Neil Young Announces Next Three Volumes of Official Bootleg Series

Neil Young’s Official Bootleg Series is expanding with the releases of Dorothy Chandler Pavilion (Los Angeles 2/1/71), Royce Hall (Los Angeles 1/30/71), and Citizen Kane Jr. Blues (Live The Bottom Line) (New York City 5/16/74). All three albums will be available on CD and digitally (but not on Spotify) on May 6, with vinyl editions to follow on June 3.

Royce Hall and Dorothy Chandler Pavilion were recorded near the end of a successful solo acoustic tour Young played following the dissolution of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. The two sets are largely identical and feature Buffalo Springfield tunes (“On The Way Home,” “I Am a Child”), After the Gold Rush songs (“Don’t Let It Bring You Down,” “Tell Me Why”) and new compositions that wouldn’t be released until Harvest over a year later (“Heart of Gold,” “Old Man,” and “A Man Needs a Maid.”) Both shows have circulated in bootleg circles for years, but the sound quality on these new releases will be much better than anything heard before.

Citizen Kane Jr. Blues was recorded at an unannounced show that Young played at New York’s tiny Bottom Line well past midnight following sets by Ry Cooder and Leon Redbone. “In my mind it’s a hazy memory,” Young wrote on the Neil Young Archives in 2020, “but this moment really captures the essence of where I was in 1974. Two months later, the album On the Beach was released, including songs I played that night — ‘Ambulance Blues,’ ‘Revolution Blues,’ ‘On the Beach’ and ‘Motion Blues.’”

Neil Young started the Official Bootleg Series last year with the release of Carnegie Hall 1970. Future volumes will spotlight a gig he played at London’s Rainbow Theater in 1973 on the Tonight’s The Night tour, and a show in played in 1977 with his short-lived band the Ducks.

Young hasn’t performed for a live audience since Farm Aid in September 2019. In January, he told fans that he wouldn’t play more shows until he had an electric tour bus. “For me, there are no more trips with fossil fuels,” he wrote. “The tour is waiting for the clean bus. Not for Covid. It’s about the life and death of the planet as we know it. But I will do everything to come to you and share some music.”

OBS 3: Dorothy Chandler Pavilion
(Los Angeles: February 1, 1971)
On the Way Home
Tell Me Why
Old Man
Journey Through the Past
Cowgirl in the Sand
Heart of Gold
A Man Needs a Maid
Sugar Mountain
Don’t Let It Bring You Down
Love in Mind
The Needle and the Damage Done
Ohio
See the Sky About to Rain
I Am a Child
Dance Dance Dance

OBS 4: Royce Hall
(Los Angeles: January 30, 1971)
On the Way Home
Tell Me Why
Old Man
Journey Through the Past
Cowgirl in the Sand
Heart of Gold
A Man Needs a Maid
See the Sky About to Rain
Sugar Mountain
Don’t Let It Bring You Down
Love in Mind
The Needle and the Damage Done
Ohio
Down by the River
Dance Dance Dance
I Am a Child

OBS 5: Citizen Kane Jr. Blues (Live The Bottom Line)
(NYC: May 16, 1974)
Pushed It Over The End
Long May You Run
Greensleeves
Ambulance Blues
Helpless
Revolution Blues
On the Beach
Roll Another Number (For the Road)
Motion Pictures
Pardon My Heart
Dance Dance Dance