prairie Wind, which may have been the better (yet softer) of the two.
The third release in line, was this one: Chrome Dreams II. Which takes it's name, somewhat mockingly from an unreleased 1977 album, Chrome Dreams. That story of that album being lost in a fire, is either true or untrue, I've heard bootlegs claiming to be the album, and it sounds like a bunch of demo versions of songs that were later finished on other albums. Perhaps Chrome Dreams II is the same thing. Just a bunch of outakes. The song ORDINARY PEOPLE is very obviously a song recorded in the eighties. The song is very cool though, at a lengthy 18 minutes, it became one of my favorite Neil Young jammers in a long time! Neils still got IT! At least we know he had it in the obscure eighties years, he just wasn't releasing it. Alot of the other tracks sound like they could have been on either Prairie Wind or Living with War. Interesting. Still though, several of the songs are good. BEAUTIFUL BLUEBIRD is a nice Prairie windish acoustic bit, while SPIRIT ROAD is another stab at the White House (I think? Perhaps; at least written on the same bottle of booze anyway...) Theres a cool R&B type tune called I'M A BELIEVER, and even another extended jammer (only 14 minutes this time though) called NO HIDDEN PATH. Theres a couple songs where the boys goof off BOXCAR and DIRTY OLD MAN (Neil likes to slap his knee here and there, nothing wrong with that) Not all of it is top shelf Neil Young, but still a pretty decent collection... I enjoyed it.

I did not like this album. Parts of it were fine, such as the song The Way, which I really like. However, the album is terribly uneven, as some songs carry on for nearly 20 minutes. Prairie Wind is a much better testament to the genius of Neil Young.