Credits:Written by Neil Diamond
Produced by Don Was & Jacknife Lee
Project Coordinators: Sam Cole, Ivy Skoff
Engineer: Tom McFall
Mixing Engineer: Bob Clearmountain
Mastering Engineer, String Engineer, Vocal Engineer: Bernie Becker
Art Direction: Todd Gallopo
Design: Todd Gallopo, Leslie Kim
Photography: Micah Diamond, Ari Michelson, Jesse Diamond, Todd Gallopo
Vocals: Neil Diamond
Guitar: Neil Diamond, Jacknife Lee, Richard Bennett, Mark Goldenberg, Hadley Hockensmith, Smokey Hormel, Greg Leisz, Blake Mills, Tim Pierce
Bass: Hutch Hutchinson, Sebastian Steinberg
Keyboards: Jacknife Lee, Don Was, Benmont Tench, Jim Cox, Rami Jaffee, Greg Phillinganes, Matt Rollings, Cj Vanston
Drums: Joey Waronker, Jeremy Stacey
Percussion: Joey Waronker, Alan Estes
Flute: Sara Andon, Don Markese
Horn: Eric Gorfain, Mike Cottone, John Fumo, Justin Hageman, Marc Bolin, Stephanie O'Keefe, Dan Weinstein, Jamelle Williams
Horn Arrangements: Eric Gorfain
String Arrangements: Alan Lindgren, Davide Rossi
Conducted by Alan Lindgren
Strings: Davide Rossi, Erik Avinder, Brian Benning, Robert Berg, Chuck Berghofer, Sally Berman, Caroline Buckman, Phillippa Ruth Clarke-Ling, Giovanna Clayton, Matthew Cooker, Marcia Dickstein, Andrew Duckles, Alan Estes, Michael Ferrill, Alex Gorlovsky, Agnes Gottschewski, Lynn Grants, Maurice Grants, Sarkis Gyurgchyan, Vahe Hayrikian, Norman Hughes, Carrie Kennedy, Ousep Ketendijian, Anna Kostyucheck, Johana Krejci, Gayle Levant, Marina Manukian, Dennis Molchan, Karolina Naziemiec, Cheryl Norman-Brick, Aaron Oltman, Joel Pargman, Steve Richards, Anatoly Rosinsky, Jody Rubin, Harry Shirinian, Christina Soule, David Stone, Kevan Torfeh, Elizabeth Wilson, Zhou Yi, Shari Zippert
Background Vocals: Waters Family (Julia Waters, Maxine Waters, Oren Waters)
Release Notes:Melody Road is Neil Diamond's debut album as an artist signed to Capitol Records. His 32nd studio album, it is the first album of original music Diamond has recorded since 2008's well-received Home Before Dark, which debuted on the US album charts at #1. It was produced by Don Was and Jacknife Lee. After 40 years recording for Columbia, Diamond signed with Capitol in early 2014. At the same time, his back catalogue was moved to Universal Music Group, Capitol's parent company. Capitol released Diamond's 1980 soundtrack album for The Jazz Singer.
On September 8, 2014, six of the tracks from Melody Road were premiered at the Capitol Records studios in Hollywood, CA at a listening party for a small group of music industry executives and journalists. Following the event, Billboard wrote that the album is "rich in orchestration that retains the dark rustic qualities of his last two studio albums of original material, 12 Songs and Home Before Dark. Of the songs, the article stated that "'Something Blue', the most commercial of the songs played Monday, has the classic Diamond mid-tempo lilt; the ballads 'The Art of Love' and '(Ooo) Do I Wanna Be Yours' offer springboards for Diamond's still-potent voice; and 'Seongah and Jimmy' is a eyewitness account of a romance between a woman from Korea and a man from Long Island." The Wall Street Journal wrote that "The Art of Love" is a "tender offering from Diamond, who at age 73, hasn't lost that ability to convey a wide swath of emotions in just four minutes."
In September, three videos from the album were released. A lyric video for "The Art of Love" debuted on Diamond's YouTube/VEVO channel, and the video for the album's first single, "Something Blue", premiered on Yahoo! Music. Rolling Stone debuted the video for "Nothing But a Heartache".
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