Disharmony Part 1: Crosby vs. Stills, Nash, and Young

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Rivals is a production of I Heart Radio. Hello Everyone,
and Welcome to Rivals, the show about music beefs and
feuds and long simmering resentments between musicians. I'm Steve and

(00:21):
I'm Jordan's and welcome Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. I've
so much cried in saying that, I'm so excited. This
is like the Rival's equivalent of like The Godfather the Trilogy.
It's long, it's complex, the villains keep changing. It's it's great.
Buckle up, and we kept it at three because Graham
Nash has generally been kind of like the passive player

(00:41):
throughout the saga. You know, he's more like reactive rather
than the aggressor. He just seems like, you know, the
most decent guy. But the others have done more than
their fair share of mud slinging. Today, we're gonna look
at how David Crosby has screwed over and been screwed
over by the other members of this beloved musical collective. Yeah,
Crosby to me seems like a good starting point because
he's the one who is currently on the outs with

(01:03):
everybody in C S N Y. I saw this quote recently.
Neil Young said that David Crosby should write a book
called Why Don't My Friends Want to Talk to Me Anymore?
Which is pretty brutal. But as we'll see as this
series unfold, Stephen Stills and Neil Young have also been
very big agitators in this world, So, like Jordan, I'm

(01:24):
extremely excited to dig into those conflicts as well. Can
I just say, though, at the start, how much I
love C S N Y. I mean, both as a
band and as a soap opera. They're all like such
great songwriters and musicians. I mean, just think of like
all the incredible like tunes these guys have given us.
There's just like such a long list. But they're also
just like incredible divas. I mean, you won't find a

(01:46):
more fascinating hive of bitchy characters than this one. Oh yeah,
Cross is by far and away my favorite member of
cs M Y. He's just he's one of the greatest
characters in rock and roll history, right. I mean, he's hilarious,
he's articulate, he's excessive, and he's probably second maybe to
Keith Richards as like rock and Roll's most unlikely survivor.
I mean the fact that he's above ground at all

(02:07):
is miraculous. But also he's like more prolific than ever.
His last couple albums have been amazing, and now he's
this like Twitter, dear Abbey Figure. I mean it's great.
It warms my heart, you know, even though the rest
of CSMLI apparently hates him. Yeah. You know, what's that
line from The Dark Night? You either die of hero
or you live long enough to become a villain, Like
I feel like that's true of of David Crosby. I mean,

(02:30):
I had forgotten just how down it out he was
at his lowest in the nineteen eighties. Yeah, he did prison,
He was in prison, I mean yeah. I mean this
is a guy who literally had a room set up
just off stage at every concert just so he could
have a space to free base cocaine between songs. Like,
I mean, it's amazing and frankly a miracle that he
lived this long to piss off his one time friends

(02:53):
well into their seventies. I can't wait to get into this.
So without further ado, let's get into this mess. Oh man,
I mean just so much again too. But the perfect
starting place is really back at the Birds. David's time
in the legendary folk rock group. That's a whole episode.
One of the best bands ever, incredible American. I mean,

(03:15):
that's its own episode later on, but we'll go quickly
through that. The Birds, of course folk rockers, fused the
rich lyrical poetry of Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger with
the melodic sophistication and amplification of rock bands like the Beatles.
In the mid sixties, they had number ones with Mr
Tambourine Man, Turn Turn Turned, And I would say that
the Birds were probably the most transformative of all of

(03:36):
the proto CSNY bands. I think that they had a
huge hand in turning l A into a major musical
hub in the early sixties. I mean, the Beach Boys
did that a little earlier, but I think the Birds
made l A cool, like on par with New York
and San Francisco. And you know, in the Birds, no
one was cooler than Cross, you know, Like I said,
he was one of the great characters in rock and roll.

(03:57):
He's he were the kve. He was. All the newspaper
like profiles of him around the time have him like
on his huge motorcycle with this they called him Batman.
He had this like big leather cape that he would
wear regardless of the season. Dennis Hopper famously modeled his
character an easy rider after after Cross. I mean, he
just you knew him. You saw him around and you
knew that this this was somebody and he you know,

(04:20):
he's hanging out with the Beatles. He had the best weed,
dated the prettiest girls, knew the best people. What else
did you need? I mean, he's like the prototypical rock
star hedonist, and I think Steven Stills later described him
as like Brando, he had no boundaries, but also like
brand though, he was kind of kind of mercurial. Yeah,
that's a nice way of saying it. I think a

(04:41):
less nice way of saying it is that he was
a huge egomaniac. And it seemed like from the beginning
he was alienating his collaborators and and the birds. He
was the coolest guy, but he acted like he was
the coolest guy, and it's not cool. That's never cool.
It's not cool. And the problem was that he was
not the leader of the band either. Roger mcgwinn was
the person who was in charge of that band. And

(05:01):
I would also say that in terms of just talent,
I think Gene Clark was the best songwriter in that
So even when you look at David Crosby all that
he's accomplished, I feel like he was maybe like the
third ranked guy and the Birds, even though in a
lot of ways, as you say, he was like this
cool guy. He had a really high media profile. You know,
this is this hilarious quote from Terry Melcher where he

(05:23):
was asked once. Of course, Terry Melcher is this record
producer from the sixties. He produced The Birds. He also
worked with Paul Revere in The Raiders and a bunch
of other sixties rock bands. Someone once asked Terry Melcher
who was the most difficult person that he ever worked with,
and without blinking an eye, he said David Crosby. His
number two choice was Charles Manson, And keeping mind, Charles

(05:46):
Manson tried to kill Terry Melcher, or he wanted to
kill Terry Melcher. That's you know, he lived in the
house on Ciallo Drive originally that the Manson family went
and they committed all those terrible murders. So even compared
to Manson, Terry Melcher thought David Crosby was more difficult. Eventually,
of course, David Crosby ended up getting bounced from the birds,
and there's completing stories about whether he was fired or whether.

(06:09):
I mean, I think it's clear that he was fired,
but it wasn't also a story that maybe he quit
maybe at some point. I think there was like some
sort of weird thing like I think Crosby kind of
pushed the idea that he was treated unfairly by those guys. Yes,
Stills would later try to rat out Cross and say like, yeah,
he likes to say that he was fired, but it
was really more mutual agreement. I think it definitely helped

(06:29):
Crosby's cred later on to be like, oh, yeah, the
birds couldn't handle me, because by the sort of like
sixty six sixty seven, the birds were sort of not
seeing as this cutting edge that they've been sort of
in sixty five early sixty six. And I think he
liked the idea of be like, oh yeah, no, I
had moved beyond them. They were rejecting my songs. He
famously put for the song Triad, which is basically his

(06:50):
ode the Threesomes, and he loved to say that like,
oh yeah, mcgwin was way too square to handle a
song like that, and mcgwyn would later saying, no, I
rejected it because the song sucked. It was just the
bad song. So yeah, there's Crosby likes to make himself
out to be this outlaw who was kicked out of
this like Squeaky Clean l a plastic pop band. But yeah,
it seems more like they were just diverging. One story

(07:12):
I love from that time is about the cover of
the Birds album that the Notorious Bird Brothers, which is
a great record record. It was the first record that
the Birds put out after Crosby was bounced out of
the band, and on the cover it's mcgwyn, it's Chris Hillman,
Michael Clark, the drummer, and there's a horse. When David

(07:32):
Crosby saw that cover, he thought that the horse was
supposed to represent him and so he was very insulted
by that. Mcgwinn denied it and he said, yeah, if
we meant it to be cross, we would have had
the horse turnaround, so you just saw its backside. It's
just incredible comeback. You know. My theory about David Crosby
and and I feel like this will I think be
born out as we get into this episode and we

(07:53):
talked about all of his experiences over the years, is
that he's at heart, you know, this kid that craves attention. You,
he's like the little boy maybe who was. I know
that he had a difficult relationship with his father. I
don't think he ever got the attention he really needed
from that paternal figure. And it seems like he will
do anything to get the attention that he craves, even

(08:14):
if it involves throwing his bandmates under the bus. Like
I was reading David Brown's book about Crosbie, Stills, Dash
and Young, which is an incredible book, by the way,
you should definitely go check that out, And there's a
story in there where he's talking about it's like one
of the many times that Crosby tried to go through
rehab in the seventies, and there was a psychologist that

