"On the Beach" is the second of the so-called 'Ditch Trilogy' of albums that Young recorded after the huge success of "Harvest". The multi-platinum best seller — with a No. 1 hit, “Heart Of Gold” — almost perfectly synthesized the popular singer-songwriter movement underway in Southern California in the early 1970s. By the time the full scope of that album’s success became apparent, Young wanted to have nothing to do with it. Looking back on it just five years later, he wrote in the liner notes to the "Decade" box set that the experience “put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore, so I headed for the ditch. A rougher ride but I saw more interesting people there.”