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Classic Vinyl

With John Gardiner

Want to catch up on world events – try listening to CSNY

Tuesday, April 22, 2003

You know, I've made a bit of an effort to stay away from the mainstream in Classic Vinyl. Hence, I've tended to avoid the Beatles the Rolling Stones and do guys like John Mayall and Roy Buchanan. This week, though, I'm going to write a bit about one of the real heavyweights of the rock world over the last thirtysome years – Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.
This review of the late 1960's supergroup was prompted by a Good Friday trip up to my hometown of Hanover and the discovery of a dusty cassette tape under the driver's side seat. I was pleasnatly surprised that at some point in the past I'd recorded both sides of a 90-minute tape with some great CSN and CSNY music.
In fact, each of these groups, the original trio of David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, and the quartette after Neil Young was added, released very little original music back in their hey day.
Certainly, the self titled album by CSN that featured signature tunes like Wooden Ships and Suite: Judy Blue Eyes was that group's only album before Neil joined. CSNY then released Deja Vue, which was its only studio album of the period. I'll tell you that's a very slight musical legacy to leave behind to still be remembered all these years later.
While it's true there was a buzz when CSN first formed, it wasn't a huge buzz. Crosby, Stills and Nash met at a party in San Fransisco, jammed a few tunes together vocally and decided to make a go of it. All three had rich rock music pedigrees with Crosby coming from the Byrds, Stills from Buffalo Springfield and Nash from British supergroup, the Hollies. All of us back in that era knew the result would be magic.
Still, there were other groups of the era that combined enormously rich vocal harmonies with a primarilly acoustic delivery – think of America and how huge they were. I remember sitting in a friend's bedroom in Napanee, Ontario back when the CSN album first came out and, wow, were we blown away. It was great stuff. Still, I'm not sure we'd remember it so well if Neil Young hadn't joined the group.
I mean, what can you say about Deja Vue that's likely not already been said a million times. This is surely the quintessential album of the decade of love – what with "Almost Cut My Hair", "Helpless", "Our House", "Woodstock" and the list goes on. I know people who can almost sing the whole, darned album. It was an amazing piece of music.
And you know what? It's just as amazing today – that's what I discovered on the trip to Hanover. I listened to 90 minutes of these guys straight and was moved to tears by a couple of lyrics. When the vocals in "Almost Cut My Hair" talked about "letting my freak flag fly", I knew what he was singing about and I could identify. These would be good days to let our freak flags fly once again, and, indeed, I've got mine back.
I should mention "Four Way Street" before I get on too far – it's a super live period album by CSNY that followed Deja Vue, but certainly didn't elicit the same kind of excitement. It's a good solid piece and one you should have in your collection. Now, I'm probably going to show my ignorance of actual rock history, but I think "Ohio" may have debuted on Four Way Street – it might be my favourite CSNY tune and the one I think is perhaps most poignant today.
I continue to be blown away by CSNY and their music. I hear their concerts these days are some of the best around and they all look like they're really enjoying playing. Think what they could have produced if they'd stayed together for all those years – or was it just a special time – they've done a couple of discs in recent years and I even own one, but they just aren't the same.
It's hard to believe it's been over 30 years since I first listened to CSN and then CSNY. And I'll tell you that there's not a new band around today that can carry their guitar cases. Great singers, great songwriters, great musicians – the whole package. Brilliant harmonies and lyrics that stretch across time. Am I a fan? You bet.




John Gardiner is a 25-year-veteran of the community newspaper business, but he is also a prolific writer of moralistic short fiction he refers to as "emotional thoughtscapes" or "adult fables". Samples of his fiction can be found at:

He has also produced a noteworthy piece of humanist philosophy which can be found at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~aboiten/ad502.htm He welcomes comments on his work.