(08:35):
did an analysis of him and the conclusion was is
that David Crosby as a person who is perpetually dissatisfied
and can't derive any contentment from his relationships. And that
line really struck me as being profoundly sad. But it
seems like that explains him in a lot of ways,
Like he's a self destructive person in his own life
and and I think in a lot of ways in

(08:56):
his relationships, there's something in him that just has to
kind of throw a monkey wrench into even a good situation.
He definitely thrives on chaos, and for the reason you mentioned,
probably just attention seeking behavior. And it shows up again
and again, and then you add tragedy later on, as
we'll see when we talk about the depth of one
of his girlfriends, that's just catastrophic and that sends him
off down this this horrific trail of drug abuse and

(09:18):
uh and personality clashes. But but that's why he's so
good on Twitter, you know, because he's a he loves
attention like that is like a godsend for somebody like him.
If only Twitter had existed in nineteen sixty nine, maybe
a lot of this could have been avoided. Can you
imagine I mean mcgwinn and cross now on Twitter pretty hilarious,
But can you imagine them in like sixty sixty seven

(09:39):
going at it talking about like, you know, tryad or something.
Well Crosby blocked mcgwyne did on Twitter. Yeah, because I
think Well mcgwinn is a born again Christian he was
trying to preach to Crosby. So you know, maybe you
could say Crosby was justified in that respect. But yeah,
I mean that's another rival where we could talk about
Crosby and mcgwinn, but you know, we digress, which to

(10:00):
get back to the csn Wine story. Absolutely, okay, So
across It's sixties six he meets Graham Nash. Of course,
the person who introduces them, the the sort of the
leading light, the patron saint of Crosby, Stills, Nash and
Young is Mama Cass, Mama Cass Elliott of the Moms
and the Papas she introduces Graham, she she was a
real anglophile in the sixties and when the Hollies came

(10:21):
to town, Graham Nash's band. Uh, she said, I really
want you to meet my my friend Crosby, David Crosby.
So she drives him up to his little bungalow and
Laurel Canyon and uh and Crosby has this real, like
very very visceral first impression of Crosby just sort of
laying on the couch rolling joints without even looking. He
can just do it just by touch and Karen on
full conversations with people, and I thought, I remember in

(10:43):
Graham's book that was the first time he ever got high,
which sounds kind of crazy, but I don't know. I like,
I'd like to believe that Cross was the guy who
got him high for the first time. Maybe I'm wrong.
They became pretty close. They hit it off, and they
would visit each other when they were in their respective cities,
and they both kind of occupied similar roles in their band.
Graham was really fed up with his lot in the Hollies,
who were hugely successful and incredible harmony band, probably one

(11:07):
of the most lightweight British invasion groups that I can
think of. Great great pop. I mean songs like carry
Anne with that kick ass steel drum solo like bus Stop,
incredible songs, but they weren't really They didn't have a
lot of lyrical and emotional half and Graham just all
about harmony right right. And Graham was trying to sort
of push them forward. He wrote a song called King
Midas in Reverse in sixty seven, which was a little

(11:29):
bit deeper. It was kind of like, you know, everything
he touched turns to stone, everything he touched. That's how
he sort of felt about the pop world at that time.
He was at a very unhappy part in his point
in his life, and you know, pop songs are generally
happy if they're not about like a breakup or something,
and there's the song sort of about existential angst and uh,
with this really complex production arrangement. It almost sounds like

(11:51):
Strawberry Fields or something. It's big, elaborate orchestral thing, and
the song tanked, sort of confused their listeners, and Crosby
had sort of gone through that himself and the Birds.
He had a song, his first Bird's A side was
called Lady Friend, and it was very different than the
Bird's material. It was sort of louder and faster and
rocky or it sounded like sort of like a totally
different band, and that also tanked. So they both were

(12:14):
kind of like trying to pull their bands forward in
just in a musical sense, and helped them progress, and
the fans and the rest of the band weren't really
going for it. And in the same way that the
Birds passed on David's triad, the Hollies were passing on
some of Graham's newer songs like Mary Cash Express. They
tried to do with the Hollies, and they just weren't
feeling it and they abandoned it, so they had a
lot to talk about. It's funny to me that like

(12:35):
Mary Cash Express was considered like two for the Hollies,
because that's like a pretty lightweight song, just like whoa,
this this is two edgy Man, This is like two revolutionary.
This song about like, you know, going to Markesh and
having like this fun adventure. So yeah, when you look
at the early days of CSN, Crosby is certainly I
think the pivot point between Nash and Skills, Like he's

(12:57):
bringing these guys together because while he's hanging out with
Graham Nash, he's also getting to know Steven Stills, and
at that time, Steven Stills of course was one of
the main artistic forces in Buffalo Springfield. Who I think
in many ways you could say we're a rival band
or maybe even like a successor band to the Birds.
They came around a little bit later. They were starting

(13:19):
to become this hip local band at a time when,
as we said before, the Birds were starting to fade
a little bit, and Crosby being this attention seeking glory
hound essentially, you know, he knew what time it was,
and he started cozying up to Buffalo Springfield and he
actually ended up playing with that band at the Monterey
Pop Festival because Neil Young, the other main creative force

(13:42):
in that band, he started flaking out around this time.
He he didn't want to play Monterey Pop. He famously
bailed before a high profile appearance on The Johnny Carson
Show when Buffalo Springfield would have been the first rock
band to ever play on Carson. Neil Young basically bailed
before they were supposed to tape that, which would of
course be very precient for how Neil Young would would

(14:03):
behave in the future. So he's starting to cozy up
the Stills and and they're starting to talk about also
having some sort of musical union. And can I just
say that, like, Steven Stills is like my favorite member.
You said at the start that David Crosby is is
your guy in this group. I'm a huge Stills fan.
And uh, we'll talk more about that in our next
episode because Steven Stills is going to be the focal

(14:24):
point that time. But yeah, I mean it is it
fair to say that Crosby is most responsible for these
guys coming together, I would say, so, yeah, I mean
he he Instills, we're trying to make a duo after
after Crosby got fired from the Birds and Stills uh,
and after Buffalo Springfield was done, they were a duo
called the Frozen Noses, which is a a cocaine reference,

(14:45):
which is some nice foreshadowing there. Um, it's like pretty
early to to be making a cocaine fan like sixty eight,
like they were ahead of the curve. They were doing
blow before a lot of people, and they would do
more blow than a lot of people as the seventies
unfold through using pioneers. That's absolutely true. Yeah, I would
say that. I mean because I Stills didn't really know

(15:05):
Graham very well. But there's a famous story and before
Graham left the Hollies, this would have been I think
in February of sixty eight, the Hollies came to l
A and play at the Whiskey and Go Go, and
Stephen and Cross showed up as kind of like cheerleaders.
They would later say they were in the front row
cheering and getting everybody all pumped for the Hollies, who were,
you know, not that cool of a band. And after
the Hollies did their show. They all crammed into Still's car.

(15:28):
Still's Crosby and Graham, and they're they're driving around talking
and I guess Graham went to the bathroom or something
and and Crosby goes to Stills and says, okay, which
one of us is going to get him? They both
wanted to work with Graham early on, but yeah, I
think that Cross was definitely the lynch pin between the two. Yeah,
and there's that famous story where I feel like it's
changed depending on who's telling it about like the first

(15:49):
time that they sang together. I've heard that it was
like Mama Cass's house. I've heard it was at Joni
Mitchell's house. I don't know if there's like a definitive
version of that story. All I knows that they started
playing the song you Don't Have to Cry, which was
a Stephen Stills song and ended up on the first
Crosby Stills in Nash record, And it seems like they
hit upon that like iconic harmony sound pretty quickly. Yeah.

