Available to buy in ebook format 'Change Partners - The Alan's Album Archives Guide To CSNY' by clicking here!
♫ In-depth review: CSNY’s new DVD film
’Déjà vu’,
released ahead
of schedule on September 30th 2008, in which Neil Young’s ‘shakey’ film about
the super-group’s outspoken and troubled American ‘freedom of speech’ tour of
2006 reveals just how similar our times are to the late 60s: politically we’re
in some of the most troubled times we’ve ever seen, but musically things are
almost as good as they used to be.
Following this DVD review straight after the CSN compilation
review in the previous issue has made me wonder . Even the biggest fans of the
trio/ super-group probably don’t know that the band has been releasing
albums—together and apart—with more regularity this decade than at any time
since the early 70s and that—far from becoming the ‘oldies’ group that every
other 60s band seems to be becoming, they are still as brave and ;political as
they ever were—just not as often these days. Unlike most ‘political’ groups,
CSNY never hung up their peace banners when the Woodstock movement died a death at the hands
of glam rock and punk rock in the 1970s. Even Neil, who has been telling us in
interviews for years that his impassioned 1970 Kent State Massacre protest
‘Ohio’ was a ‘one-off’, has been heading back into analysing the American
psyche on his later solo albums. Yet on previous four-way long-players like
‘American Dream’ (1988) and ‘Looking Forward’ (2000) our favourite out-spoken
trio have sounded distinctly uncomfortable when they’ve got together, afraid of
the weight on their shoulders when they get back together and sneaking in the
odd rabble-rousing anthem in-between their more conservative and catchy songs.
Even the most optimistic fan CSNY could never have dreamed
that the band would get back to their political provocative best—but for better
or worse, that’s what we’ve got here. Then again, its not that weird that CSNY
are doing this tour now, its weirder that no one else is doing it, that no
other group has really united the anti-Iraq protestors and peace promoters the
way that CSNY and their contemporaries did back in the bad old days of Vietnam
and Watergate. A documentary that is as much of a political hot potato as this
one would have been unthinkable even for CSNY just a half-decade or so ago—and
then along the aftermath of 9/11, the Bush administration’s re-elections and
latest scandals, the lack of headway in the Iraq War and most recently the
growing credit crunch and suddenly politics in music is accepted again, with
the actions of George W impacting people around the globe and affecting
everybody once more, not just the committed few. We’ve been here before of
course— and I humbly take back what I said about the title song ‘déjà vu’ not
fitting the context of this anti-war project in my review of the soundtrack CD
because I see it all now; the song weaves continually throughout this
documentary, juxtaposing marching Vietnam veterans with marching Iraqi veterans
and telling us over and over that ‘we have all been here before’ - and asking
us all why we’ve failed to learn from our mistakes. In this context, Crosby’s
classic song isn’t about learning from your past lives anymore—its about the
lives of most of the people who came to the concerts who never ever thought
they would see the same volume of Governmental distrust and the same level of
anti-American hatred that they used to see in the 60s so firmly planted in the
modern psyche. Band like CSNY have never been away—but we haven’t needed them
as badly as this for a long time and suddenly their songs are far more relevant
to our times as they were even a few years back.
The good news is that CSNY are brave and courageous once
again, more so than they’ve been since the days of the mid-70s, and are fully
in tune with the growing feeling of the world at large that our sudden long
list of ‘freedom of speech’ and ‘liberty’ acts that were passed overnight after
9/11 are actually systematically robbing us of our chances to speak out against
the policies made in our name, of our need to ‘stand and be counted’. It’s just
like Nixon and Thatcher all over again—we all want nothing better than to trust
our leaders and have them do what is best for all of us, but when our leaders
represent their views over ours and deprive us of our chance to tell us how we
feel, then we need music and artists like CSNY to fight back. Having CSNY
giving people the chance to have a small tiny voice night after night—even if
it’s a voice that half the audience can’t understand or reject out of hand— is
entirely the ‘growing old disgracefully’ image we always longed for our
favourite, most out-spoken, most committed, most audience-serving band to have
(even if do still charge a fortune for tickets, as some wag points out on the
documentary). I’ve loved CSNY since I first loved music, but I’ve never been as
proud of them as this in my whole music-collecting monkeynuts life-time.
But the bad news is that those expecting to learn about
CSNY’s feelings during this controversial tour or even see their talents
fully-blossoming again don’t get much of an opportunity to do so here
and—perhaps worst of all—we don’t even see the band on a particularly good
night; in Neil’s own words the band are ‘all over the place’ during the first
few nights and guess which concerts make up the bulk of this documentary?!?
