The fact that Neil Young can turn out an album or two a year and still make something as casually remarkable as Second Song goes to show that creativity is not a linear thing. Where 2025’s Talkin’ to the Trees was a heavy, occasionally angry album, Second Song recaptures the cosmic contentment of Harvest Moon and the sweeter side of After the Gold Rush. “The Foggy Edge of Time” is a survey of Young’s life from 30,000 feet (“alcohol, alcohol…,” he repeats mournfully at one point, leaving the listener to fill in the blank). “Earth Girl” sounds like something out of an elementary-school musical (“The space between your deepest thoughts, like stars in the night”). Two long songs—“Second Song” and the elegiac “Soon I Might Be Going”—unspool like bedtime stories. The feeling is natural and almost effortless, a sleight of hand that is harder to pull off than it sounds.