Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - 4 Way Street 1971

I've been using this down time to work on other projects around the house and in the studio so I haven't had much time to give to this blog. A while back AEC over at Albums Back from the Dead posted a CSNY album that imagined what a follow up to DeJa Vu might have sounded like using tracks from the solo albums released at the time. I chimed in with my take but had no plans of posting it here but with the lack of projects in my vault and to keep you guys busy while in quarantine and because it turned out so nice, I thought, why not?

After the release of Deja Vu in 1970 Crosby, Stills Nash and Young went on tour. Some of the shows were recorded and in April, 1971 they released a live album titled 4 Way Street. After the tour the band fell apart and all members commenced recording solo records. Those albums were released between September 1970 and May 1971.

In spite of the supposed bad blood that broke the band apart there was still some interplay between the members. Stephen provided some vocals on Neil's album. Neil played on David's and Graham's and Crosby-Nash laid down backing vocals on Stephen's and each others albums. So what if they came together and recorded another CSNY album proper? Enjoy.

Tracklist

Side 1
01 Love the One You're With
02 Better Days
03 Laughing
04 After The Goldrush
05 We Are Not Helpless

Side 2
01 Music is Love
02 Do for the Others
03 Military Madness
04 Southern Man

Side 3
01 Chicago (We Can Change The World)
02 Sit Yourself Down
03 Don't Let It Bring You Down
04 Traction in the Rain
05 Simple Man
06 Orleans

Side 4
01 Only Love Can Break Your Heart
02 Church (Part of Someone)
03 I Used to Be a King
04 Cowboy Movie

Running time: 79:44

Reality Notes

In the comments of AEC's post, myself and The_Reconstructor chimed in with our opinions. I took clues from each of them and ran with it. I loosened my criteria a bit and used the previous album for precedence. With a few exceptions, that album was largely recorded separately, coming together mostly to do harmonies.

While songs that included two or more members were given priority, some of David's tracks were cut due to not actually having lyrics. Lots of vocals but the voices were used as instruments rather than tell a story. We still have an example of that style here in the track Orleans but at least he's singing words even if they are in another language. I used the tracklist from the live album for more clues, any song on there that had not appeared on a previous album was in the running. I also chose to allow solo acoustic numbers. Stephen setting the precedent with 4+20 on Deja Vu.

I ended up with 19 songs that fit on a single CD. On vinyl that would make a double album. I sequenced the tracks to split nicely onto four sides but also flow between them. Everyone gets at least one song per side and never two in a row.

I used the tracks as they are with the exception of three. Two Neil songs come from the 4 Way Street live album. I removed the audience before and after each of those as well as Neil's rap before Don't Let It Bring You Down. The live version of Southern Man was an obvious choice over the studio version. Not only is it the only track here to feature all four members, it's a full eight minutes longer with some great guitar interplay between Stephen and Neil making it a perfect side closer.

The last edit I made was to join Graham's Chicago with the reprise We Can Change The World to create a single track. I did this by ducking the opening chatter of the reprise under the last chords of Chicago to form a natural transition between them. Turned out nice.

The results fit in nicely within the overall discography and replaces the live album. Each member was prolific enough that the solo albums could still happen. Though arguably we took the cream of the crop from each. Originally I had sides one and two flipped. I thought that it would be clever to have each member open a side in the order of their names but the flow didn't feel right and Love The One You're With is an obvious album opener.

For the cover, I simplified the original.

Sources

David Crosby - If Only I Could Remember My Name
Stephen Stills - Stephen Stills
Graham Nash - Songs For Beginers
Neil Young - After The Gold Rush
CSN&Y - 4 Way Street

CSN&Y - Long May You Run - 1976

Hot on the heels of their 1974 release Human Highway, CSN&Y managed to regroup and record and release Long May You Run. A much more polished effort than its predecessor we find the band working together nicely. The songwriting credits are divided evenly among the four giving each member equal time, the first and only CSN&Y album to do so. A strong album that received good to fair reviews, it is still counted among their best works.

For a band with such a tumultuous past and turbulent relationships and large egos it's amazing they can work together at all. When they do manage, that's when the magic happens.

Side One
01 Long May You Run
02 Mutiny
03 Black Coral
04 Time After Time
05 Make Love To You
06 Ocean Girl

Side Two
01 Taken At All
02 Guardian Angel
03 Foolish Man
04 JB's Blues
05 Midnight On The Bay
06 Out Of The Darkness

Reality Notes

In 1976 CSN&Y made one more attempt to finish an album together and once again egos got in the way. This is basically a straight mashup of the two albums Whistling Down The Wire and Long May You Run with full band versions used where available. I stuck with those songs I knew they had worked on but dropped Human Highway as that was used on the last album.

