“Down By the River” by Neil Young

"Down by the River" first showed up on Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, Neil Young's 1969 album with Crazy Horse, and it's a murder ballad that won't hold still. Young later said he wrote it, along with "Cinnamon Girl" and "Cowgirl in the Sand", while laid up in bed in Topanga Canyon, delirious with a 103-degree fever, and the song has that woozy, feverish drag all the way through. Its story has a man shooting his lover, though Young has told it different ways: in 1970 he insisted there was no real murder, just a relationship blown, and by 1984 he was describing a man who couldn't control himself, a cheating woman and a sheriff at the door.

Young and Danny Whitten trade snarling guitar lines over Billy Talbot's bass and Ralph Molina's drums, and David Briggs produced with Young.

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