1. EIGHT MILES HIGH – The Byrds (3:34)
(Roger McGuinn/Gene Clark/David Crosby)¹

Jim McGuinn: 12-String electric guitar, Vocals
Gene Clark: tambourine, vocals
David Crosby: rhythm guitar, vocals
Chris Hillman: bass, vocals
Michael Clarke: drums

Produced by Allen Stanton. Recorded by Ray Gerhardt at Columbia Studios. Hollywood. January 25. 1966. From the album Fifth Dimension. Columbia CS 9349. released on July 18, 1966. Under License From The SONY BMG Custom Marketing Group. SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT

DC: The lyrics – which were mostly by Gene – were about our first trip to London, but they were a double entendre. We were talking about the flight over there, but also about getting high. "Rain-grey town" ... that line is obviously me. Gene didn't know the rules, he loved The Beatles, and he wrote great stuff for Roger and myself to apply musically. His chord changes were dandies to run harmonies through.

Roger's solo was the thing that got everybody off, and that came from me playing Coltrane for him endlessly. On one of our first tours as The Byrds, we went on a Trailways bus with everybody else, and that was pretty terrible. By that time we were smoking pot, so we said, "Next time we'll get a Winnebago and travel on our own." We had a Fender Bassman amp and a tape recorder set up in the back, I played John Coltrane's Africa/Brass over and over, and it permeated into Roger. When he was looking for what to play on "Eight Miles High," that's what he played.

NOTE: Quotes by David Crosby from interviews with Steve Silberman (1994, 1995, 2005, 2006) and Joel Bernstein (2005) unless otherwise noted.

Roger McGuinn: When Coltrane did "India," he was emulating Indian music on the saxophone. Then later, we were emulating Coltrane emulating Indian music, on 12- string I had a physiological reaction to Coltrane. Almost a chest pain, it was so intense "Whoa'" I just fell in love with Coltrane's playing. It was so wild. It was obviously disciplined, but very free.

Interviewed by Peter Lavezzoli in The Dawn Of Indian Music In The West: Bhairavi, Continuum, 2006.
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2. RENAISSANCE FAIR – The Byrds (1:51)
(David Crosby/Roger McGuinn)²

Jim McGuinn: 12-string electric guitar, vocals
David Crosby: rhythm guitar, vocals
Chris Hillman: bass, vocals
Michael Clarke: drums
Jay Migliore: saxophone

Produced by Gary Usher. Recorded by Tom May at Columbia Studios. Hollywood. December 6, 1966. From the album Younger Than Yesterday. Columbia CS 9442. Released on February 20, 1967. Under License From The SONY BMG Custom Marketing Group, SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT

DC: I used to go to the Renaissance fairs outside of LA., and I loved everything about them: the girls, the pot, the music, the food, the costumes and the general looseness. People dropped acid all the time. They were the first large gatherings of hippies, even before the Be-Ins. I liked this song because it took you off into that place – it gave you a taste of what that was like.

I THINK DAVID CROSBY IS AN ABSOLUTE GENIUS AT HARMONY. WITHOUT HIS INNOVATIVE AND UNCANNY ABILITY TO BLEND FOURTH AND FIFTH HARMONIES INTO THE BYRDS' FIRST FEW ALBUMS, OUR VOCAL SOUND WOULD HAVE BEEN MUNDANE. THAT SAID, I LOVE DAVID AS A SOLO ARTIST. HE WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR GETTING ME INTERESTED IN DOING SOLO PERFORMANCES. Now THAT'S ALL I DO. THANKS, DAVID!

- ROGER MCGUINN
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3. EVERYBODY'S BEEN BURNED – The Byrds (2:59)
(David Crosby)²

Jim McGuinn: 12-string electric guitar, vocals
David Crosby: rhythm guitar, vocals
Chris Hillman: bass, vocals
Michael Clarke: drums

Produced by Gary Usher. Recorded by Tom May at Columbia Studios, Hollywood, December 7, 1966. From the album Younger Than Yesterday, Columbia CS 9342, released on February 20, 1967. Under License from The SONY BMG Custom Marketing Group, SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT

DC: "Everybody's Been Burned" is the first song of mine that's really worth listening to – the first relatively sophisticated set of changes that I came up with, the first song I was really proud of. Everybody knows love "never works" and that you should hide because you're gonna get hurt. But if you do that, you don't ever come out of yourself and see what's going on in the world.