(16:11):
I always love the fact that for a band that
fought so much, they can't even agree on the first
time they sang together, which you would would think. They
all have very very like like photographic style memories of
how they believed it went down, and they're all different,
all three or different. The one that's most commonly said
it was a Joni Mitchell's house. Graham had just come
from London, right from the airport and he arrived there
and and Stephen and David were there and they wanted

(16:33):
to play some of their their Frozen Noses material for
their friend Graham, and he asks them to sing the
song you Don't Have to Cry again, and he's listening
to it, and then Graham asks him to sing the
song a third time, and Cross and Stephen are like,
what the hell is he want? You know, what's he doing? Like,
I know the song is good, but three times on
the row? Jesus. So they start singing in a third
time and Graham has capped the lyrics by this point,

(16:55):
and he sings and he adds his top level harmony,
and yeah, they would always say that Crosby stills in Nash,
which is born in that moment at this at this
little dinner party at Joni or Mama Cass's house, depending
on who's telling the story. And yeah, that was really
where it started. Yeah, And you know, speaking of Joni Mitchell,
she was involved with David Crosby early on. He ended
up like producing her first record. They were sort of

(17:16):
a thing. I don't know how serious that was, but
it was at least a fling of some sort. And
then Graham Nash comes along. And Graham Nash, you know,
I've read a lot of CSNY books. He has this
reputation for being a ladies man, essentially, like he's got
the British accent. He's a pretty good looking guy. He
is not a raging egomaniac, at least not to the
degree that the other guys in the band are. So

(17:37):
he's like pretty charming and sensitive and he swoops in
and he ends up just sweeping Joni Mitchell off her feet.
So it seems like Crosby was fairly cool with that.
He's like not really protested about that too much over
the years. But again, you see like this is another
sort of premonition of what's going to happen in this band,
because there's going to be other conflicts over women that

(17:59):
occur in this group. But you know, it's fascinating about
the name of the band is that you know they
weren't the Birds, they weren't Buffalo Springfield, they didn't adopt
like a band moniker. They put their names in the
name of the group. And that was a very deliberate
decision because they were all used to being in bands
and all of the ups and downs that you experience

(18:21):
and things like that, and also knowing that when you
are in a band, if someone leaves, it's very easy
to replace them. And the idea was that we're going
to put all of our names in the title of
the band, because no one is replaceable, and it also
shows that we're all individuals at the same time. I
have to say too that you know, again looking ahead

(18:42):
that I feel like that band name benefit of David
Crosby the most, especially as we look ahead to the
nineteen eighties, because during that time he became a real
liability in the group where on their records they were
subbing in other singers for him essentially, but like they
had to put his name on the title card or
they couldn't get record deals essentially. So you know, it's

(19:04):
like if they hadn't have been called that, you know,
if they had just been the Frozen Noses or something,
ye know, I wonder if Crosby would have been the
first one replaced. Wow. Yeah, that's a good point too,
because I always view their name as sort of almost
like you say that it was a way to sort
of protect them and make sure that they were all none,
no one was expendable. I almost thought it was the opposite,
where it made the band a lot more amorphous and

(19:26):
people could sort of come and go as they please
and like, Okay, oh, maybe this next album is gonna
be Stills in Nash, or maybe the next one is
gonna be Crosby and Nash, or maybe the next one
is gonna be Stills and Crosby. And I almost thought
of it as being sort of like an open relationship
because they both they all had had such horrible experiences
in their prior bands, and that this was sort of
like a way of not labeling the band. It was

(19:46):
just themselves and the next, you know, the next time around.
Then I guess this would happen in the seventies too,
with the Steels Young Band and all the La Crosby
Nash albums and stuff, So I guess it worked both
ways to it protected them as a as an entity
that they weren't replaceable, but it also made the band
a lot more fluid. All right hand, We'll be right
back with more rivals. So as we head into that

(20:15):
first record, that icon of Crosby Stills a Nash record
where they're all sitting on the couch in front of
that house uh in Los Angeles, I feel like we
maybe should dig deeper into that in our Stills episode
because Stills really was the driving force of that record,
and obviously Crosby and Nash made vital contributions in terms
of their songs, you know, with Crosby specifically the songs

(20:38):
Guenevere he co wrote Wooden Ships, He was a writer
on Long Time Gone, obviously a big part of that record.
But it seems like the making of that record was
relatively smooth because Stills was the one in charge and
Crosby and Nash were willing to go along with what
he was doing. And then things started getting a little
weird when they had to come around to touring because

(20:59):
Steals played all the instruments on the record essentially, and
then they had to bring in another musician to you know,
sort of round out their life sound. And that's how
Neil Young ended up in the band. And that's a
huge drama. I feel like that's more of a still
centered drama, though, I mean, do we want to get
into that in this episode too? Yeah, that's definitely more
about Stills. Like I love how Skills would later refer

(21:19):
to Neil as the snake, as the snake that they
led into their like Laurel Canyon, Garden of Eden. It's
pretty unfair. I don't know, it's like, you know, you
invited him first of all, well, you know, And I
don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but I feel
so bad for Stills on some level because I feel
like Neil Young has traumatized him many many times, like

(21:41):
in their relationship, even though now they seem like pretty cool,
you know. Again, like it seems like the other guys
in this band at this point all like each other,
and the thing that unites them is hating Crosby, Like
they all hate Crosby, or at least like they're distracted
by their other. Like if Skills does have feuds with
Young or vice versa, it's not taking precedence over like

(22:03):
the anti Crosby sentiment at this time. But again, that's
we're getting ahead of ourselves. There's so much to discuss
in this story. I think next in this timeline with Crosby,
we have to talk about the Christine Hinton story. Is
his girlfriend who died? Was that in sixty nine, Yeah,
that was right before they started recording Deja Vu. And
I mean, just this absolutely heartbreaking story. I mean, she

(22:25):
was Crosby's this is gonna sound terrible, his main girlfriend.
He obviously he was very into the free love thing
at this time, but very very very close to her
and loved her a great deal. And she was I
guess driving a VW bus with some kittens that they
had either rescued or just got to the vet. And
one of the kittens scratched her, and she instinctively swerved
the wheel and swerved across the center lane and drove

(22:46):
into uh, into oncoming traffic. And what a weird way
to to die. I'm sorry. It's like, that's why I'm
a dog person. It's the most flower child way to die.
It's his heartbreaking. It's like a it's like if Stephen
King wrote like a child story or something. It's like
a very Stephen King type thing. It's awful. And she
was twenty one years old. Oh, she was just a kid. Yeah,

(23:08):
and Crosby. Really that I think is the thing that
sent him off into this this path that would lead
to free basic cocaine on the side of the stage.
And he would say in his in the documentary from
two thousand nineteen, Remember My Name, he would say, there
was just this emptiness after she died. It was like
a rip in the fabric in an empty place, and
it leaves a big hole where you just want to

(23:28):
fill it. And he would spend much of the next
two decades just kind of filling it with with heroin
and cocaine. He said it was it was a pain killer.
It really just numbed him and helped him pretend that
nothing had happened that really, I mean, he was in
really rough shape. I guess Graham and Mama Cass took
him to London for a while trying to get his
mind off things, and they wouldn't even let him go
to the bathroom on his own. He was basically on

(23:50):
like suicide watch at that that period, and this spilled
over into sessions for Deja Vu, and he was just
really barely functional, like in tears on the mic. Yeah,
and you know, and keep in mind, you know, the
first Crosby, Stills and Nash record comes out and it's
a huge hit, and you know, there's there's stories about
how that album was essentially like the soundtrack of Los

(24:11):
Angeles in nine, Like you couldn't go into a head
shop or the grocery store anywhere in l A without
hearing those songs over and over again. So they're a
huge band. They're the biggest band in America basically at
that time. So there's a lot of anticipation for Deja Vu.
Of course, they've added Neil Young into the mix, and
Neil Young really wasn't that big of a star yet.
He would become a big star because of his association

(24:34):
with this band. But as they're recording that record in
contrast with the first album, which again it seems like
that would relatively smooth, you know, there was the novelty
of working together. It seems like they weren't arguing as much.
Now they're go into Deja Vu, and it's the old
story about you know, people getting a little bit of
money and notoriety. The ego start coming into play. You
have Neil Young entering the picture and he has a

(24:55):
much different way of working. He's challenging Steven Still's authority again,
We're going to get it warned that in our next
episode the Skills versus Young psychodrama going on. But as
it pertains to Crosby, it seems like Stills like he
was not all that understanding of like the pain that
Crosby was going through at this time. Like Stills is
like this perfectionist taskmaster and he is um just making

(25:20):
Crosby go through the paces on the record. He's demanding perfection,
Like I think on the title track, he made Crosby
play that song like a hundred times, like they did
a hundred takes of that song. It's a very tricky
time signature. And there was also the conflict over almost
Cut My Hair, where Stills was just like the song
is too sloppy, and also I have to say that,
like I don't know how you feel about this almost

(25:42):
cut my Hair. I kind of like that song, but
it's also like pretty dumb like song lyrically, like that
line where he's like, must be because I had the
flu for Christmas and I'm not feeling up to par
it increases my paranoia, like looking out my mirror and
seeing a lit up and he says police car. It's like,
come on, dude, but anyway, you know. But at the