What we get instead of CSNY magic, though, is still highly moving—we speak to
the soldiers who came back from the war despising what they saw there and found
the CSNY tour the best way of letting off years of burning steam and choking
anger; we speak to the proud families of those still serving in the army
kicking and screaming about the band ‘stuffing their political opinions in our
faces’ after paying hard-earned money for a night’s entertainment and escapism,
horrified that their off-spring’s defence of their country is being
‘dishonoured’ or even ‘exploited’ by the band; we see Stephen Stills rallying
voters at mid-term elections, half of which seem only to be there to get him to
sign his autograph for them—and half of whom clearly don’t know who on earth he
is; we see journalists re-counting their own horror stories and trying to give
their own unbiased opinions of the tour, although on the negative side the fact
the chosen reporter is travelling on their tour-bus is surely not conducive to
unbiased filming; most of all we see America divided, confused and seemingly
split down the middle with citizens confused as how to best serve their
country— whether to give Bush the benefit of the doubt and rally behind him or
join in with the protests, each side blaming the other for the whole sorry
mess.
Thankfully the documentary isn’t all serious —two of the best
scenes are the footage of Neil trying to dupe a conservative American chat-show
host into allowing him to sing his new song ‘Let’s Impeach The President’ live
on air and a clueless American interviewer asking Neil what exactly that same
song is all about (the clue’s in the title, surely?!); both of these people
clearly haven’t got a clue who these aging hippies are or why the people tuning
into their shows should care about what a bunch of mid-60s musicians should
think—in contrast, footage like this shows just how little some people know
when it comes to what really is going on in American foreign policy these days
and make CSNY’s desperation at putting their message across in corporate
America all the more clear. But most of this documentary sticks in the
throat—even at its bittiest, jumpiest and shallowest, there will be some quote
that really brings home the stories of the audience and just why they love/
hate this show and this band so much and it’s been years since I saw a decent
documentary do just that.
A group once labelled, unfairly I think, as the most
egocentric bunch of songwriters who ever walked the planet, have suddenly
become truly selfless with this release, passing their film over to the people
who attended it and those who helped make it happen. Sure their songs are
telling people what to do as one irate concert-goer points out in the
documentary—but it would be worse for a band like CSNY renowned for their
honesty to bury their heads in the sand and ignore what is happening to them
and their audience. For CSNY fans, the annoying down-side of handing the camera
to others to give their two penn’orth is that every time a song seems to build
into full throttle and soar, the camera cuts away, to tell us the story of
someone else, often completely un-related to the group instead of showing us
the power of the songs. Old timers already know how great these songs are—but
new-comers probably won’t hear enough of them to be converted into raving
passionate monkeynut collectors like me. The up-side of this is that this
concert tour was never just about the music and the use of real war footage and
audiences half-filled with people sobbing their hearts out and half-filled with
people booing and throwing things make the band’s songs seem ever more poignant
the few times we ever do hear any of their songs for any length of time. As
anti-Bush documentaries go, this isn’t even in the same league as Michael
Moore’s ‘Farenheit 9/11’ film (which uses a Neil Young song—’Rockin’ In The
Free World’ - on the end credits by the way; why on earth wasn’t that song in
CSNY’s war set-list?) and on a purely musical basis, this is shoddy stuff for
purely music collectors considering it’s the only film of the quartet out on
DVD ( I still recommend CSN’s ’Daylight Again’ DVD of 1983 though). But as a
documentary about the importance of music and its power to move people and get
them thinking, this is the most important musical documentary we’ve had since Woodstock .
There are a tonne of extras on the DVD , from an interview
with a rather bored Neil to a full 40 minute re-tread of Neil’s ’Living With
War’ album, complete with mocked-up CNN footage to illustrate such lyrics as
’here in the days of shock and awe’ and ’after the garden has gone’. Just as
with the soundtrack CD reviewed earlier on this site, this solo album sounds
surprisingly flimsy without those CSNY vocals in tow and even the presence of a
100-strong choir can’t cover up the loss of the three-some—but if you don’t
already own the album, this is a fantastic value-for-money way of getting the
main songs played on the ’freedom of speech’ tour and Neil’s own put-together
footage (taken from his website) is moving most of the time. Best of all,
though, is the montage of faces for the song ‘find the cost of freedom’,
showing us every single American soldier who had died in Iraq up to the making
of the film. Even though this trick has been borrowed from the ’director’s cut’
of Woodstock (where CSNY’s performance of the same song illustrates a list of
names of performers and organisers who had died between taking part in that
1969 festival and the late 1990s DVD release), this 38-year-old Stephen Stills
song—rejected from the film ’Easy Rider’ and only ever released originally as a
CSNY B-side— is so spot-on for this footage and so moving that watching this
straight after the film you can’t help but cry for the loss of life on both
sides of the war, whether you think Neil and co have got things right or are
barking up the wrong tree. (...continued
next page...)