We had set an end date for the Human Highway album at December of 1974 - mostly so that we could use Homeward Through The Haze and give David at least one strong song. That leaves us with 1975 through the Miami sessions in 1976 to build our song pool from. I also allowed any song from the Crosby-Nash and Stills & Young Band albums to be in the running. While we don't have mixes of every song they worked on we can use anything from those albums as substitutes. The list of songs we know they worked on is as follows.

January 1975
Western Witches
Guardian Angel

Long May You Run Sessions Miami 1976
Taken At All
Long May You Run
Human Highway
Black Coral
Midnight On The Bay
Ocean Girl
Mutiny
Talk To Me
Dancer

I immediately eliminated Western Witches, Talk To Me and Dancer, each for different reasons and also Human Highway because we used that already. This gives us seven songs to establish a foundation with. The three songs we do have a that include all four are Long May You Run, Black Coral and Taken At All.

The track listing for this comp has gone through several iterations. My first attempt came out as follows.

01 Long May You Run
02 Mutiny
03 Black Coral
04 Foolish Man
05 Taken At All
06 Time After Time
07 Midnight On The Bay
08 JB's Blues
09 Out Of The Darkness
10 Ocean Girl
11 Guardian Angel

I really liked this tracklist and it stayed this way for some time but one day I realized that there were only two songs from Stephen and three each from the other three. Knowing the egos of those involved I assumed that Stephen would insist on one more song of his so I added one of his and removed one each from Graham and David which is more in line with earlier releases.

01 Long May You Run
02 Mutiny
03 Black Coral
04 Time After Time
05 Make Love To You
06 Ocean Girl
07 Taken At All
08 Guardian Angel
09 Midnight On The Bay
10 Out Of The Darkness

This made me happy briefly. The timing was right and the overall feel was concise and flowed nicely but I missed Foolish Man and I felt that I couldn't add that back in and not Graham's song so I came up with what we have here.

Three songs each, egos placated but it now is 24 minutes per side. What's a producer to do? For my post here I will leave it as is. You can configure this anyway you want but personally I am going with my original 11 song tracklist. I'm not really fond of Stephen's Make Love To You and the other song choice of his, 12/8 Blues, was not any better.

I altered the original album cover to reflect the change from Stills & Young to CSN&Y.

Sources
Crosby-Nash - Whistling Down The Wire
Still & Young Band - Long May You Run
CSN - Box Set
The CSNY Anthology (Bootleg, although the songs from here are also available on official sources)

CSN&Y - Human Highway - 1974

In May of 1973 CSN&Y had some writing sessions at Neil's rented Maui beach house followed soon after by some recording at Neil's ranch. In October they did a surprise performance at Winterland. All of this was leading up to the recording of a new record that was to be titled Human Highway. The album was released shortly after a 1974 summer arena tour. Being a bit heavy on the Young portion of CSN&Y and due to some of the tracks being live performances some critics accused Neil of dragging his bandmates with him into the ditch.

Side One
01 Human Highway (Bootleg)
02 And So It Goes (Nash - Wild Tales)
03 Little Blind Fish (Bootleg)
04 Hawaiian Sunrise (CSN&Y 1974)
05 Myth of Sisyphus (CSN&Y 1974)
06 See The Changes (CSN - Box Set)

Side Two
01 As I Come Of Age (CSN - Box Set)
02 Traces (CSN&Y 1974)
03 Homeward Through The Haze (CSN - Box Set)
04 Love Art Blues (CSN&Y 1974)
05 Prison Song (Nash - Wild Tales)
06 Through My Sails (Young - Zuma)

Reality Notes

Human Highway is among the most debated and reconstructed unreleased albums out there. So why do another one? After a lot of research (mostly from this forum thread) and comparing other reconstructions and being less than thrilled but still intrigued by the results I decided "why not?".

The history of this "lost" CSNY reunion album starts in 1973 and runs through 1974 or 1975 depending on how you view the sessions. Over those two or three years there were several attempts to record an album each failing due to egos and other personality conflicts. Other reconstructions of this album have focused on creating one definitive collection of songs that could have been the official final release at the end of 1975. I have decided to take a different approach.

My first attempt ended up with a four album cycle of three "unreleased" acetates that showed the progression from a very rough sketch of an album through to the fourth finished product where it ceased to be Human Highway and became Long May You Run. Since then I have refined and redone the project several times until I ended up with what we have here.

I decided to set a cut-off date for the Human Highway session at the end of 1974 and focus only on those songs that were actually worked on during those sessions. It is my opinion that anything after that belongs to Long May You Run. (I will address that album sometime soon.) Because none of the recording sessions produced enough material to fill and entire disc and due to the lack of leaked material I have utilized the three CD set of live recordings from the 1974 tour to fill in the gaps.

If we examine the timeline and what was worked on we can come up with a short list of songs. Those sessions and what they produced are as follows.

May 1973 - Writing sessions at Neil's rented beach house on the island of Maui Followed by recording at Neil's Broken Arrow ranch. Six songs produced.