(26:03):
same time it's like, hey, Stills, go easy on cross here. Man.
He's like just lost his Girlfriend's a pretty terrible time
for him. In his very Still's way, he tried to
kind of make a man's He wrote him a song
called Do for the Others, which I don't think didn't
wind up in the album. I said, I don't know where.
It might have been a bonus track later on, where
he wrote it for Crosby to sing, and it was
basically about It had lines portrays Crosby as cries with

(26:25):
the misery lies singing harmony before coaxing him to borrow
the life of his brothers. Was kind of like, you know,
lean on your brothers for strength kind of song, which
was his way of trying to distract Crosby. I guess
you could say with work, which is a very Stills
thing to do, and even get him back on the
mic with something that he might might relate to. I mean,
I always, whenever I think of their relationship, I think

(26:46):
of that footage that is in Every Crosby Stills, a
Nash documentary of Crosby in a hammock, just kind of
lying there with a joint hanging out of his mouth
and Stills hanging over him, just being like, I'm not
going to give it an inch to fear. You know,
I've been waiting for you for two days. You ask
whole he's just like brating Crosby. I don't know what
caused the fight, but I can use my imagination that
they're working. Methods are so different. I mean, still, he said,

(27:09):
is the guy who was in the studio for eighteen
hours a day or or you know, and then later
in the seventies, well not even that. I mean from
what I've read, it was like twenty four hours a day.
Like he would go on these benders like where he
would be in the studio around the clock for like
five days, and like engineers would come in and out
of the studio essentially because he would not stop working.
I mean, I've seen that confrontation you're talking about, and

(27:30):
I just look at it as like an example of
two different types of drugs at work. Like to me,
Crosby is pure weed, you know, he's on the hammock,
and Stills is just like uncut merk cocaine, you know,
just a hundred miles an hour, and uh, you know
that's going to come into the But the other thing
with Cross at this time too, And I wanted to

(27:50):
get your take on this because you know, we both
have seen the documentary. Remember My Name came out in
nineteen like really great documentary about David Crosby. One of
the things that struck me about that movie though, is that,
like they spent a lot of time talking about the
song Ohio, which ended up you know, that came out
in of course, right after the Kent State shooting and uh,
ended up being this iconic Crosby Still's Nation Young song.

(28:12):
But I feel like Crosby whenever he talks about that song,
it's almost like he wants to take partial credit for
writing it, because he always tells a story about like
how he told Neil Young that he should write a
song about this, and like he showed him. I think
it was like the cover of Life magazine with the
Kent State like famous Kent State photo. I don't know.
I just look at that like as another example of
him maybe kind of glombing onto something that someone else did,

(28:34):
because because Neil Young wrote that song, like David Crosby
didn't write that song, But I mean, am I being
too hard on him? Though? In that respect. To hear
Cross tell it, he makes it sound like he's spoon
fed the lyrics to Neil who just kind of like
basically edited it and they went from there. But yeah,
Cross always makes it seem like it was his idea.
He made the call, Okay, we should all say something,
get into the studio right now, we're gonna We're gonna

(28:54):
work this out right now. I don't think it really
went down like that, but I think that that that
song I think more or than definitely more than like
almost cut My Hair or something like that, or A
Long Time Gone, which is written after OURFK was killed.
I think Ohio cemented csn Y as politicized. They weren't
just like kind of Laurel Canyon hippies, like flower children
like it actually made them figures that stood for something.

(29:15):
And I think as the years went on, the reputation
of the song Ohio is grown for that reason that
that so much of the substance of Crosby, Stills, Nash,
and Young rests on that, and I can see why
Crosby would want to have a piece of that legacy
and be responsible for it because that was their platform, right,
And I think he does deserve credit for, like you said,
like he was um, I think the driving force and

(29:36):
recording that song so quickly and getting it out and
there's that part at the end of the song where
he starts yelling how many more and you can hear
the emotion in his voice, and that is I think
the emotional peak of that song. I think you're right though,
in terms of like their political reputation, Ohio is like
a big reason why people look at them as you know,
being like protest singers. And I do think that's that's

(29:58):
probably the best protest song outside of maybe Fight the
Power by Public Enemy of like the last fifty years.
I mean, that's an incredible song. But when I think
about David Crosby, like his musical sensibility, I think more
about like his first solo record, If I Can Only
Remember My Name, which I think is like one of
the great like vibe records of all time. Like you

(30:19):
put that album on and you feel like, Okay, I
know what it was like to be super high in
l A in one, and you know the strength of
that record is not lyrics. I mean, there's like songs
that don't even have lyrics. It's just like Crosby saying
like la la la the entire song. Like literally, I
think it's like a couple of songs like that on
that record. But um, I actually think that's a strength

(30:40):
of that album, Like it doesn't need a lot of lyrics. Again,
it's more about like the feeling in the vibe of it.
And you know, it's a hammock record. It's the perfect
record to have on when you're in a hamm It.
It is gorgeous. I mean, yeah, the song without Words,
oh my god laughing is incredible. And then of course
you've got the Cowboy Song, which is like an eight
minute or nine minute like mythical retelling of the Crosby, Stills,

(31:03):
Nash and Youngest story to date, which is pretty hilarious too.
But oh my god, Yeah, that album is gorgeous. And
he got some incredible people on there too, right, I mean,
he got Nash and Young, he got Jerry Garcia, got
Joni Mitchell. I think he had members of of Santana
and Jefferson Airplane on there. The thing that's amazing to
know about that album too, is that it was really
done to kind of help him through the grief of

(31:25):
losing Christine Hinton too. So to hear this beauty that
he made from this really really dark place kind of
makes it all the more astonishing. Yeah, exactly. And you
know it's interesting too that like Crosby was making a
solo record at that time and all the other guys
were making solo records because essentially, after you know, making
the first Crosby Stills a Nash record and they put
out Deja Vu, which ended up being an enormous hit.

(31:46):
You know, they went on that tour in nineteen seventy,
and it seems like that was a pretty miserable tour,
and like, I think after that tour and seventy they
were like, Okay, we need to be a part, we
need to make our own records now. Yeah, I'm kind
of amazed that that tour didn't like finish off the
group for good forever, or at least for like, you know,
forty years or something. It was it was pretty miserable.
Steven Stills had fired their bassist for reasons that were

(32:10):
really like basically political, because he was getting tight with Neil.
Neil retaliated by demanding that they fired the drummer who
was type with Stephen. This led to a huge fight
with Cross and Neil. There was a opening night on
the tour UM. I guess Stills had gotten into a
he fell off a horse, right, he fell out a horse,
and he came on stage with like a body cast

(32:31):
or something, or on crutches. He was on crutches and
he was just like out of it all night. And
I'm guessing we'll probably get in this more on the
Stills episode that he kind of felt his hold on
the group slipping, and he was just all over the place,
like he's backing Neil on on helpless and like playing
piano and just like played all over him. And then
when Crosby goes to introduce Stills for a solo set,

(32:54):
Stills is just like nowhere to be found. It was, Yeah,
a miserable tour came to a head in New York
when Um every band member had a little mini solo
set in their show. I think they did like two
songs a piece, and during this one night, Stills just
like kept going and that really piste off the rest
of the band. I think there was like a physical
like battle royal backstage after the show was over, and yeah,

(33:17):
that really kind of like is a defining moment of
that tour, I think, And um, what's worse that Stills
and Graham are fighting over a woman? They were fighting
over Rita Coolidge, the incredible singer who Crosby and this
might have just been the cocaine or really bad weed
either or believed it to be some government agent that
was sent by Nixons. Yeah, yeah, perfectly reasonable. I think

(33:40):
he was stone called sober when he came up with that.
I mean, I think that seems pretty you know, on
the on the money. Yeah, he's like terrified of It's like, man, like,
can you imagine being a woman coming into this situation,
like these poor women that had to deal with these
like lunatics, because yeah, like Stills was into Rida Coolidge,
but she was more into Nash. And then like the
other guy, think that you're you know, like Jacker Hoover.

(34:02):
You know, it's just like insane. But I don't know,
I mean I feel like in a way, like you
know that that CSN y Um world, it had this
like inherent toxicity that didn't necessarily translate like when say,
like Crosby and Nash worked together because like they actually
end up making a bunch of records together, David Crosby
and Graham Nash like through the early seventies that I

(34:24):
think are actually like pretty good, Like the first one
in particular, Graham Nash. David Crosby is what it's called.
I think has some great songs on it, like Southbound Train,
Page forty three, Frozen Smiles, a bunch of really good songs.
And it seems like those two guys had a genuine
friendship that I don't know if like that they had
with the other guys in the bands. Yeah, Like I

(34:46):
feel like those two guys um really liked each other,
and also they just worked together musically. Their voices of course,
just fit together so well. I mean that is really
the core of like that harmony sound. I mean, like
Stills I think is like I think pretty clearly the
third best singer out of those three guys. I mean,
like his voice I think has some cool qualities to it.