I LOVE THE OLD MAN – ALWAYS HAVE. WE DON'T HAVE A LOT IN COMMON ON THE POLITICAL, MORAL, OR SPIRITUAL FRONT ANYMORE, BUT THERE'S NO DENYING IT: THAT BOY CAN SING LIKE AN ANGEL!

– CHRIS HILLMAN
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4. WOODEN SHIPS – Crosby, Stills & Nash (5:27)
(David Crosby/Stephen Stills/Paul Kantner)³

David Crosby: electric 12-string guitar, vocals
Stephen Stills: electric guitar, bass, organ, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Dallas Taylor: drums

Produced by Crosby, Stills & Nash. Recorded by Bill Halverson at Wally Heider Recording Studio III, Hollywood, February 20, 1969. From the album Crosby, Stills & Nash, Atlantic SD 8229, released on May 29, 1969. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: "Wooden Ships" was written in the main cabin of my boat, the Mayan. I had the music already. Paul Kantner wrote two verses, Stephen wrote one, and I added the bits at both ends. (Kantner couldn't be credited, because he was being sued by his managers.) I borrowed the first part off a little Baptist church sign in Florida that said, "If you smile at me I will understand, because that is something everybody everywhere does in the same language." It's a weird science-fiction story, but one that could happen tomorrow. "Silver people on the shoreline" are guys in radiation suits. We imagined ourselves as the few survivors, escaping on a boat to create a new civilization. Later on, Jackson Browne said, "What about all the people who get left behind?" and wrote "For Everyman" in response.

From an interview by Raymond Foye. Previously published in the booklet of the CSN boxed set, Atlantic 82319, released on October 15. 1991.

David still owes me the $10 I loaned him to get his laundry out of hock while he was staying out at the Padre Hotel on Cahuenga, in L.A., in 1963-64 … just like Bob Dylan still owes Jorma [Kaukonen, Jefferson Airplane guitarist] the $5 he “borrowed” in early 1960-something in NYC.

– Paul Kantner
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5. GUINNEVERE - Crosby, Stills & Nash (4:38)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: acoustic and electric guitars, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals

Produced by Crosby, Stills & Nash. Recorded by Bill Halverson at Wally Heider Recording, Studio III, Hollywood, February 22, 1969. From the album Crosby, Stills & Nash, Atlantic SD 8229, released on May 29, 1969. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: It's a composite of three women. I can tell you two of them. One of them was Joni; that's the third verse, golden hair riding down by the bay. And there was another girl, Christine, who was the middle one. The "green eyes" one, I can't tell you.
Interviewed by Andy Gill, "O Lucky Men!", Word magazine, October, 2004.

Joni Mitchell: His eyes were like star sapphires to me. When he laughed, they seemed to twinkle like no one else's and so I fell into his merry company, and we rode bikes around Coconut Grove and the winds were warm and at night we'd go down and listen to the masts clinking down on the pier.

Interviewed by Carl Gottlieb, in Long Time Gone, Doubleday, 1988.
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6. LONG TIME GONE - Crosby, Stills & Nash (4:17)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: electric guitars, vocals
Stephen Stills: electric guitar, bass, organ, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Dallas Taylor: drums

Produced by Crosby, Stills & Nash. Recorded by Bill Halverson at Wally Heider Recording, Studio III, Hollywood, March 11, 1969. From the album Crosby, Stills & Nash, Atlantic SD 8229, released on May 29, 1969. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: First we lost JFK, then we lost Martin Luther King, then we lost Bobby Kennedy. When they finally got Bobby ... What would you do if people were shooting down the only people you thought were worth believing in? I was angry.