The end verdict? As I said earlier in my review of Neil’s
solo ‘Living With War’ album (which makes up the bulk of songs used on this
tour), this documentary will become old very quickly once Bush leaves his
office next year and the Iraq war comes to a close (if it ever ends in our
life-times of course, depending on who the next American president is and how
badly America still needs oil). But just as CSNY’s old songs still fit the bill
for this modern anti-war tour, so too will these songs resonate with some of us
in some way, long after the garden has gone. My only real reservation is that
if CSNY were going to try and be brave and shock everybody with this release,
they should have gone even further, giving us more, obscurer songs from after
the ’classic years’ (Crosby’s ’Stand And Be Counted’ (‘Lookin’ Forward’, 2000),
Stills’ ‘Treetop Flyer’ (‘Just Roll Tape’, 2006), Nash’s ‘Soldiers of Peace’
(@American Dream’, 1988) and Neil’s ‘Comin’ Apart At Every Nail’ (‘Hawks And
Doves, 1980) would have been even more fitting than the ones they sing here).
But that’s a minor quibble and perhaps its selfish of me to want to see more
CSNY on a documentary that, really, is about our times and not about CSNY at
all. Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young have always been, in my opinion and in that
of many others, the bravest and most relevant band of their day, willing to
speak out and stand up for things when others were afraid to, feared their
voices would be silenced or their careers ruined by their political stance.
Right now CSNY are the bravest and most relevant band of our day too, something
which doesn’t say much for the bands of today but says plenty about CSNY and
how much their songs still mean to us, even all these years later.
A Now Complete List Of CSN/Y and Solo Articles Available To Read At Alan’s Album Archives:
'Crosby, Stills and Nash' (1969) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-29-crosby-stills-and-nash-1969.html
'Deja Vu' (CSNY) (1970) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-34-crosby-stills-nash-and-young.html
‘Stephen Stills’ (1970) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/stephen-stills-1970.html
'If Only I Could Remember My Name' (Crosby) (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-45-david-crosby-if-only-i-could.html
'Songs For Beginners' (Nash) (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-46-graham-nash-songs-for.html
'Stephen Stills II' (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-48-stephen-stills-ii-1971.html
'Deja Vu Live' (CD) (2008) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/08/news-views-and-music-issue-1-crosby.html
'Deja Vu Live' (DVD) (2008) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008_09_21_archive.html
'Reflections' (Graham Nash Box Set) (2009) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/news-views-and-music-issue-22-graham.html
'Demos' (CSN) (2009) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/08/news-views-and-music-issue-41-crosby.html
'Manassas: Pieces' (2010) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/news-views-and-music-issue-52-manassas.html
‘Carry On’ (Stephen Stills Box Set) (2013) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/stephen-stills-carry-on-box-set-2013.html
'Croz' (Crosby) (2014) http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/david-crosby-croz-2014album-review.html
A Now Complete List Of CSN/Y and Solo Articles Available To Read At Alan’s Album Archives:
'Crosby, Stills and Nash' (1969) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-29-crosby-stills-and-nash-1969.html
'Deja Vu' (CSNY) (1970) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-34-crosby-stills-nash-and-young.html
‘Stephen Stills’ (1970) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/stephen-stills-1970.html
'If Only I Could Remember My Name' (Crosby) (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-45-david-crosby-if-only-i-could.html
'Songs For Beginners' (Nash) (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-46-graham-nash-songs-for.html
'Stephen Stills II' (1971) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-48-stephen-stills-ii-1971.html
‘Graham Nash, David
Crosby’ (1972) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/graham-nash-david-crosby-1972.html
'Stephen Stills-Manassas' (1972)http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-51-stephen-stillsmanassas-1972.html
'Wild Tales' (Nash) (1973) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/news-views-and-music-issue-75-graham.html
'Stephen Stills-Manassas' (1972)http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-51-stephen-stillsmanassas-1972.html
'Wild Tales' (Nash) (1973) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/news-views-and-music-issue-75-graham.html
'Down The Road' (Stephen
Stills/Manassas) (1973) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/stephen-stillsmanassas-down-by-road-1973.html
'Stills' (1975) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/review-65-stephen-stills-stills-1975.html
'Wind On The Water' (Crosby-Nash) (1975) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-67-crosby-nash-wind-on-water.html
'Stills' (1975) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/review-65-stephen-stills-stills-1975.html
'Wind On The Water' (Crosby-Nash) (1975) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-67-crosby-nash-wind-on-water.html
'Illegal Stills' (Stills)
(1976)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/stephen-stills-illegal-stills-1976.html
'Whistling Down The Wire'