(35:06):
Like I said, I'm a huge Stills fan, But in
terms of just like pure harmony, you can't beat Crosby
and Nash. And you know, as we said at the top,
we're not doing a separate episode on Nash because I
think Nash is like the nicest guy in this band.
He hasn't really instigated a lot of conflicts. Although in
a way, I feel bad that we're doing what I

(35:28):
think a lot of people overlook Nash when they look
at this band, like they don't give him his props
for essentially like writing their biggest hits and you know,
being like the pop star essentially in the group. But
I think another reason why we're not talking about Nash
separately is that him and Crosby they had like a
lot of their adventures together until of course they ended
up having a very decisive break later on, which we'll

(35:50):
get to later in this episode. But it seems like
like throughout the seventies you just see this like sort
of off and on thing of like csn Y getting
back together and falling apart, and around seventy three seventy
four they started to come back together again. Yeah, they're commercial.
Like fortunes had kind of fallen. Uh Stills had just
done the second Manassas album, which was kind of everyone

(36:11):
viewed as sort of a disaster. Graham Nash's second solo album,
Wild Tales, kind of got ripped apart Crosby didn't have
another solo album for many years, I believe Um and
then Neil's post Harvest work wasn't selling up the expectations,
so they they ended up reuniting in um in mauiuh
to try to work on very early stages of a

(36:33):
new Crosby Stills Nation Young album that they tentatively called
Human Highway, which has become sort of semi mythical for
its uh it's almost like their Smile. There's just tons
of songs that were up for consideration at that point.
Also extremely dysfunctional. I the sessions kind of fell apart.
Graham suspects some kind of weird cocaine deal thing that

(36:53):
that went awry, but yeah, it's just that they ended
up going their separate ways until they came together the
next year for what's been called the doom To, which
was when oh my god, well because those are the
year after Bill Graham that the music and Pissario got
back the road. I think I think the Dylan and
the band were early in seventy four, and then this

(37:16):
Crosby Stills Nation Young tour was like the summer and
it was like I think it was like the first
stadium tour. Like there have been stadium shows that you know,
the Beatles obviously played some shows that's Shade Stadium in sixties,
like Grand Funk Railroad played at Shay, But like in
terms of like a series of stadiums, I'm pretty sure
that the Doom Tour was the first example of that.

(37:40):
And yeah, I mean this was it just became synonymous
with like excess in the seventies, not only because of
what the musicians were doing backstage, including like David Crosby.
Like wasn't this the period like Crosby was like traveling
with with two women at once and like like he
basically just had like a harem around him. That was

(38:00):
like he didn't even try to hide it, like he
was just known that he was like having like you know,
like three way sex every night essentially. It's just like
that was like his you know every night in the
middle of me I think that people he would come
in and like talk to people and then like midway
through the conversation that people would realize that that he
was getting a like a blow job underneath the table

(38:20):
or something like that. Like that that level of depravity,
I believe is what we're talking with Cross at this era.
I mean, the phrase cocaine fueled gets tossed around a lot,
but I think that's really the only way to put
it for this tour. I mean, it was really this
is the one where he like freaked out a hotel
manager because his room is too breezy. I think I
think this was the same era. Yeah, my favorite part

(38:42):
is that, I mean for all the excess, and there's
stories of them like spilling cocaine on rugs and then
all falling to their knees and huffing the rug and
stuff like that. The item that all the members tend
to site for being like the ultimate excess of this
tour are these SI pillow cases where they had Joni
Mitchell's illustration embroidered on them, And I'm just like, yeah,
I mean I'm sure that cost some money. But like,

(39:03):
how about the time like Still's got a private jet
to like fly in his favorite years. Course he wanted
six packs, of course, so he like charted a private
jet and had like Cours brought to him. And I
think like in the seventies, Cours was maybe sort of
like a like a more of a boutique beer. But still, yeah,
that's just insane extravagance. Yeah, there's a there's a figure

(39:25):
that like they made something like eleven million dollars from
this tour, but because of all the expenses that they incurred,
that each guy only made like maybe you know, a
couple hundred thousand dollars, you know, Like so like they
expected this to be like a big windfall. But you know,
it's that old story about like when you put a
bunch of expensive things on your writer as a band,
the then you charges you for that. Yeah, like you

(39:47):
paid so Yeah, I had like the fancy meals by chefs,
and like the private jets and like the silk embroidered
pillow cases and like all these unnecessary expenses. You know,
it just killed them and they go from there to
try to make another record. I feel like there's like
several aborted attempts to like to make another record, Like
didn't they try to do Human Highway again after the

(40:10):
Doom tour, Yeah, which is such a huge tactical error.
I mean, if you can't get back together in the
studio after years apart and have tensions flare up, you
don't want to do it after being on the road
for two or three months. In you know, relatively confined space.
I mean, that was just a bad idea from the star.
They Yeah, they tried to do Human Highway again. I
think they went to I think it was a grand

(40:32):
um at Neil Young's Broken Arrow Ranch and Crosby and
Nash started fighting with Stills almost immediately. They were arguing
about doing a harmony part on the Steven Still's song
Guardian Angel, and Still's got so angry that he took
the tape master of their song Wind on the Water
and just ripped it apart with the racer blamed. I
mean again, which at the beginning when I said that

(40:53):
these guys are bitchy divas, like, I was not joking,
like they're like, there are no divas bigger than these guys.
Just insane behavior that they would do that. The story
that gets me is about the long May You Run record,
which started out as a Steven Skills and Neil Young album.
They were going to make a duo record, and this
was at the same time that Crosby and Nash were

(41:14):
making a record called Whistling Down the Wire and uh,
you know, Stills and Young are working together, and they
eventually decided, hey, let's bring Crosby and Nash into the fold.
So they end up recording vocals for this Stills Young record,
and there's an idea I think for a moment that
this might become a csn Y record. Um, but then
like I forget what the particulars were exactly, but it

(41:35):
was decided that no, we're not going to make this
a CSNY record, We're going to keep it as Stills
Young record. Crosby and Nash left to kind of finish
their own record, and then like Young decided to wipe
their vocals, Crosby and Nash's vocals off this record. Like
why did he decide to do that? Like was there
some fight or something. Well, I think that Cross and
Graham were called back by the label like okay, you

(41:56):
gotta finish your record and start promoting this. So I
think that they were called the It wasn't that they
stormed out at so Young was just mad that they
left it. Sounds like that, Yeah, it was just so
pissed that they left in them. You know, maybe not
the middle of it, but like when it wasn't completed
yet that he wiped their vocals. Again, let's let's repeat.
Neil Young was upset that someone left early, Like, you know,
can we just like marinate in the irony of that

(42:18):
for a moment here? Uh, you know, like Neil Young,
of all people, I feel like you should understand if
like someone has to leave a project early, but at
any rate, he's mad, he wipes their vocals off the record,
and like Crosby and Nash I think understandably are very
piste off about that, and they're like, basically, screw these guys,
We're not going to work with them again. Uh, but
that was not true because they were back in the

(42:40):
studio was Still's like very soon after that to work
on the CSN record from seventy I think it was
like months later. I mean, Neil famously crushed still spirit
by leaving him in the middle of the Still's Young
band tour with the famous you know, funny how things
that starts spontaneously in the same way eat a peach
Neil telegram. Yeah, we're gonna get into that a lot

(43:02):
in our next episode. Neil Young just like traumatizing Steven
Stills over and over again. But yeah, like he ditches Stills,
and Stills is like I think Stills at one point
that like, you know, like my life is over, or
like my career is over. I have no future, have
no future. He like, you know, basically like Hanks tail
and goes back to uh, Crosby and Nash and they

(43:25):
make this record CSN, and I feel like you and
I disagree about this a little bit. I actually really
like the CSN record from seventy seven. It's the one
where they're on the yacht and it's like it's a
literal exactly the yacht with the yacht rock. Then because
it's very smooth, it's very soft rock. It's very I
think emblematic of like nineteen seventy seven, which was the
year of rumors by Fleetwood Mac Hotel, California by the