Ellen Sander: The song just wouldn't hang together the way they had been playing it; it sounded overweight, clumsy, preachy, and preposterous. It was getting to the point where they were wondering whether it should even be on the album after all. Crosby was frustrated. Stills was impatient. Nash was concerned. "Long Time Gone" was coming to a short dead end. It was very late, they had been in the studio for nine straight hours, and had accomplished a great deal. They prepared to go home and get some sleep for the next night's sessions. Stills grumbled about putting away the guitars and stayed late. When the others left, he worked all night long and into daylight, going home on the verge of collapse. The following night the group assembled in the studio again. Stills sat at the control board and ran the tape. Out came an entirely new arrangement for "Long Time Gone," which he had single-handedly put together the night before. It was gorgeous. It churned out rhythmically, the lines meeting with the incredible force the song contained. An organ part undulated along the top of it, insinuating a siren. David was agog. He swigged a jug of wine, went into the studio, and sang in an entirely original way. As if possessed with the immensity of the music, he broke through. He was tearful at the end. "I finally found my voice," he said afterward. "Five years I've been singing and I finally found a voice of my own. Every time I had a lead vocal part with The Byrds I choked up because I was so scared. But these two loved me enough to let me find my own voice."

Excerpted from Trips: Rock Life In The Sixties, Scribners, 1973.
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7. DEJA VU - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (4:10)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: Acoustic guitar, vocals
Stephen Stills: electric guitar, bass, electric and acoustic pianos, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Dallas Taylor: drums
John Sebastian: harmonica

Produced by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Recorded by Bill Halverson, assisted by Stephen Barncard, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, November 17, 1969. From the album Deja Vu, Atlantic SD 7200, released on March 11, 1970. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: When I was about 10 or 11, somebody put me in a sailboat and I already knew how to sail it. I started thinking, I must have done this before, Then somebody ran the idea of reincarnation by me, and it went "boing!" It seems to me that if there's a law of conservation of energy, then life energy doesn't go away either. It gets recycled. They wipe the tape of the identity print, but use the tape again. And there are probably ghost prints, which give the deja vu effect ... print-through.
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8. ALMOST CUT MY HAIR - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (4:21)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: 12-string electric guitar, vocals
Stephen Stills; electric guitar
Neil Young: electric guitar
Graham Nash: organ
Greg Reeves: bass
Dallas Taylor: drums

Produced by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.
Recorded by Bill Halverson, assisted by Stephen Barncard, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, November 6, 1969. From the album Deja Vu, Atlantic SD 7200, released on March 11, 1970. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: I kept "Almost Cut My Hair" in there over the protestations of Stephen, who didn't want me to leave it in 'cause he thought that it was a bad vocal. And it was a bad vocal in the sense that it slid around and it wasn't polished, but I felt like what I meant when I sang it, and so it always puts me on that trip. Now, I don't know whether that communicated through to the people out there or not. See, I don't know whether it communicated anything but just a bunch of raucous guitar and me yelling. If it did communicate, then it was right.
Excerpted from an interview by Ben Fong-Torres, Marina del Rey. Spring, 1970. Published in Rolling Stone magazine July 23, 1970.

Graham Nash: Christine got killed three days before we recorded "Almost Cut My Hair." Even though it's as rough as it was, the track meant so much to us as a musical entity. We just went in and played the shit out of that song. To a lot of people, it might grate against their ears, but to me, it was a wonderful experience. Interviewed by B. Mitchell Reed, "Crosby, Stills, Nash &Young Special," KMET-FM, broadcast on April 18, 1971.

DC: Neil told me "Almost Cut My Hair" was his favorite thing on DejaVu. He likes it when I get all excited and howl at the top of my lungs. That's the Crosby he loves.
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9. TAMALPAIS HIGH (AT ABOUT 3) - David Crosby (3:31)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: electric guitar, vocals
Jerry Garcia: electric guitar
Jorma Kaukonen: electric guitar
Phil Lesh: bass
Bill Kreutzmann: drums

Produced by David Crosby.
Basic track recorded by Alan Zentz & Maurice Ieraci at Wally Heider Recording, Studio A, San Francisco, August 4, 1970. Vocals recorded later by Stephen Barncard in Studios A & C. Mixed by Stephen Barncard in Studio C. From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

