10 Greatest Rock Albums That Are Totally Acoustic

Everything that Neil Young does tend to provoke a more rustic feeling. From having a more caustic side with Crazy Horse to his more intimate ballads, Young certainly has run the gamut of being both a recovering folkie as well as the Godfather of Grunge. However, the real triumph is when he went to Nashville and got a lot more raw.

Compared to the more authentic sound of something like After the Gold Rush, Harvest really does feel like rock and roll on country's terms, with Young pulling out all the stops on tracks like Heart of Gold and the title track. Despite having an acoustic foundation, that doesn't mean the album is one-note, with a Man Needs a Maid being one of the most beautiful orchestral backings ever to grace a Neil Young record.

In fact, there's also a bait and switch done on this record, with The Needle and Damage Done being a snippet from a live show that Neil had done around the same time. As to be expected, this is also a firm look at the world Neil sees around him, like the savage condemnation of the south on Alabama and the inevitability of age on Old Man. While Neil was never one to stay in one genre for too long, this is one of the few times where both the rustic sound and accessible hooks reached their comfortable middle ground.