(43:48):
Eagles ended up. I think that came out at the
end of seventy six, but it was like a huge
seller in seventy seven. And I really look at CSN
is like the third record of that, like l a
rock triumvirate um. You know, you've got great songs on there.
You like Shadow Captain, which I think it's like one
of the best David Crosby songs. That's like one of
my favorite Cross songs for sure. And you know, like

(44:10):
Steven Still's dark Star. I think it's a great song.
I actually really like the soft rock Graham Nash song
just a Song Before I Go. I appreciate that for
what it is. I really feel like that's maybe like
their last great record. But I don't know, what, do
you think, You're not as big into that album now?
For me, that was that just felt like, I mean,
in a way, I understand that it makes sense that

(44:32):
they embraced the whole yacht rock thing. I mean because
I feel like the success of their first two records
kind of laid the groundwork for all the the sort
of l a excess that was the common the seventies,
so it kind of makes sense that they ended up there.
But I don't know something about it. It It feels to
me like that was the moment when they started becoming
more of a nostalgia act. I mean, the soft rock

(44:52):
sound for them, it felt like it felt too easy.
I don't know, it's not. I prefer the Laurel Canyon
kind of more acoustic vibe to the the just a
Song Before I Go or Cathedral. I do like Shadow Captain.
That is a great song, but I don't know, just
the soft rock thing kind of bums me out with
them in the same way that like Hotel California makes
me uncomfortable because it does has that l a excess

(45:15):
cocaine paranoia vibe. And when I think of CSN Y,
I don't want to think of that. I want to
think of them in like, you know, in a Hammock
and Laurel Canyon, this sort a hippie idyllic setting, And
so maybe that's why it just makes me said. It's
like later seasons of Mad Men, when you see everybody's
kind of like it just looks bad, Like Pete Campbell's
got like the receding hairline and stuff, and they've got

(45:36):
all the like wide Paisley ties and stuff. It just
you think back to like how cool and slick and
everybody was in the earlier season. I think that's how
I feel about the CSN album. It just feels like,
you see how far they've come in this sort of
uncomfortable setting that they're in now, and it just makes
me nostalgic. I guess, well, if you think CSN marked
their declined, then I'm sorry to report that we've got

(45:57):
a long way to go down slope with these guys,
especially with David Crosby, because as we enter into the
late seventies and early eighties, this is the time where
Crosby really starts to fall into a bad way and
he discovers something that we like to call free basing
cocaine um, which is a terrible thing for anyone to do.
If you're listening, Uh, this is my p s A

(46:19):
announcement for this episode. Do not free base cocaine. Do
not really even snort cocaine. Avoid drugs if you can,
but do not be like David Crosby as he was
in the late seventies and early eighties, because yeah, he
was in terrible shape at this time. And I mean,
there's so many horrible stories that we could tell about
Crosby at this time. Again, like I alluded to this

(46:41):
earlier about how Crosby's habits became so bad at one
point that they had to set up like separate rooms
like in the studio or like offstage at concerts where
Cross could just go and literally smoke cocaine during shows
or like during recording sessions. Like he really was that
dependent this drug. And it seems like there were so

(47:02):
many instances, like through the eighties, like where he would
relapse and then maybe try to go to rehab and
then relapse again, like so many instances, Like I didn't
realize like how much like he like he was, like
how many opportunities he was given basically to recover and
then like when he got into legal trouble, he was
given many chances to avoid jail time and he just

(47:23):
could not stop smoking the rock no I mc graham
and UM and Jackson Brown stage an intervention at his
house and in the middle of the intervention, he ran
off to go to the bathroom to free base and
they caught him and that and that was when, you know,
they were just like Jesus Christ, like I kind of
give up. I mean, this is there's only so much
that you, as his friend, can do. Yeah, and even

(47:44):
his best friend Graham, they were trying to make a
duo album together and they were having a jam session.
It was going really well until uh crosses free base
pipe fell off an amp and fell on the floor
and broke, and then Crosby stopped the session and went
to go pick up the pieces and NSS. You know,
until that point, the music had always been first, regardless
of David's personal problems, but at this moment I knew

(48:06):
I couldn't work with them anymore. And so that's when
Nash and Still's got together to try to make Daylight Again,
which was their duo album with the two of them,
and the record company wasn't interested. They said, we'll get
cross me back in and we can talk, but at
this point we don't really want still That's what I think.
You know why I said that thing before about why
having each member's name in the band title really protected

(48:27):
them from being replaced, because you know, for all intensive purposes,
like Crosby like shouldn't have been on that record, Like
he was not in any condition to contribute to that album,
although he did actually end up adding a really great
song to that record called Delta, I think one of
the strongest songs on Daylight Again. But for the most part,
I mean, like he shouldn't have been making records, he
shouldn't have been touring. He should have been like, you know,

(48:49):
chained to a bed and like basically drying out and
and and straightening out his life. But because of the
power of the brand, like he was brought back into
the fold. Know, Crosby has talked about over the years
about how he felt like, yeah, I feel like those
guys cared about me, but I also know that they
had to pay their bills, and you know, if I

(49:10):
wasn't in the band, you know, they weren't going to
get the type of concert bookings or the kind of
record deals that they would get if it was a
Crosby Stills, a Nash record. I have to say too, though,
like when you listen to bootlegs from that time, Like
I have a bootleg of CSN from and St. Louis,
and that was like I think right around the time
that he went to jail, like pretty soon after that,

(49:31):
I think he went to prison. And again this is
in the middle of him like free basing cocaine during shows.
There's like this one example of like how like Crosby
left a show to free based cocaine and like I
think Stills through like a bucket of water on him
and then like Crosby walked out like drenched in water,
like he was like kind of dazed. Watching him on

(49:51):
stage in that area, like the live video for Southern Cross,
I mean, he just looks like he's got this thousand
yards he's not there. He just looks horrible. But like
if you listen to the bootlegs, it actually sounds pretty good.
Like I don't know, like how much cocaine you have
to smoke to ruin your voice, but like Crosby apparently
didn't get to that threshold because his voice steal sounds
pretty good even though he's like in a terrible way.

(50:12):
Like I said, I think, was it an eighty five
that he went to jail finally? I think, uh yes,
I think it was the end of eighty five. I mean,
he was a fugitive from the FBI. He liked soul
Blast like valuable item that he had, which was a piano,
and rented a plane to fly from California to Florida
to try to get to his yacht. When he gets there,
he's he was gonna basically take his yacht and just

(50:32):
spend the rest of his days at sea or something.
I guess he hadn't really fully thought that one through.
And then when he found his yacht, it was just
in total disrepair and unseaworthy after just years of neglect,
and he turned himself in and he went to prison
I think for about a year and nine months or
something like that, and he he detalks in prison, but
they didn't even give an aspurn or anything. He would say,
like he just completely went through all that just on

(50:53):
like a you know, a prison bench. And then when
he ended up performing for the first time sober and
like twenty years soon after got out in August of
eighty six and um, and he got back together with
CSN Line not long after. It was part of Neil
Young's promise. Basically they performed together. They did one song
at at Live Aid then it was it was a shambles,
and Neil basically said, look, Crosby, if you can get

(51:15):
your act together, I'll come back and we'll we'll do
something together. I wonder, like when Kneel Young said that,
if you actually like thought that Crosby, Like I just wonder,
because like when I read about that, it kind of
feels like one of those promises we were like, yeah, Crows,
if you survive, which ye right you won't, but like
if you do, yeah, sure, I'll play with you guys,
because like we'll talk and we'll get into this in

(51:36):
our Neil Young episode. But like he dissed those guys
so much over the years, and like he obviously had
his own thing going. I just feel like he wouldn't
have otherwise felt a strong compulsion to play with those
guys again. And and the results American Dream kind of
bears that out. Is not a lot of effort in there,
and he didn't even bother to tour it. Yeah, and
that record isn't great. And I mean, like when we

(51:57):
look at like the nineties records that like CSN put out,
Like I mean, like Live It Up. That record, which
is like one of the worst album covers of all time.
It's like it's a shot of the moon and there's
like these huge sticks and there's hot dogs on the sticks,
and then there's like it looks like there's like telephone
operators climbing the poles on the cover, and like you

(52:17):
see the planet Earth in the back. It's like it
makes no sense. Do you know what there is there
any kind of meaning to have you? I've not been
able to find anything. I would love to know. I
was just like, oh yeah, like okay, this this record
is called Live It Up. We're trying to assert that
we're still a relevant band. We've had some problems over
the years. What can we graphically use to represent our

(52:38):
sort of rising from the ashes if you will? Oh,
how about some hot dogs on sticks on the moon,
like oh yeah, perfect, perfect, Uh yeah, I don't know.
To me, it just seems like no one gave a shit,
and and that's how it is. That seems like the
only reasonable explanation. So that record is pretty bad. After
the storm came after that, that's like pretty good record.