Paul Kantner: Wally Heider's became the studio of choice, because he did it right. The pianos alone were beautiful – I could sit down at one of those pianos and it would sound like Beethoven. Wally had three studios, which any number of us would be working in at the same time. I'd be making Blows Against The Empire in one studio, Garcia would be playing something with the Dead down in D, Crosby would be up in C doing vocal overdubs. As in making movies, there's a lot of "hurry up and wait" time while they're setting up this or that. So we would just wander into each other's studios, listen for a while, and say, "I could add something to that. Give me a mike." It was just a very natural thing. It wasn't planned, it was very incestuous, and it made for great music.
Interviewed by Steve Silberman, San Francisco, September 16, 2005.

DC: Everyone thinks the song is about being high on Mt. Tamalpais. The joke was that it's really about Tamalpais High School at three in the afternoon when all the young ladies escape, and those of us who would prey upon them flock about. But Mt. Tamalpais means a whole lot to me. When Christine died I had no way to handle it. The feelings would just roll over me, overwhelming me. I remember trying to eat a dinner with some people at the Trident in Sausalito, and I started crying and couldn't stop. So I got in my car and drove up Tam. Near the top, there's a fork in the road: you can go right toward an overlook, or left and follow the ridgeline. If you drive about half a mile, there’s a spot that opens out and you look down on Stinson Beach, where you can park and sit on some rocks. I spent a lot of time up there after Christine died. I didn’t know what else to do. So by they time I recorded it for the album, the song had come to be about that mountain and that magic.
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10. LAUGHING - David Crosby (5:24)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: 12-string acoustic and 6-string electric guitars, vocals
Jerry Garcia: 6-string electric guitar, pedal steel guitar
Phil Lesh: bass
Bill Kreutzmann: drums
Joni Mitchell: vocals

Produced by David Crosby.
Recorded by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, November 4, 1970. Mixed later by Stephen Barncard at Studio C.
From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: "Laughing" came out of me watching George Harrison go to the Maharishi. I wanted to say to him, "Look, he doesn't have the answer. Nobody does." But George was still thinking that there was an external answer, and he wanted it. He was always the more spiritual of the four, and he knew he wasn't going to get answers from the Church of England. I turned him on to the music of Ravi Shankar, which turned him on to Indian stuff, including Indian gurus. The Maharishi got his hooks in George and told him, "It's very fine, hee hee." I said the closest thing you're gonna find to truth is stuff that isn't trying – like children.

You try for things like "Laughing," but you don't always get them. For one thing, at that point in time, Stephen Barncard could produce acoustic guitars better than anybody. Two, Phil Lesh doesn't play like any other bass player – at all – and there was a certain kind of rhythmic looseness to that track. Also, in that studio, with those mikes, those earphones, and the head I was in then, I could get harmony stacks that were extremely in tune, and guitars that were extremely in tune. I know that machines tune guitars pretty accurately, but something else happens when you tune by harmonics, and nobody was tuning with machines then. When you want the thing to come up and start existing in another space, overtone structures really do it. They give depth and dimension and put you in another space. They were inherent in the acoustic guitars that we were using, but most people did not record them well enough to get' em. They're inherent in stacks if you do ' em well enough; most people don't. I would get the guitar in tune the first time, and each time I put another track on, I would hit harmonics and make it harmonically true with the original track. That gives you stuff like "Laughing."

Phil Lesh: Jerry's pedal steel on "Laughing" eats my heart every time I hear it. It's so expressive – it's a cry. It takes the tune into a whole different realm.

I FIRST MET DAVID AT THE OLD WHISKY IN L.A., BUT I'D SEEN THE BYRDS PLAY BEFORE THAT – ONCE FOR DANCERS AT SOME CHEESY GO-GO CLUB ON BROADWAY IN SAN FRANCISCO, AND ONCE AT THE BIG ROLLING STONES CONCERT AT THE COW PALACE IN '65. (I'LL NEVER FORGET THE LITTLE BLONDE WHO RAN UP TO HER FRIEND, SHOUTING, "I KISSED DAVID!") WHEN I FIRST HEARD "EIGHT MILES HIGH" I THOUGHT SOMEHOW THEY WERE US; IT'S ONE OF THE FEW SONGS I'VE EVER HEARD THAT I'D WISHED WE'D WRITTEN.

