On the Beach: Neil Young Reimagined

We’ll be panning for gold this summer at VFMF!

The reimagining of songs from classic albums is an annual festival highlight and Neil Young’s After the Gold Rush is the focus this year for a celebration of his music interpreted by a bumper crop of festival artists. Released in 1970, After The Gold Rush was recorded with members of both of his associated groups at the time, Crazy Horse and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. This breakthrough album set the template for Young’s career, allowing him to shift back and forth between soft and hard, folk and rock, one foot firmly in the coffee shop scene of the ‘60s, the other in the rock arenas of the ‘70s.

Curated by Vancouver expat Steve Dawson and backed by the Hen House All-Stars, with artists including Krystle Dos Santos, Sue Foley, Margaret Glaspy, Rich Hope, Marcus Mosely, Marin Patenaude, Samantha Parton, Jane Siberry, and Julian Taylor–these musicians will show you another side of one of the greatest songwriters around. In addition to songs from After the Gold Rush, the performers will have some freedom to explore other favourites from Young’s expansive songbook.

This year more than ever, we need to show that Canadians know how to keep rockin’ in the free world!

– ND