Re·ac·tor is the eleventh studio album by Canadian folk rock musician Neil Young, and his fourth with American rock band Crazy Horse, released on November 2, 1981. It was his last album released through Reprise Records before he moved to Geffen for his next five albums.
Re·ac·tor | ||||
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Studio album by Neil Young and Crazy Horse | ||||
Released | November 2, 1981 (1981-11-02) | |||
Recorded | October 9, 1980 – July 21, 1981 | |||
Studio | Modern Recorders, Redwood City, California | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 38:45 | |||
Label | Reprise | |||
Producer | David Briggs, Tim Mulligan & Neil Young with Jerry Napier | |||
Neil Young chronology | ||||
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Crazy Horse chronology | ||||
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The album marked Young's first use of the Synclavier, which would be featured heavily on the subsequent albums Trans (1982) and Landing on Water (1986).[citation needed]
The song "Shots" had originally been performed live in 1978 as a ballad.
In 2003, Greg Kot of Chicago Tribune proclaimed that Re·ac·tor "works up a punk-blues racket [...] that sounds as shaggy and disheveled as anything the Replacements recorded".[3] AllMusic opined the album to contain "guitar-drenched hard rock made up of thrown-together material".[1] Salon.com described the album as a proto-grunge effort.[5] Peter J. Howe described it retrospectively in 1985 as "gritty post-punk".[2]
The album features the Serenity Prayer on its back cover ("'Deus dona mihi serenitatem accipere res quae non possum mutare fortitudinem mutare res quae possum atque sapientiam differentiam cognoscere'" – "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference").
The original 1981 album gave Neil Young sole writing credit on every track, however the 2021 live release Way Down in the Rust Bucket added Frank Sampedro's name as a co-writer on "Surfer Joe and Moe the Sleaze."[6]
It was unavailable on compact disc until it was released as a HDCD-encoded remastered version on August 19, 2003, as part of the Neil Young Archives Digital Masterpiece Series.
Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
AllMusic | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Pitchfork | (6.8/10)[7] |
The Village Voice | B+[8] |
William Ruhlmann of AllMusic is largely dismissive of Re·ac·tor in his retrospective review,[1] awarding the record only two-out-of-five stars,[1] although he praises "Shots" as " a more substantive and threatening song given a riveting performance".[1]
All tracks are written by Neil Young, except "Surfer Joe and Moe the Sleaze", written by Neil Young and Frank Sampedro.
No. | Title | Length |
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1. | "Opera Star" | 3:31 |
2. | "Surfer Joe and Moe the Sleaze" | 4:15 |
3. | "T-Bone" | 9:10 |
4. | "Get Back on It" | 2:14 |
No. | Title | Length |
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5. | "Southern Pacific" | 4:07 |
6. | "Motor City" | 3:11 |
7. | "Rapid Transit" | 4:35 |
8. | "Shots" | 7:42 |
Crazy Horse | |
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Crazy Horse | |
Neil Young & Crazy Horse |
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Songs | |
Songs (with Neil Young) |
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Related articles |
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