THERE'S AN OPENNESS TO EXPERIENCE AND FEARLESS CURIOSITY IN DAVID – MAYBE THAT'S WHY HE'S SUCH A COMPELLING SONGWRITER. AS A PERFORMER HE SETS THE GOLD STANDARD FOR COMMITMENT AND DELIVERY. AND IT'S SUCH A GAS TO SING HARMONY WITH HIM.

-PHIL LESH
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11. MUSIC IS LOVE - David Crosby (3:21)
(David Crosby/Graham Nash/Neil Young)⁵

David Crosby: acoustic guitar, vocals
Neil Young: acoustic guitar, bass, vibes, vocals
Graham Nash: congas, vocals

Produced by Graham Nash & Neil Young.
Recorded by Henry Lewy at A&M Recording, Studio C, Hollywood, August 23, 1970. Mixed later by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco. From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: That was a very fortunate, wonderful, happy jam that we did. We were very excited when we played it, but it was just a jam. But then Graham and Neil said, "That should go on your album," And I said, "That was a jam – that wasn't good enough to go on the record," And they said, "Oh, good – we'll just borrow the master," And when they brought it back, they had put the bass and congas on it. And it worked.


DC: Sing it again. Just sing it again, sing it again. [singing]

Neil Young: It's sorta like "Sally Come Round The Roses," you know what I mean? [singing]

Graham Nash [to Neil]: You're singing the bottom this time, that's far out, and he's taking the top [David].

Neil Young: Yeah, that's a groovy part.

Graham Nash: Did you get any of that on tape, Henry? Groovy. [singing] That's a nice riff. We should do that one.

Neil Young: It's good in that song, man. It sounds good. We should try to get something together and do it. We can just work quick,

 – “Music Is Love" session tape, August 23, 1970.
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12. SONG WITH NO WORDS (TREE WITH NO LEAVES) – David Crosby (5:56)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: 12-string acoustic and 6-string electric guitars, vocals
Jerry Garcia: electric guitar
Jorma Kaukonen: electric guitar
Gregg Rolie: piano
Jack Casady: bass
Michael Shrieve: drums

Produced by David Crosby.
Basic track recorded by Alan Zentz & Maurice Ieraci at Wally Heider Recording, Studio A, San Francisco, August 4, 1970. Vocals recorded later by Stephen Barncard in Studios A & C. Mixed by Stephen Barncard in Studio C. From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: There was all this immensely wonderful chemistry going on. I'd play a song like "Song With No Words" to Jorma, then I'd play it to Jack, I'd play it to Paul, I'd play it to Phil, I'd play it to Jerry, I'd play it to Grace, I'd play it to Mickey, I'd play it to Billy, I'd play it to Neil. That was the close-in group. On any given night, we might try any given song. On some nights we would hit critical mass. The thing would go nuclear, and we'd have it on tape.

Do I look at "Song With No Words" as a failed attempt to write a regular song? No. The object of pieces of art that are musical is to make you feel something. They don't need words to do it.


DC: I called it "Song With No Words," and Nash called it "Tree With No Leaves." That shows you where he's at. That's why I hang out with him.

David Crosby and Graham Nash, "In Concert" BBC-TV, broadcast November 9, 1970.
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13. WHAT ARE THEIR NAMES? – David Crosby (4:11)
(Neil Young/Jerry Garcia/Phil Lesh/Michael Shrieve/David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: acoustic and electric guitars, vocal
Jerry Garcia: electric guitar
Neil Young: electric guitar
Phil Lesh: bass
Michael Shrieve: drums
David Frieberg, Jerry Garcia, Paul Kantner, Phil Lesh, Joni Mitchell, Graham Nash, Grace Slick: vocals