(Crosby-Nash) (1976)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/david-crosby-graham-nash-whistling-down.html
'Long May You Run' (Stills-Young) (1976) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/05/news-views-and-music-issue-33-stills.html
'CSN' (1977) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-70-crosby-stills-and-nash-csn.html
'Long May You Run' (Stills-Young) (1976) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/05/news-views-and-music-issue-33-stills.html
'CSN' (1977) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/review-70-crosby-stills-and-nash-csn.html
'Thoroughfare Gap'
(Stills) (1978) http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/stephen-stills-thoroughfare-gap-1978.html
'Earth and Sky' (Nash)
(1980)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/graham-nash-earth-and-sky-1980.html
'Daylight Again' (CSN) (1982) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/news-views-and-music-issue-131-crosby.html
'Daylight Again' (CSN) (1982) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/news-views-and-music-issue-131-crosby.html
'Right By You' (Stills)
(1984) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/stephen-stills-right-by-you-1984.html
'Innocent Eyes' (Nash)
(1986)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2017/01/graham-nash-innocent-eyes-1986.html
'American Dream' (CSNY)
(1988) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/crosby-stills-nash-and-young-american.html
'Oh Yes I Can!' (Crosby)
(1989)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2016/07/david-crosby-oh-yes-i-can-1989.html
'Live It Up!' (CSN) (1989) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/news-viedws-and-music-issue-104-crosby.html
'Live It Up!' (CSN) (1989) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/news-viedws-and-music-issue-104-crosby.html
'Stephen Stills Alone'
(1991)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.nl/2016/09/stephen-stills-alone-1991.html
'A Thousand Roads'
(Crosby) (1993) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2017/02/david-crosby-thousand-roads-1993.html
‘After The Storm’ (CSN)
(1994) https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/12/the-final-review-crosby-stills-and-nash.html
'CPR' (Crosby Band) (1998)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/cpr-david-crosby-band-1998.html
'Looking Forward' (1999) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/crosby-stills-nash-and-young-looking.html
‘So Like Gravity (CPR,
2001)
https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07/cpr-just-like-gravity-2001.html
‘Songs For Survivors’ (2002) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/graham-nash-songs-for-survivors-2002.html
‘Songs For Survivors’ (2002) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/graham-nash-songs-for-survivors-2002.html
'Crosby*Nash' (2004) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2010/02/news-views-and-music-issue-21-crosby.html
‘Man Alive’ (S) (2005) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/stephen-stills-man-alive-2005.html
'Deja Vu Live' (CD) (2008) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008/08/news-views-and-music-issue-1-crosby.html
'Deja Vu Live' (DVD) (2008) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2008_09_21_archive.html
'Reflections' (Graham Nash Box Set) (2009) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/news-views-and-music-issue-22-graham.html
'Demos' (CSN) (2009) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2009/08/news-views-and-music-issue-41-crosby.html
'Manassas: Pieces' (2010) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/news-views-and-music-issue-52-manassas.html
‘Carry On’ (Stephen Stills Box Set) (2013) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/stephen-stills-carry-on-box-set-2013.html
'Croz' (Crosby) (2014) http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/david-crosby-croz-2014album-review.html
'CSNY 74' (Recorded 1974 Released 2014)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/crosby-stills-nash-and-young-csny-74.html
'This Path Tonight' (Nash) (2016) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/graham-nash-this-path-tonight-2016.html
'Lighthouse' (Crosby)
(2016) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/david-crosby-lighthouse-2016.html
‘Sky Trails’ (Crosby)
(2017) https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/david-crosby-sky-trails-2017.html
‘Here
If You Listen’ (Crosby) https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2018/10/david-crosby-and-friends-here-if-you.html
The Best Unreleased CSNY
Recordings http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/csny-best-unreleased-tracks-news-views.html
Surviving TV Appearances (1969-2009) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/csny-surviving-tv-appearances-1969-09.html
Non-Album Recordings (1962-2009)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/crosby-stills-nash-and-sometimes-young_6.html
Live/Compilation/Rarities Albums Part One
(1964-1980)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/crosby-stills-nash-and-sometimes-young.html
Live/Compilations/Rarities
Albums Part Two (1982-2012)
http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/crosby-stills-nash-and-sometimes-young_20.html
Essay: The Superest Of
Super Groups?
https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/csny-essay-superest-of-super-groups.html
Five Landmark Concerts and
Three Key Cover Versions
https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/csny-five-landmark-concerts-and-three.html