See The Changes
Prison Song
And So It Goes
Human Highway
Through My Sails
Little Blind Fish

October 4 1973 - Crosby, Nash and Young joined Stills at the end of a Manassas show at Winterland playing many new songs.

As I Come Of Age
Human Highway
New Mama
And So It Goes
Prison Song

Reunion Tour Rehearsals - Some recordings were made during the rehearsal sessions for the tour.

Summer 1974 Reunion Tour - Most if not all new songs as well as many even newer songs were played during this tour.

December 1974

Wind On The Water
Carry Me
Homeward Through The Haze
Time After Time
Different Tongues

It appears that Homeward Through The Haze is the only song completed during the '74-'75 sessions.

My intention was to see how CSN&Y would sound if Neil was successful in dragging the rest of the band with him into the ditch. This allows for the rough edges to show through whereas normally the group is known for its polish and perfection. Because Neil is the major instigator here I have bookended the album with his songs. The title track comes first on side one and side two finishes with Through My Sails (as a slight nod to Zuma where it also closes that album). Neil writes and sings five of the twelve songs giving him a big chunk of the album. The other three songs were previously unreleased until the 1974 live album (at least officially).

And So It Goes and Prison Song are taken from Graham's Wild Tales album but both were introduced during the initial writing sessions in Hawaii. David sings backup on both songs and Neil plays piano on And So It Goes. And So It Goes sounds like it could have been recorded with Crazy Horse with Neil at the helm. As I Come of Age actually comes from 1981, a version also appeared on Stills in 1975 as a solo recording but the song was first played at the reunion concert in 1973. Stephen's Myth of Sisyphus is a solo piano and vocal live recording from the '74 summer CSN&Y tour. Homeward Through The Haze was recorded during the last sessions in 1974.

Little Blind Fish was written and recorded during the initial 1973 sessions. If someone can point me to a better version of Little Blind Fish I will do an upgrade. I have two versions. Both are low quality. One seems to shift to mono at the end and the other sounds better but  is sped up. I reluctantly used the first version because I felt the song was needed due to the collaborative nature of the song.

There are two versions of the album in the archive. One where I did my best to eliminate any crowd noise and applause and another where I used the crowd to create transitions between the live and studio tracks. You can decide which you like best.

The cover features a photo taken during the Hawaii sessions.

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - CSN&Y - 1973

In 1973 CSN&Y released a best of LP, presumably to have something to promote on their upcoming tour. This seemed odd due to the fact that they only had two albums and one non-LP single to choose from. What if instead they dipped into their archives to flesh out the album. They had more than enough unreleased material to utilize. I took from this pool of unreleased songs what I thought was the best material. There is still a lot of songs that are still unused.

Side One
1 Ohio
2 Horses Through A Rainstorm
3 How Have You Been
4 Triad
5 Everybody's Talkin'

Side Two
1 Urge For Going
2 The Lee Shore
3 Sea Of Madness
4 Blackbird
5 Everyday We Live
6 Find the Cost of Freedom

Reality Notes

1973-1974 seems like a good time for the group. They seemed to be enjoying each others company and getting along. They had some writing sessions in May '73 at Neil's Maui beach house. Then in October '73 David, Graham and Neil joined Stephen onstage after a Manassas concert. 1974 saw rehearsals, a summer tour and some recording sessions. All of this was leading up to the recording of a new album that never happened called Human Highway. We will return to that album in the future.

I kept the first and last songs from the original LP. They were released as a single only so this would be the first time these songs were available on an LP. The rest of the songs are all from the periods that produced the first and second LPs. I utilized two sources for the unreleased material. The CSN box set and the bootleg Studio Archives 1969. Editing was limited to removing excess studio chatter, count ins and false starts.

• Ohio - Single
• Horses Through A Rainstorm - CSN Box Set
• How Have You Been - Studio Archives boot
• Triad - Studio Archives boot
• Everybody's Talkin' - Studio Archives boot
• Urge For Going - CSN Box Set
• The Lee Shore - CSN Box Set
• Sea Of Madness - Studio Archives boot
• Blackbird - CSN Box Set
• Everyday We Live - Studio Archives boot
• Find the Cost of Freedom - Single

Hindsight

I still enjoy this comp and I don't think I would change anything. The main push for constructing it was to have a place for Crosby's Lee Shore and Triad, still among my favorite Crosby songs. I still feel this is the way the label should have gone rather than the best of collection officially released.

Is it on my iPod? No. If my 160GB iPod still lived then yes but on my 30GB, with more limited space, I took a different route with CSNY. Listening to CSNY in the digital world has presented some challenges. Sometimes you want to listen to everything and others one of the many different configurations they have recorded under over the years or some combination of the two. What I've done is create my own "box set" for the iPod. Six discs each focused on each individual or group. One for each solo. one for Crosby-Nash and one that covers CSN, CSNY and Stills and Young. Works out nice.