Produced by David Crosby.
Recorded by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, October 30, 1970. Mixed by Stephen Barncard in Studio C. From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: "What Are Their Names?" was an incredible piece of luck. I went into the studio and started playing something on the guitar, and Garcia started playing with me. Then Lesh heard what we were doing and started playing too, and Neil joined us. You can almost hear each of us walk into the room, stumble over a couple of mike stands, put the joint down, and start playing. Then later on I was on an airplane thinking about how fucked it is that the leaders of this country – the ones who control really huge amounts of old, deep money – you don't know who those people are. Very carefully, they keep you from knowing. So I wrote two verses of a song, Then I went back and listened to the jam that we'd recorded, and there was a hole in the middle of it ... I suddenly realized that the words I'd written on the plane fit perfectly into that hole, as if we'd composed the music to fit the words. So I went, "Ha ha! The music loves me, God loves me," And we put them together.
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14. I'D SWEAR THERE WAS SOMEBODY HERE - David Crosby (1:21)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: vocals

Produced by David Crosby.
Recorded by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio A, San Francisco, September 18, 1970. Mixed later by Stephen Barncard in Studio A. From the album If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic SD 7203, released on February 22, 1971. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: Stephen Barncard created this fabulous echo for me to do something with. He had turned it up more than normal, and I was sitting there goofing around, But then all of a sudden I wasn't goofing around – I was smitten with very strong emotion. The result was one of the most startling pieces of music I ever made, I had no idea where it came from, and I had never sung anything like it before, It just happened. The music was coming through me, not from me – layer after layer, level after level.

I felt like Christine was there. I could feel her.
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15. WHERE WILL I BE? - Crosby & Nash (3:20)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: electric guitar, glass harmonica, vocals
Graham Nash: glass harmonica. Vocals
Craig Doerge: electric piano
Dana Africa: flute
Leland Sklar: bass

Produced by David Crosby, Graham Nash & Bill Halverson.
Basic track recorded by Stephen Barncard. assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, September 8. 1970. Additional recording by Bill Halverson, assisted by Doc Storch, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco. November 22, 1971. From the album Graham Nash/David Crosby. Atlantic SD 7220, released on April 5. 1972. (P) 1972 Atlantic Recording Corporation. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: I had a set of tuned wine glasses that we thought was the right sound for the song. But you can't play wine glasses like that, because the delay time is too long, and the notes aren't controllable. So we figured out what scale we were working in and recorded notes out of that scale on different tracks, and then Nash and I "played" the wine glasses on the board. Boards didn't have automation back then, so the engineer and Nash and I would have six hands on the board at the same time – “When you get to this part, you have to duck."

I certainly had an ego, and life hadn't really beat me up until the Christine thing. All of a sudden I went from being in the biggest group in the world, total success, everything, to – I had nothing. "Where Will I Be?" is a sad song that comes out of a very lost period in my life. It's the question to "Page 43's" answer.
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16. PAGE 43 - Crosby & Nash (2:55)
(David Crosby)⁴
 
David Crosby: acoustic guitar, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Danny Kortchmar: electric guitar, piano
Leland Sklar: bass
Russ Kunkel: drums

Produced by David Crosby, Graham Nash & Bill Halverson.
Recorded by Bill Halverson, assisted by Doc Storch, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, December 13, 1971. From the album Graham Nash/David Crosby, Atlantic SD 7210. Released on April 5, 1972. (P) 2972 Atlantic Recording Corporation. Produced under license from Atlantic Recording Corporation.

DC: I wrote "Page 43" in the main cabin of my boat in Sausalito. And it was under the influence, musically, of James Taylor. I had been listening to how many passing chords he used and it was like saying, "Jesus, man, where does he get that shit?" Because he's so good, you know. And so the next song that I started writing, I was fooling around with a set of changes that was like that, and that's what came.

Paul Zollo: It's a song about diving into life.

DC: Yeah. Don't wait for it. Taste it. Go with it.

Paul Zollo: Was "Page 43" a page from a specific book?