(52:59):
It inc like relatively speaking, like if you if you
have little expectations, um, it's not too bad. Glenn John's
produced it. So I feel like a lot of these
CSN records like sound bad production wise, and I think
the production on that record is pretty good relatively speaking.
I remember being really disappointed by Looking Forward because that
was like the first cs N Y record since Deja Vu,

(53:21):
and like Neil Young had a great nineties and I
think I was expecting it to sound more like a
Neil Young record from the nineties, but like that's another
one where uh it just sounds kind of weak and
a little to sort of like adult contemporary. Well, I
think he came in late in the game and basically said,
oh yeah, I've got these two or three acoustic songs
you can just sort of like stick on it. And

(53:41):
then so it was really like a CSN plus y album.
I feel like there, I don't think there was a
lot of of collaboration going on there at all. It
seems like to like, you know, one of the big
splits that proved to be decisive in this band was
they were going to do a covers record with Rick Rubin. Um.
I think that was like a two thousand kind of like.
I think they had worked on it for a while

(54:02):
and like they couldn't get it together mainly because like
David Crosby didn't like Rick Rubin. Yeah, I guess he
thought Rick Rubin was like too much of an autocrat
to really work with. He just thought he completely owned
every element of the creative process and felt stifled. H
I know, I don't think any of them Have you
heard any of those tracks? I don't think any of
those tracks have ever. No, I haven't. I mean, like,

(54:24):
you know, like I won't respect you're like, oh, a
cover's record, Okay? That I mean that that kind of
speaks to artistic bankruptcy right there. But it's also like
kros like Rick Rubin, whatever you want to say about
the guy, he has been involved in like some pretty
high profile uh comebacks, you know, and you would think
that like a Rick Rubin CSN record, it's going to

(54:44):
get a lot more attention than like live it up
or after the storm, did you know? I think that
that would have given them a pretty good bump, but
they just couldn't get it together. But I feel like
that's just a precursor to like the big incidents that
involved David Crosby that ended up really sort of self
destructing this band. And it just, I mean, it boils
down to David Crosby talking like ship and interviews, right,

(55:07):
I mean, like at least with the Neil Young Darryl
Hannah story, it's maybe the pettiest example of the fighting
throughout this entire story, and the fact that it seems
to be like responsible for the longest lasting schism between
them all is blows my mind. You're right, It's just
David Crosby was given an interview. It was after Neil
divorced his wife Peggy, his wife of twenty nine years,

(55:29):
and he started dating actress Daryl Hannah, and David Crosby
in septem is giving an interview with the Idaho Statesman,
and apparently these quotes were supposed to be off the record.
That's what I later heard, but of course they were
so uh inflammatory that they were I guess put In
the interview, Crosby refers to Daryl Hannah as a purely
poisonous predator. Uh and and which you know you don't

(55:50):
say that about your friend's girlfriend, especially to an outlet,
even if it is like supposedly off the record. Neil
goes on Stay. Not long after this interview, Hit stands
and tells the concert go or CSM, I will never
tour again ever. Uh And soon after he makes that pronouncement,
Crosby confirms that that Neil is very angry with me,

(56:11):
and he goes on this big apology tour. He's apologizing
on Twitter, and he goes on Howard Stern and says,
you know, basically tries to make a man's sport. He says,
I'm screwed up, way worse than that girl. What do
I get off criticizing her? She's making Neil happy. I
love Neil and I want him to be happy. Darryl,
if you're out there, I apologize, Where do I get
off criticizing it? Yeah? But then he did the same
thing to Graham Nash. Like Graham Nash you know, ended
up leaving his wife, his longtime wife, Susan I think

(56:34):
her name was or Is, and he started dating woman
in her thirties, which you know, look, you can criticize
rock stars for doing that. It's a very rock star
thing to do. Um, but he is not the first. Yeah,
he's not the first to do it. And like David
Crosby is not in a position to judge other people.
But like apparently like he confronted Graham Nash about this
or didn't say something on stage even where he was like, well,

(56:55):
I'm you know, I haven't left my wife, you know,
like Graham over here like making a joe about it. Yeah,
I think he made he made a joke about like
Crosby stills Nash and always I'm the one who's keeping
to my marriage house right, which you know, by the way,
And again I'm not trying to be judgmental here, I'm
just bringing up as a fact that like the woman
that David Crosby is with Jan Dance, they've been together
for a long time, but like I think Crosby was

(57:17):
responsible for like getting her addicted to drugs for a
long time. They had to like go through rehab together
because they were in such a bad way, like they
were free basing essentially together, like you know in the
late seventies and early eighties. Uh so again, maybe don't
throw stones at people, especially at Graham Nash. Like again,
we've talked about how I feel like Graham Nash is

(57:37):
like the nicest guy in this band. Like one story
that I forgot to tell earlier is that when Crosby
was in such bad shape and uh you know it
was basically selling off everything in order to get money
for drugs, Graham Nash like very quietly bought Crosby Song Publishing,
I think grand and then when Crosby got cleaned up,

(57:57):
he sold the publishing back to Crosby, like basically bought
the publishing so Crosby couldn't sell it off for drugs,
which is like an incredible thing for a friend to do.
And I think it speaks to like what kind of
person Nashes and like how much he genuinely cared for Crosby.
So after all of the crap that Nash had to
put up with over the years, you know, for Crosby

(58:18):
now to like be given him shit about you know,
his relationship, it just must have been infuriating for him.
And I know, like he there's a couple interviews that
he's done. There's like one on YouTube where he is
just I rate about Crosby. He says, like he tore
the fucking heart out of the band, and like, you know,
like he distinguishes. He said, he tore the heart out

(58:39):
of CSN and he tore the heart out of CSN Y,
which uh is just brutal and like to see Graham
Nash of all people angry, it just shows like how
far he had been pushed, you know, over the course
of like fifty years. Oh yeah, he says, I've been
there and saved this ask for forty five years and
he's treating me like shit, and he's right, yeah, it's awful.
And so you know, I feel like the story now

(59:00):
that gets told is like the official end of the
band occurred at of all places, a Christmas tree lighting
ceremony at the White House, which it just goes to
show like the most innocuous setting, you know, even that
would be infused with drama by you know CSN, because
like they did this performance, what song were they doing?

(59:23):
It was like and like you know, there was some
issue with the monitors. They couldn't really hear each other.
And it's really I think it's on YouTube. I think
you can go on and watch it. It just sounds horrible.
I know Crosby has talked about that being the end
of the band. I don't know if they just kind
of realized at that point that, like, we're not sounding
very good. I mean, it sounds like there were all

(59:44):
these other conflicts as well, that we're bubbling under the surface.
That really kind of again, as Nash said, tore the
heart out of the band. Yeah, and the reference you
made the new Young saying that Cross should write a
book about like why all my friends hate me. That's
kind of where we're at now with Crosby. When he
put out his documentary Remember My Name in twenty nine team,
it comes across as this like massive apology tour dating
back to the Birds of like everyone he's ever piste off,

(01:00:06):
so he's very open about how he can be and
and now most recently he's just been sort of trying
to make amends and uh making over truths to the
others to to get the band back together for political purposes,
to do uh election stuff. I mean he's sort of
doing that, But then he also is you know, he
reiterates in every interview that he does that like he's

(01:00:26):
in the middle of this great creative renaissance right now, like,
which is true. Like I think his first record in
this run that he's put out lately was Crossed. I
think that came out and that was his first solo
record since if I could only remember my name, it
was like what is that? Like, you know, forty three
years after that record, and now he's just like put

(01:00:46):
out a record almost every year, like and each one
like really strong. Like I would say that Crosby, out
of all these guys right now, is making the best music,
like by far easily here if you listen, as an
incredible album. So I think he wants to get the
band that together. But he's also talked a lot about
how he was sick of playing the hits over and
over again and that he feels much more sort of
creatively satisfied on his own. So I don't know. Again,

