Rating: 
Summary: OK, but the author needs to remove himself from the story
Review: Shakey is a fine, but by no means definitive, biography of the always elusive, enigmatic Neil Young. Those of us who have followed Neil's career, well, since it began, won't really discover a lot of new material. Some gossip, a little more about Carrie Snodgress than we might care to know, but no great revelations. We all know Neil: he follows his muse at the expense of relationships, personal or musical. Springfield, gone. Stray Gators, gone. CSN&Y, gone, back, gone, back, gone. Crazy Horse, here, gone, here, gone. Pearl Jam, here, gone. Solo, here, gone, here, gone. The Geffen Records period, best forgotten. Insecure? Sure, we know Neil's insecure. Neurotic, sure, we know that too. Self-centered. Duh, what successful artist isn't? All of that's fine grist for a biography, but in laying all that out, the author injects himself and his opinions into the book. A biographer should be a fly on the wall: seeing all and telling what's relevant and useful. Shakey is a good title for this book. Not only is it one of Neil's nicknames, it also is how I progressed through his book. A little here, a little there, in shakey fits and starts. The book reads well in places and then, bam!, stops and interjects some Q&A between the author and Neil. Used effectively, that might have worked. Instead, too many times it stops the flow of the story and gives me an excuse to put the book down. Jimmy McDonough may know a lot about Neil Young, but he needs to learn how to tell a story. This just does not flow well. Last, how about some photos? There are a few in there, but considering the things Neil's done with his life, a few meager pages of photos doesn't do this man justice -- and a blurry photo of Neil outside a model train store? Couldn't a better photo have been used? Not to mention that the most recent photo is about 15 years old... All in all, if you're a Neil Young fanatic, you will probably get this book, just as I did. If you're a casual fan, skip it and spend you money on a Neil Young CD instead. May I recommend "Everybody Knows This is Nowhere," "After the Gold Rush," "Tonight's the Night," "Freedom," or, my favorite, "Ragged Glory." Neil's music is much more important than a sloppily told story of his still unfolding career.
Rating: 
Summary: The most insightful Neil bio
Review: As a long time fan of Neil's I have read a couple of biographies and countless interviews and articles over the years. This is by far the most revealing portrait I have ever seen of this enigmatic, fascinating artist. Even though the book is well over 700 pages, I was never bored. If you are a Neil fan I would have no reservations about recommending it to you. If you are not particularly enamored with his music, it might be a little too inside and too long, but it still tells a compelling, honest story about Young's passion for musical success and his sometimes self-destructive impulse to alienate his audience with projects which he must have known were not commercially viable, especially during the Geffen fiasco.
My primary complaint with the book is that the author injects too much of himself into it. Apparently, he spent 6 years chasing down Young for interviews and got fairly close to Young's family and friends. That makes for good reportage, but his critical analysis of all of Young's music is more than I needed to see. I will make up my own mind about what Neil Young music I like and don't like, thank you.
I thank Jimmy McDonough for writing a great book about a great artist, but next time make it more about the subject and less about yourself.
Rating: 
Summary: World on a String
Review: Jimmy McDonough crawled uphill in a hail storm to get this monster biography published. The struggle was well worth it. This exhaustive study of Neil Young's career, though it celebrates the prodigious output of the grizzled axman, never descends to idol worship. McDonough maintains a sharp critical eye throughout, and his unaffected prose is loose, often biting. When covering the Buffalo Sprinfield era, the author justifiably savages the pastiche excesses of "Broken Arrow" while praising the majestic "Expecting to Fly," a song that Young and Jack Nitzche a whole month to get right. And boy did they ever get it right.The book digs up "innaresting" dirt on Young's songs and literally drips with atmosphere. You can smell the hippie idyll of Topanga Canyon slowly sour and feel the chemical depravity of sessions dragged down to stupor by honey slides, tequila, and the memory of fallen comrades. Interviews with Young, interspersed throughout the biography, reveal a self-absorbed artist enslaved by his shchizophrenic muse. Changing musicians like they were flannel shirts or guitar strings, Shakey Deal admits to leaving a considerable wake in his tenacious pursuit of the perfect vibe.
Rating:
Summary: The heart and soul of a loner.
