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Two of this country's best-known rockers, Neil Young and Randy Bachman, have teamed up on a marathon ode to their homeland, titled Made In Canada.
The 10-minute song, written by Bachman, was recorded this month at Young's sprawling ranch/studio north of San Francisco. The tune is slated to be the centrepiece of Bachman's new solo album, Merge. It's tentatively slated for release June 12.
"It's 10 MINUTES long," says an incredulous Bachman, on the phone Tuesday from his Vancouver home. "The song was over at four, but then he launched into this solo that's like Hendrix burning his guitar at Monterey. He plays notes, then in the end he's banging his guitar and getting these shudders out of it. You haven't heard these noises since the '60s ..."
As per Young's usual modus operandi, Made In Canada was recorded in a single take.
Recalls Bachman: "We set up, I show him the chords to Made In Canada, we run through it once, he goes, 'That's it'. It was just like recording in the '60s, in mono!
"And you can't do any overdubs because of the way he mikes everything. It's in his barn, every mike in every corner is turned on. It's like, if you saw La Bamba, when they first showed Richie Valens playing in a gymnasium? That's what it's like."
That wasn't quite the end of the session, as Bachman ruefully explains.
"We had stopped at a sleazy restaurant going up to his place, because we didn't get fed on the plane that morning. And I got a very upset stomach from some bad restaurant food. So that night, true to form, we just get the song done and I get these stomach cramps and have to excuse myself.
"So I'm on my knees in Neil's BATHROOM, and Neil proceeds to go in and finish singing the background vocals, singing with (my vocals), he does a harmony with himself, and he kind of took over the track ... Neil kept it going, and I'm real grateful for that."
Bachman has just finished editing together a four-minute version of the song, which will go out to radio stations, likely in mid-May. The full 10-minute version has been maintained on the Merge album.
Meanwhile, a second Bachman-Young track, Spring Is Nearly Here, will turn up on a tribute album to Hank Marvin, the guitar god from influential '60s band The Shadows later this year. "Neil and I both still play our solos like him, real single note with an echo on it," says Bachman, proudly.
It'll take its place alongside contributions from Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour, Dire Straits' Mark Knopfler, and fragile Fleetwood Mac legend, Peter Green.
The Marvin track was actually the reason Bachman and Young got together in the first place.
The instrumental was the unofficial theme song of Winnipeg radio station CKRC, back when Bachman and Young were both playing around town in their first bands, an era the pair paid homage to on Bachman's 1994 single, Prairie Town.
After their run at Spring Is Nearly Here went so well, the pair decided to tackle Made In Canada, too.
Though Bachman expressed reservations about the "technical imperfections" of both recordings, Young had the same advice for him while listening back to each song:
"It's a moment captured in time. Don't mess with it."
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