DC: No. As a matter of fact, some very peculiar things happened with people saying [in a low whisper], "Page 43. Yeah, I read that too. I know that nobody else knows but that was really far out." And I'm thinking, "Yeah? What book are you thinking about?" "The Kaballah" You have no idea which page 43 they're absolutely sure that I'm talking about. But they're sure.

Interviewed by Paul Zollo, Encino, CA, 1993, for Songwriters On Songwriting, Da Capo, 1997 expanded edition.
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17. CRITICAL MASS - Crosby & Nash (1:20)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby & Graham Nash: vocals

Produced by David Crosby & Graham Nash.
David's vocals recorded by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Ellen Burke, at Wally Heider Recording, Studio C, San Francisco, September, 1970. Graham's vocals recorded by Stephen Barncard, assisted by Rick Stanley, at His Master's Wheels, San Francisco, December, 1974. From the album Wind On The Water, ABC 902, released on September 15, 1975. (P) 1975 Geffen Records. Courtesy of Geffen Records under license from Universal Music Enterprise.

DC: "Critical Mass" was directly related to how much classical music my mom played in the house when I was a kid – it sounds like it was written by someone who spent way too much time listening to the Brandenburg Concertos. I wish I could write another one like it.


DC: That's what people need to understand about making new music. You synthesize these apparently unrelated streams and they generate new connections inside you. So listening to Indian music and jazz at the same time, or listening to Bulgarian folk music and The Everly Brothers, all plays a part in that. Tons of classical music. American and European classical music is a hugely powerful influence on me. Copland, Ives, Stravinsky, Bach, Haydn, Beethoven, Sibelius, Grieg. But probably above all others is the British composer Ralph Vaughn Williams. Fantasia On A Theme By Thomas Tallis is so melodic I can't stand it ... The atonal music, like Stockhausen, I didn't dig at all. I don't like atonality too much. I like crowding the edge of it.

Interviewed by Peter Lavezzoli in The Dawn Of Indian Music In The West: Bhairavi, Continuum, 2006.
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18. CARRY ME - Crosby & Nash (3:33)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: 6- and 12-string electric guitars, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
James Taylor: acoustic guitar
Craig Doerge: piano
Leland Sklar: bass
Russ Kunkel: drums

Produced by David Crosby & Graham Nash.
Recorded by Stephen Barncard and Don Gooch, assisted by Stanley Johnston, at Village Recorders, West Los Angeles, April 9, 1975. Mixed by Stephen Barncard at Sound Labs, Hollywood. From the album Wind On The Water, ABC 902, released on September 15,1975. (P) 1975 Geffen Records. Courtesy of Geffen Records under license from Universal Music Enterprises.

DC: A song of transcendence. The third verse is about my mother. This cuts close to the bone. She was lying in hospital, dying of cancer, and wanted to go while she still had some dignity. She asked me to do it, set her free – coup de grace, the French call it. So I said, "Hell, yes." I learned how to do it from a doctor friend, and I was perfectly willing to do it, I'm not ashamed to say that. But she found out if she didn't die on the hospital and doctor's schedule, they'd conduct an autopsy and charge me with murder. So she had to go through an extra couple of months of desperate pain. She was a good lady She taught me music, and was always writing poetry. I loved her a whole lot. She really nailed me when she said she felt like a bird with weights tied to her feet, that if someone would just untie them she could fly. What an image – I couldn't ignore it.

From an interview by Raymond Foye, previously published in the booklet for the CSN boxed set, Atlantic 82319, released on October 15, 1991.
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19. BITTERSWEET - Crosby & Nash (2:38)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: piano, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Danny Kortchmar: electric guitar
Craig Doerge: electric piano
Leland Sklar: bass
Russ Kunkel: drums

Produced by David Crosby & Graham Nash.
Recorded by Don Gooch and Stephen Barncard, assisted by Stanley Johnston, at Sound Labs, Hollywood, June 8, 1975. Mixed later by Stephen Barncard at Sound Labs. From the album Wind On The Water, ABC 902, released on September 15, 1975. (P) 1975 Geffen Records. Courtesy of Geffen Records under license from Universal Music Enterprises.