Review: "After the Gold Rush" (1970) and "Harvest" (1972) were two of the first records I ever owned, and I've been listening to Neil Young ever since. His music has influenced my life. Since 1967, Young has released nearly fifty albums and over four hundred songs (p. 16). However, as Village Voice journalist, Jimmy McDonough's 786-page biography reveals, although Young's "music might ooze with raw emotion," as a person, "stoic, inward Neil" is "frequently an impassive, impenetrable fortress" (p. 68). In writing his ambitious biography, McDonough followed his elusive subject for six years, talked to more than three hundred of Young's closest associates (p. 20), and interviewed Young himself for more than fifty hours between 1989 and 1996 (p. 741). As a result, McDonough triumphs not only in bringing his engmatic subject to life in these pages, but also in revealing how Neil Young has survived in the better-to-burn-out-than-to-fade-away business of rock and roll. Interspersing his biographical discussion with "one endless, ongoing interview with Young" (p. 20), McDonough takes us on a journey through Neil Young's past, from the singer-songwriter's birth in Toronto on November 12, 1945 (p. 37), to his 1951 polio infection (p. 44), to meeting Stephen Stills in the Greenwich Village folk scene in 1964 (p. 112), to arriving in Los Angeles in 1966 to start Buffalo Springfield (p. 155), which remains a "painful memory" for Young, "linked forever to epilepsy and inner turmoil" (p. 231). "Epilepsy, band problems, management hassles, arrests," McDonough writes, "if you want to know how Neil Young was feeling circa mid-1966, pull out that beat-up copy of "Buffalo Springfield" and play "Out of My Mind" (p. 181). McDonough then follows Young through "a lotta destruction," a painful relationship with actress Carrie Snodgrass and two marriages, and numerous musical configurations in the uncompromising pursuit of his dreams. While Young avoids offering any insights into the meaning of any of his song lyrics, McDonough succeeds, at least, in providing us with the context of Young's life in which many songs were written, including his collaborations with Crazy Horse and Crosby Stills Nash and Young. About Neil Young--difficult artist, ferocious guitar player, poetic folkie, unpredictable control-freak, reclusive songwriter, model-train mogul, rancher and Ronald Reagan supporter (p. 18)--David Crosby says, "they don't call him Shakey for nothin'" (p. 232), and Graham Nash says "he's a very strange human being . . . very strange" (p. 249). This "shouldn't be a book that makes me look like I'm great and that everything I did is perfect," Young advises McDonough. "So obviously it's not gonna be that kinda book . . . There are ways to say things where the reader can put things together. Draw their own conclusions (p. 11). In following Young's advice, McDonough's fascinating book examines the rock and roll life of a tortured, but musically-gifted loner in a way that will offer new insights to Neil Young's music. G. Merritt
Rating:
Summary: Better than a lot of folks give it credit for...
Review: Okay...the writing's not the greatest. McDonough is no great stylist, but his prose is adequate and certainly not mediocre. I don't particularly mind the author's insertion of himself into the book; he's hardly the first to do so and in fact this technique seems to be more and more typical of modern bios. I don't really believe that McDonough had any axes to grind with Young. I think he's simply telling it the way he feels it. What biographer doesn't? There's no such thing as an objective biography. I might not agree with all of McDonough's critiques of Young's various albums, shows, etc, but so what? At least he had me, on several occasions, rethinking my own ideas about some of Young's work. At the very least this book is rarely less than an animated look at Neil Young's music and personality. And more than anything else I've read on the man, this biography seemed to give me a better feel for what sort of person Young is, though to be blunt I don't think there has been a single indispensible book yet written on him. In the end, I enjoyed this read.
Rating:
Summary: Long May You Run
Review: Jimmy McDonough, who obviously has a penchant for rubbing people the wrong way, crawled uphill in a hail storm to get this monster biography published. The struggle was well worth it. Young's formative years in Canada with his irascible mother Rassy make for an "innaresting" story of a frail, sickly boy who latches onto the sounds drifting north over the plains. This exhaustive study of his eventual career, though it celebrates the prodigious output of an insanely talented songwriter, never descends to idol worship. McDonough maintains a sharp critical eye throughout, and his unaffected prose is loose, often biting. When covering the Buffalo Springfield era, the author justifiably savages the pastiche excesses of "Broken Arrow" while praising the majestic "Expecting to Fly," a song that took Young and Jack Nitzsche a whole month to get right. And boy did they ever get it right. The book fleshes out a large supporting cast and literally drips with atmosphere. You can smell the hippie idyll of Topanga Canyon slowly sour and feel the chemical depravity of sessions dragged down to stupor by honey slides, tequila, and the memory of fallen comrades. Interviews with Young, interspersed throughout the biography, reveal a self-absorbed artist enslaved by his quixotic muse. Changing musicians like they were flannel shirts or guitar strings, Shakey Deal admits to leaving a considerable wake in his tenacious pursuit of the perfect vibe.