(01:01:10):
I go back to what that you know that psychiatrist said, uh,
that was quoted David Brown's book that I think there's
a question quality to David Crosby. He's searching for contentment
and he still hasn't found it, and uh, you know,
maybe he's just sort of destined to be that kind
of guy. We're gonna take a quick break to get
a word from our sponsor before we get too more rivals. Okay,

(01:01:40):
so this is the part of the episode where we
talk about I guess the pro side of each part
of the rivelry. So I guess with Crosby. We'll look
at the pro Crosby case first. And I think, for me, like,
you know, Crosby is probably the most emblematic member of
the band, Like he looks the most like the sixties.
You know, he's got the bushy musta ash in the
long brown hair. I think he also in many ways

(01:02:03):
is like the most unique of the band in terms
of like his artistic sensibility. He has that sort of
jazzy quality to a lot of his music. He uses
like a lot of you know, weird tunings. He's not
really writing like the conventional pop songs that Graham Nash
writes or you know that amalgam of folk and blues
that Steven Stills is involved in. Crosby really has his

(01:02:24):
own sort of unique voice artistically, and again, you know,
he is making the best music right now. I think
his late career renaissance is incredibly impressive, you know, especially
in the midst of all the drama that he's been
in the middle of. You know, like he's really rededicated himself,
maybe more than he ever has in his life to
like making great music. And uh, you know, for an

(01:02:44):
artist his age, that's really commendable. Like he's definitely not
leaning on nostalgia. No, absolutely not getting back there. You
said earlier too, I mean, but what he brought musically
to csm Y, I feel like it's not discussed enough.
I mean, dejav and Guenevere, You're right, has this weird
sort of jazz influence. But I all the credit him
as being sort of the chief vocal arranger of the band,
and he came up with these all the really unique

(01:03:05):
harmony lines that aren't just like the normal chortal triads,
I mean, all going in in the same way that
he does weird guitar tunings. He would find really unique
ways to blend all their voices. That's so so interesting,
and it's funny that his voice is sort of the
least distinct I think of of the three. I mean,
you've got kind of stills anchoring it with this bluesy growl,
and then you've got um Nash's harmony like razor sharp

(01:03:29):
cutting through on top. He just kind of has this.
He's like the glue. I always thought vocally that holds
it all together. Were you almost don't notice it until
it's not there, and then it feels hollow. So yeah,
I think that the vocal work that the band is
known for, I really think he doesn't get enough credit for.
And you're right. I just think he's the soul and
spirit of the band. I feel like he brought the cred,
the coolness. I think that his social circle and being

(01:03:52):
kind of like, you know, the king of the l
A scene at that time, was really responsible for getting
the band, which obviously had a tremendous amount of talent,
to this higher level of the buzz that got everybody
was excited about this band. All the cool people in
l A. We're talking them up. They always talk about
how when they were playing Woodstock, they had everybody in
a semicircle behind them, Jefferson, Airplane, the Band, Hendrix all

(01:04:14):
kind of watching them with their arms folded, seeing what
they could do. I think the Crossby was a huge
part of that. I think because he was such a
key figure in that social scene that when they exploded,
they exploded even bigger because of that. So yeah, I
think that he's really the spirit of the band. So
when we go, I guess to the pro Stills, Nash
and Young side, or like the anti Crosby side of

(01:04:34):
this equation. Look, I think for me, if you look
at the story, it's pretty clear that Crosby is like
a major pain in the ass, and like if he
was your friend or he was in your band, yeah,
I don't think there's any reason why you would react
any differently than like Roger mcgwin did, or Graham Nash did,
or Neil Young or any of these people who came

(01:04:55):
to turn against him. As I said before, I think
there's something in David Crosby's personality that just craves attention.
You know that again is why he's so good on Twitter.
He always has to have people hanging on his every word,
and he feels bad if people aren't, you know, looking
at him and giving him praise. So in order to
do that, I just feel like he ends up hurting
the people around him. And I think in the Neil

(01:05:17):
Young story where he's like, you know, calling Darrell Hannah poisonous.
You know, I think that was him trying to be
a good interview. I think there was him trying to
be compelling and like not really thinking like what the
weight of his words would be, or like him making
a joke at Graham Nash's expense about his recent divorce.
It's like he's trying to be funny, you know, He's
trying to be provocative, and like he hurt the people

(01:05:37):
that were closest to him in the process of doing that,
and it just seems like he can't help himself. You know,
he can't help hurting those people, even if he might
know intellectually that it's like not the best thing for
him to do. So, you know, even in a band
like with as many egomaniacs in them as like C. S.
N Y, I feel like Crosby stands alone as like

(01:06:00):
the king egotist in this band. And um, while like
you said, I think it's helped the band a lot,
because yeah, he was the king of l A and
I think he was able to martial a lot of
resources because of that, it's also hurt him a lot,
and in a way, I feel bad for him, although
at the same time it's like he's brought a lot
of this on himself. Yeah, I was trying to figure
out if CSN would have continued in relative stability had

(01:06:24):
they not welcomed Young, and I think Young probably hastened
their demise a lot sooner. But I was trying to
figure out, like, would things have gone almost as smoothly
as they had for the first record that they made,
And I just was thinking of Crossby's personality and not
even to say his rug adiction, just his personality alone,
and thinking, yeah, no, there would have been problems there
fairly soon after, even Neil hadn't been in there, Cross

(01:06:44):
would have blown that ship up real quick. Yeah, and
he certainly blew up there. I guess Legacy era like
when they were touring and you know, you could say
that they weren't maybe terribly relevant creatively, but they were
still making a lot of money on the road. But again,
maybe that was a good thing. You know. I think
from Cross's perspective of as much as he might miss
those guys, he's also going to say like, well, I'm
making great records right now, you know, I'm looking forward

(01:07:05):
and uh, you know, so there's lots of ways to
look at that. But you know, when we look at
all these guys together and I guess, like, you know
what CROs brings uh to the table? I mean, I think, ultimately,
like Cross, like he is along with being the biggest
like egotists in the band, I think he is like
probably the biggest star I guess outside of Neil Young,
you know, like in terms of like the original three,

(01:07:27):
Crosby certainly now is the most famous out of there.
And as you said before, I think he made a
really good point about how like when you listen to
the vocal blend, you don't necessarily notice Crosby right away,
but like he is the glue of that harmony. And
I think the uniqueness of his talent and his ability
to be like a great compliment to the other people
in that band, you know, they just wouldn't have been

(01:07:48):
a CSN I think without Crosby. Yeah, I feel like
the band gave him the perfect set of parameters to
really excel and make good work because it was structured
enough to give him a reason the work, which if
you consider all the decades where he didn't put on
any solo albums, it's a pretty good indication that he
probably wouldn't have he's not that prolific on his own.
The game a reason to show up, but it was
also free form enough that he felt like he could

(01:08:09):
experiment and try different ideas and also different incarnations like
with Nash. Yes, but you know, it looks like at
this point there will be no incarnations with anybody. I mean,
do you, I mean, do you have any hope that
like they're going to forgive Crosby at some point and
do something together. I mean, I do have hope, especially
now with all the concerts being shut down. I'm hoping
that kind of when everyone is able to get out

(01:08:30):
and be together again, they kind of use as an
opportunity to like, Okay, let's all join together musically, ourselves
on stage and the community in front of us in
the audience. I'm hoping. I don't know, it just it
seems like that I know it's personal as opposed to well,
some of the arguments before were more professional music based,
and this is something so heartful about somebody's romantic partner.
But I hope that as they're getting up there in

(01:08:51):
years and they can move past this. He's apologized enough
times yeah, well, we'll see if the hostility is a
long time gone by that time and they're able to
come back together. Always have to work in the corny
joke incorporating a song title at the end of another
Rivals episode. Like we said, this is the first part
of our Crosby Stills National Young Series. We're gonna be

(01:09:12):
talking about Steven Stills next week, which I'm really excited about.
It's gonna be Part two, and then in part three
it's gonna be Neil Young. So lots of fun Laurel
Canyon cocaine fueled adventures ahead of us. I'm very excited
to get into it. Until then, thanks for listening to
another episode of Rivals. We will be back with more
beefs and feuds in long simming resentments next week. Rivals

(01:09:39):
is a production of My Heart Radio. The executive producers
are Shaun Titone and Noel Brown. The supervising producers are
Taylor chi Con and Tristan McNeil. The producer is Joel
hat Stat. I'm Jordan run Talk. I'm Stephen Hyden. If
you like what you heard, please subscribe and leave us
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Disharmony Part 1: Crosby vs. Stills, Nash, and Young

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