CD review

Neil Young knows how to get to his point.

And quickly.

The 60-year-old cut his latest album "Living With War" in only two weeks, less than a year after his "Prairie Wind" album was released. Young knew what he wanted to say and how he wanted to frame it, and "Living With War" comes out as a family-centric anti- war album that has no qualms about speaking directly and intensely to President Bush.

Young considers the tracks to be "rough and ready, simple, straight-ahead folk songs about the war in Iraq," he told London's Observer.

The first track, "After The Garden," rallies you to the album's sound with growling electric guitar sitting low in the track. Whether it's the reverberations or the metaphoric lyrics, the track starts to stir something in you and its echoing chorus will have you humming.

The momentum is frustratingly halted by the following track, "Living With War." It comes out like a sour hymnal, a melody particularly abused by the intro trumpets. The fact that the lyrics are sharp ("And on the flat-screen we kill and we're killed again") gets you through, but barely.

However, "Shock & Awe" and "Let's Impeach The President" are able to pick up the slack. The smooth but urgent beat in "Shock & Awe" allows Young's cutting lines lots of space: "Back in the days of mission accomplished'/Our chief was landing on the deck/The sun was setting on a golden photo op."

"Let's Impeach The President" is even more charged, a veritable hailstorm on President Bush. "Let's impeach the President for lyin'/ and misleading our country into war/Abusing all the power that we gave him/And shipping all our money out the door," Young and a choir sing evenly. The end of the song cuts between audio of President Bush lines and Young saying coolly, "Flip...flop."

Young's Bush-hating should not be confused with America-hating. Immediately after Sept. 11, Young wrote "Let's Roll," a vigorous tribute to the Americans on the doomed Flight 93. "Living With War" ends with a choral rendition of "America The Beautiful" that Young arranged.

Young seems to conclude that America is better without war, and he desires a leader who can give our country peace. What takes some of the edge off of his message is that he ends with a tribute to the country, not a testament to hate. The music itself is not as revolutionary as the words, but it's hard not admire Young for taking such a loud and unwavering stand against war.

A graduate of Germantown Friends School, Judy Jarvis will be a senior at Vassar College.