Rating:
Summary: Flawed but fascinating
Review: This book seems to polarize readers--they usually love it or hate it. I lean toward the former, but it's far from a perfect book. But as a lifelong Neil Young fan, I couldn't put it down, even when it annoyed me. The depth of McDonough's research is impressive, and he comes up with scores of fascinating facts and quotes about Neil's past. I've read books on Young before, and was surprised by how much I *didn't* know about him before reading this book. The accounts of recording sessions--often from David Briggs, engineers, and musicians--provide important insight into the finished products. And they helped me understand why Neil never releases "perfect" albums. But it's hard to ignore the shift in the tone of the book when the story gets to the point where McDonough entered the picture (late '80s). While earlier in the book the author revealed his opinions on the music, CSNY, Neil's treatment of people in his life, etc., he kept the narrative moving in a relatively objective way. But that gets thrown out the window later, making the book read like two different manuscripts merged awkwardly. The latter part of the book isn't necessarily bad (though I could live without some of the author's more ignorant rants, like saying Pearl Jam is Jethro Tull without the flute), and it's often fun to read his attempts to antagonize Neil by playing devil's advocate, but the more objective biographical account of the first three-quarters of the book is better. As for Neil the human being--he's an artist, not necessarily a nice person. We already knew that, but this book captures it in much more detail. I came away thinking no less of him (but also no more), but understanding his artistry better. And, his frankness about how the creative muse is not always there is a significant admission that explains some of the weaker periods of his career. For example, though the book was written before their release, I now understand why "Silver and Gold" and "Are You Passionate?" are so tepid compared to his great work--the songwriting well is dry at the moment. Before reading this book, I was positive it was over for Neil...his creative muse was gone for good. Now I'm not so sure. I think it'll come back. Overall, a worthy book. If you're interested in Neil Young at all, you must read it. You won't love all of it, but it's well worth the time and money.
Rating:
Summary: Love It, Hate It, SHAKEY is here to stay
Review: I am a writer--not to mention huge Neil Young fan--and boy, I've never seen a biography that divides people more than this one. It really seemed to have hit a nerve. This is one of the most original--albeit IMPOSSIBLE--books I have ever read. The author tries a lot of stuff, and while it doesn't always work, it is nothing less than fascinating. Personally I thought he was kind to Carrie Snodgrass (one of many kooky, kooky characters in SHAKEY)--a lot kinder maybe than Neil himself was. And I think he brings Young's world to life by way of a lot of previously unknown facts. I find it funny that some fans are taking McDonough to task for all sorts of minute details while failing to address the bigger picture he creates. Perhaps they are a bit uncomfortable with this brutal but loving portrait? Maybe they are upset that McDonough questions whether Young has (forgive the train ref) any steam left in his caboose these days? Face it--the evidence seems to support him with the half-dozen or so dud albums Young has released in recent years. Is the book way too long, repitious and sloppy? Yes. Is McDonough sometimes a highly irritating windbag who should keep his endless opinions to his cranky self? Yes. But does the spirit of Neil Young in all his crazy, contrary ragged glory scream from every page? A resounding YES. Love it, hate it, you will never read a portrait of any artist quite like this one.
Rating:
Summary: me first
Review: Here's what I came away with after reading 'Shakey': 1) the age-old lesson that wealth and fame corrupts applies to the idols of the counterculture as much as everyone else who came before them. To Young's credit, he has recognized and attempted to avoid their trappings. Unfortunately, Young apparently started life with an illusion of self-importance that, like many of the other figures in the book, was only magnified by wealth and fame. In fact, it seems to be a reality of life that wealth and fame only magnify whatever it is that you are, good and bad.
2) it is possible to believe you are superior to others because you don't overtly try to make yourself superior to others.
3) having musical talent doesn't make you in any way better than anyone else. It is what it is: musical talent. It's no different, really, than being talented on the baseball field, the battlefield, or even the kitchen.
4) Neil, Stephen Stills, David Crosby, the record producers and managers, virtually everyone in the book, has had a lot of pain dished out to them in their lives, and dished out a lot of pain on others. There's an abundance of bad parenting and selfish living that is brought to the fore here. It's interesting how fame and wealth puts a gloss over people's lives that makes the grass seem greener on the other side. I don't think many people would enjoy trading places with Neil given the hardships he's had to endure, including bouts with polio, epilepsy, introversion, and having a disabled child.
5) It's interesting how beautiful music somehow rises to the surface in the midst of such suffering and selfishness. That is the inspiring and compelling phenomenon running throughout this narrative. It is the portions of the book that detail this process, whether taking place in songwriting or performance, that truly held my interest.
6) I excuse the writer for falling into self-excess. Just proves he's no different than anyone else he's writing about. No surprise that in illuminating everyone elses run for the spotlight, some of the photons fell on himself.
7) If there's a Neil Young lyric you've always thought was deep and mystical, forget about it... even Neil can't tell you what it means.
Rating:
Summary: The best Neil book
Review: The detail and obsession that went into this is evident - this is no usual ham-fisted bio-cash-in. Even the fall out with Neil adds perspective to McDonough's writing. My problem is that while it is flawless in terms of care and detail, McDonough comes accross as rather dislikeable. Fair enough he is a critic a lot of the time, but does he have to sound so preachy and knowing? Dare you have any respect for any of the more 'pretty' Young albums, or CS&N he will shred you to pieces. Furthermore, he's incredibly egotistic. The book is just as much about McDonough as it is Neil and with this I have a problem. Generally an excellent labour of love, but can the guy get off his high horse?
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