by Neil Young
Sample and Hold is a song by Neil Young from his 1983 album “Trans”. The track features electronic elements and reflects Young’s experimentation with synthesizers during that period.
“I think human emotion, and selling a sad personal story…it’s valid, but it’s been done so much, who cares? It’s like Perry Como, it’s like Frank Sinatra, it’s way back there now. Now people are living on digital time, they need to hear something perfect all the time or they don’t feel reassured everything’s okay. Like when you get in the elevator and go up and down and all the numbers go by, everyone knows where they’re going. And the drumbeats today, the computerized drumbeats? Everyone is right on the money. Everybody feels good. It’s reassuring. I like that. Electronic music is a lot like folk music to me…it’s a new kind of rock and roll—it’s so synthetic and anti-feeling that it has a lot of feeling… Like a person who won’t cry. You know that they’re crying inside and you look at them, and they have a stone face, they’re looking at you, they would never cry. You feel more emotion from that person than you do from the person who is talking all the time. So I think that this new music is emotional—it’s very emotional—because it’s so cold…I have my synthesizers and my computers and I’m not lonely.” – Neil Young
Neil Young and the Trans Band
Musician(s): Neil Young: vocals, vocoder, guitar, Synclavier
Frank Sampedro: guitar
Billy Talbot: bass
Ralph Molina: drums
Studio: Broken Arrow Ranch
Produced by Neil Young & Tim Mulligan
