The Nash vs. Crosby Feud

If you like Songs For Survivors, I imagine you'll find something to enjoy on This Path Tonight. I've been really bowled over by it. David & Stephen have also been on something of roll with their music over the last decade or so. Lots of great recent music from the CSN camp but TPT is probably my favourite of the lot.

 

I never could understand why in the later years Johnny Nash harbored such distain for Bing Crosby. I mean when the two of them...
Oh. Wait. I think I'm on the wrong thread...

 

correct

and from what i understand, not real easy to find either.

 

Whoever put this one-disc comp together sure succeeded in neutering the album. In other words, the most interesting material was left on the cutting room floor. Crosby's "Luck Dragon" and "Charlie"...Nash's "The Other Side Of Town" and "Half Your Angels"...all missing.

 

FYI

there is/was (i doubt it can be found anymore) CSN version of "half you angels" that they put up their website for about 2 minutes back in 2001. stills adds some simply beautiful guitar to the tune, i, personally find it to be a whole lot better than the crosby*nash version.

it has never been on an album or CD as far as i know.

 

I ran across it a few times but it was expensive as I recall, and I’d already bought the double CD - so I didn’t see the point.

Besides that, the highlights disc came out two years after the original release. Not sure if they thought they could capture the folks that said “oooo new Nash-Crosby release! Oh...too bad it’s a double CD, pass” or what.

 

Hmm, it can be had for under ten bucks...

Crosby & Nash – Highlights (2006, CD)

 

thanks, last i looked (which was a while ago) there none even to had......

 

What I can't believe is that I'm reading the 7th page of this thread and nobody has yet mentioned the Beatles!

 

well, according to legend, CSNY were the american beatles

 

Right. It was every so briefly on the CSN website. With Stills’ guitar, “Half Your Angel” had a “Just A Song Before I Go” feel. It was definitely preferable to the CN version. Too bad CSN was still using that eighties keyboard sound at this late date.

I always thought this was the version that was under consideration for Looking Forward.

 

I have been trying to make CN album “single album” comp from the Crosby-Nash album, and I’m not finding easy. I am modeling after Wind On The Water, and right away, I don’t have enough Nash songs in rock mode. No “Mama Lion”, “Take The Money And Run” or “Love Work Out”. The closest Nash gets to rock is James Raymond’s “Puppeteer”. And the “Lay Me Down” into “Puppeteer” works well.

It quickly falls apart and then I have trouble cutting anything. I can only easily cut “Half Your Angels” because I think the CSN version is better. The version of “My Country ‘Tis Of Thee” on Oh Yes I Can is perfect, so this version isn’t really needed.

And then I can’t easily cut the disc down to 40-50 minutes.

I found that bumping the relentlessly sad “Michael (Hedges Here)” up in the mix, and then followed by “Jesus Of Rio” works nicely. Speaking of which, that’s one of the best late era Nash songs. It’s as good as anything he ever did.

 

yes it is, in a perfect world, 'grace/jesus of rio" would have been a huge hit, but not in 2004.

i saw CPR do 'jesus' in niagara falls right after this album came out, crosby's vocals did it real justice.

 

To this day, every time I listen to the brief but terrific guitar solo on "Luck Dragon" I get a sensory kick that I wish I got more of in the other songs. Can't recall now if Jeff Pevar or Shane Fontayne played it.

 

Latest from Mr. Young to Mr. Croz
Neil Young Will Never Repair Things With David Crosby: 'I Can Hold a Grudge With the Best of Them' Ouch!!

 

That quote is from 2019.

 

I was going to say that's some quality rock journalism there.

 

I must confess to similar feelings about a number of musicians I once revered--Chris Hillman immediately comes to mind, perhaps because I read his book last fall (and neither he nor McGuinn come off admirably). in contrast, I am frequently bemused at how I maintain a healthy objectivity about others I admire to this day, such as Bob Dylan: I am beginning to wonder if the long-term quality of their work as much to do with that?!?

 

Like Stills, Crosby & Nash need some guys around to help them "love them out it":

 

The fact his manipulative, hyper-critical behavior hasn't changed appreciably since his days in The Byrds is what renders Crosby so deplorable to me...but then I don't follow him musically any longer, so there is nothing to mitigate his deeply-ingrained character flaws.

 

Graham Nash seems to have had an inflated sense of his own self-worth since he took the acid trip that prompted him to leave The Hollies...this side of Elton John, I cannot think of a musical figure that's made so much of a career out of so little.

 

A giant, in my world. One of the great songwriters and a fine singer too.

 

May I ask which of the terrible two you are heaping such praise upon?

 

I'm not heaping praise on anybody terrible.

However, My comment was aimed at Graham Nash, who, in my my opinion if not yours, is a top tier songwriter.

 

...Like Bob Dylan, a true top-tier songwriter, once said: "...you are right from your side and I am right from mine.."