Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

CSNY was an American (Stephen Crosby & Stephen Stills), British (Gramham Nash) and Canadian (Neil Young) folk rock supergroup.  They are noted for their intricate vocal harmonies, often tumultuous interpersonal relationships, political activism, and lasting influence on American music and culture.  Originally a trio of Crosby, Stills & Nash for the recording of their first album Crosby Stills & Nash Prior to the formation of CSNY, each member of the band had belonged to another prominent group.  David Crosby had performed rhythm guitar, vocals and songwriting with folk-rock group the Byrds; Stephen Stills had been a guitarist, vocalist and songwriter in the band Buffalo Springfield, which also featured Neil Young; and Graham Nash had been a guitarist, vocalist and songwriter with the Hollies, one of the British Invasion acts.  All of them have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at least twice. Stills and Crosby began writing songs together in 1968, after Buffalo Springfield broke up (The Byrds had already split, in 1967).  Nash, who had just quit the Hollies, joined them soon thereafter and the trio performed together for the first time at the L.A. home of Cass Elliot of the Mamas and the Papas.

Crosby, Stills and Nash, their first album, released May 29, 1969, was an immediate hit, with singles Marrakesh Express (#28) and Stills' Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" (#21) (about Judy Collins).  At the helm was Stills, who (with the exception of drummer Dallas Taylor) handled the lion's share of the instrumental parts himself, which left the band in need of additional personnel to be able to tour, now a necessity given the debut album’s commercial impact. Retaining Taylor, the band decided initially to hire a keyboard player.  Stills at one point approached Steve Winwood, who was already occupied with newly formed group Blind Faith.  Atlantic label head Ahmet Ertegün suggested former Buffalo Springfield member Neil Young, also managed by Elliot Roberts, as a fairly obvious choice.  Initial reservations were held by Stills and Nash, Stills owing to his history with Young in Buffalo Springfield, and Nash, due to his personal unfamiliarity with Young.  But after several meetings, the trio expanded to a quartet with Young a full partner.  The terms of the contract allowed Young full freedom to maintain a parallel career with his new back-up band, Crazy Horse. With Neil Young on board, Dallas Taylor on drums and nineteen-year-old Motown bassist Greg Reeves completing the rhythm section, the restructured group went on tour in the late summer of 1969 through the following January.  Their first gig was on August 16, 1969 at the Auditorium Theater in Chicago, with Joni Mitchell as their opening act.  They mentioned they were going to someplace called Woodstock the next day, but they had no idea where that was nor that half a million people would show up!

Déjà Vu, released March 11, 1970, took just two months to make and had advance orders for 2 million copies.  It eventually went on to sell over 7 million and included three hit singles: Woodstock (#11), Teach Your Children (#16), and Our House (#30).  A few weeks after Déjà Vu's release, the National Guard shot and killed four students during an antiwar demonstration at Kent State University.  In response, Young wrote Ohio, which the group recorded and released as a single (#4). They toured that summer, but by the time the double live album Four Way Street was released, they had disbanded. In 1977 Crosby, Stills and Nash regrouped for their quadruple-platinum studio album CSN, released June 17, which included Just a Song Before I Go (#7).  The next summer they toured as an acoustic trio, and in the fall of 1979 they performed at the antinuclear benefit concerts sponsored by Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE).  In 1982 the trio released Daylight Again, for which Stills wrote most of the songs, and toured arenas once more.  Daylight was a Top-Ten LP and boasted two Top 20 singles, Wasted on the Way (#9) and Southern Cross (#18). In 1985 Crosby (who'd already had a number of run-ins with the law and been charged with drug and weapons possession) was sentenced to prison for nine months after leaving the drug rehabilitation program he was allowed to enter instead of serving a five-year prison sentence for possessing cocaine and carrying a gun.  He appeared with Stills, Nash and Young at Live Aid while out on appeal bond.  Shortly after his release from prison in 1986, he wrote a compelling account of his long-term drug abuse entitled Long Time Gone, which was published in 1990.  The four reunited to record American Dream (#16), released November 1, 1988, after which Young refused to tour with his ex-band mates.  Crosby, Stills, and Nash reconvened as a trio for 1990's Live It Up (#58), released June 26, 1990.

Neil Young, by the 1990s, was a hugely respected elder statesman of rock.  Nash had been successful as a photographer with Nash Editions, specializing in digital fine-art printing, and as a host of his own cable television talk show.  Crosby had received a liver transplant in 1994 shortly after CSN's After the Storm (#98) released August 16, 1994.  In 1995 he reunited with a son, James Raymond, whom the child's mother had given up for adoption in 1962.  David and Raymond have recorded three albums as CPR.  By the decade's end, Crosby had also achieved notoriety as the sperm donor for celebrity lesbian mothers Melissa Etheridge and Julie Cypher. In 1999, largely at the instigation of Stephen Stills, CSN&Y re-formed to record Looking Forward (#26) released October 26, 1999.  Earlier that year, Nash had broken both legs in a boating accident, but the group's spirits and creativity were sufficiently high for the album to garner critical praise.  It was followed by the band's first tour since 1974, a heavily hyped cross-country trek entitled the CSNY2K Tour that featured studio veteran Jim Keltner on drums and Donald "Duck" Dunn of Booker T. and the MG's on bass. CSN was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997; CSNY is the only band to have all its members inducted into the Hall twice.  Crosby has also been inducted as a member of the Byrds (1991), and Stills as a member of Buffalo Springfield (1997).  In 2010, Nash was inducted as a member of the Hollies.  Young has been inducted for his solo work (1995) and for Buffalo Springfield (1997), but has not been inducted with CSNY.

Wanderin' Spirit
November, 2014
"CSNY"

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