DC: "Bittersweet" was really fun to do. Nash and I were staying in the Chateau Marmont – the real Hotel California. We had one of the bungalows in the back, I think the one Belushi was in later. And we had a Wurlitzer. I woke up one morning – Nash wasn't up yet – and I started fooling around and wrote the song. I got all excited, went to the studio early, and showed each guy the song as he came in. It was recorded by dinnertime.

DAVID CROSBY IS A MAN OF PASSION AND ENORMOUS TALENT WHO HAS NEVER SHIED AWAY FROM EXPRESSING HIS CONSCIENCE. HE MAY HAVE BEEN CANTANKEROUS AT TIMES, BUT I VALUE HIS DESIRE TO CONTRIBUTE TO SOCIAL AND POLITICAL CHANGE. FROM THE BEGINNING HE HELPED REFLECT OUR TIMES IN WAYS INSIGHTFUL ENOUGH TO BE INSPIRING. AND HE'S HAD THE COMMITMENT TO KEEP WORKING AT IT. CROSBY HAS AN ABSOLUTELY ASTONISHING GIFT FOR VOCAL HARMONY, AND HIS SONGS SUCH AS "GUINNEVERE" AND "LONG TIME GONE" ARE CLASSICS. HIS WORK MATTERS. FROM THE BYRDS TO CSN AND CSNY, HE WAS AN IMPORTANT PART OF CREATING MUSIC THAT BECAME THE SOUNDTRACK OF AN ERA.

- DAVID GEFFEN
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20. NAKED IN THE RAIN - Crosby & Nash (2:26)
(David Crosby/Graham Nash)⁶

David Crosby: acoustic guitar, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals, congas
Danny Kortchmar: electric guitar
David Lindley; acoustic slide guitar
Joel Bernstein: acoustic guitar
Craig Doerge: electric piano
Tim Drummond: bass
Russ Kunkel: drums

Produced by David Crosby & Graham Nash.
Recorded by Don Gooch and Stephen Barncard, assisted by Stanley Johnston, at Sound Labs, Hollywood, June, 1975. Mixed by Stephen Barncard at Sound Labs. From the album Wind On The Water, ABC 902, released on September 15, 1975. (P) 1975 Geffen Records. Courtesy of Geffen Records under license from Universal Music Enterprises.

DC: When I was in San Francisco, working at the Coffee Gallery – where I met Wavy Gravy when he was still Hugh Romney – Dino Valenti and I were tripping in a little hotel on Columbus in North Beach. As it came on I had a hallucination that I've tried to write about a couple of times, You know the line from "Naked In The Rain" about "fluttering pages of faces, no two alike?" That's about that. Dino's face went snap, to another face, and then snap, to another face, and then snap, snap, snap, snap, snap, snapsnapsnapsnap … At the end, they went by as fast as you could do one of those flip-books. The feeling was that he had been all of those people.
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21. DANCER - Crosby & Nash (4:49)
(David Crosby)⁴

David Crosby: acoustic 12-string guitars, vocals
Graham Nash: vocals
Danny Kortchmar: electric guitar
David Lindley: slide and lap steel guitars
Craig Doerge: electric piano, Hammond organ, glass harmonica
Leland Sklar: bass
Russ Kunkel: drums

Produced by David Crosby & Graham Nash.
Recorded by Don Gooch and Stephen Barncard, assisted by Stanley Johnston, at Sound Labs, Hollywood, April 3, 1976. Mixed by Stephen Barncard at Sound Labs. From the album Whistling Down The Wire, ABC 956, released on June 25, 1976. (P) 1976 Geffen Records. Courtesy of Geffen Records under license from Universal Music Enterprises.

DC: I was very happy with "Dancer." That's one I wrote on the 12-string long before we recorded it. It's an odd piece of music, but very spirited, and there are some real interesting vocal stacks in the bridge. It was a musical trip I went on, and when I took it to the Jitters, Danny Kortchmar was all over it – he made his guitar snarl exactly the way my voice did. The touch that Kortchmar had on the guitar was crazy, halfway between an animal and an oud. He's underrated but one of my favorite guitar players of all time.