''CSN'' is the third studio album by
Crosby, Stills & Nash, released on
Atlantic Records
Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over the course of its first two decades, starting from the release of its first recor ...
on June 17, 1977. It is the group's second studio release in the trio configuration. It peaked at No. 2 on the ''
Billboard'' Top Pop Albums chart; two singles taken from the album, Nash's "
Just a Song Before I Go" (No. 7) and Stills' "Fair Game" (No. 43) charted on the
''Billboard'' Hot 100. As of 2012 it is the trio configuration's best selling record, outselling 1969's ''
Crosby, Stills & Nash'' by 200,000 copies. It has been certified
quadruple platinum by
RIAA
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
.
Content
Following their tour in the spring and summer of 1970 to support ''
Déjà Vu'', Crosby, Stills and Nash had only completed one project together, a
1974 reunion tour of CSNY.
David Crosby and
Graham Nash had recorded three albums as a
duo, with Crosby releasing a single solo album (in addition to a
Byrds reunion album) and Nash a pair.
Stephen Stills pursued other projects including the release of four solo albums, a short career with
Manassas that yielded two albums, as well as a tour and
an album with
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian and American singer-songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, forming the folk rock group Buffalo Springfield. Since the begi ...
, which itself
nearly became a CSNY project.
''CSN'' featured strong writing from all three members, the last time for seven years that the band would compose songs and handle vocals without major assistance from outside sources.
Many of Stills' songs on the album echo his marital problems,
with "Dark Star" returning to the Latin rhythms he had favored all the way back to his
Buffalo Springfield days. Crosby continued the existential probings consistent with much of his past work, and Nash offered both a radio-ready acoustic ballad with "Just a Song Before I Go", and an elaborate set piece re-creating a vision of an
LSD experience that he had in
Winchester Cathedral with "Cathedral".
Many tracks included a string section, a first on a CSN project.
The album was released for compact disc an initial time in the 1980s, then again at Ocean View Digital from the original tapes and reissued on September 20, 1994. It was remastered once more by
Steve Hoffman in April 2013, for an
Audio Fidelity 24kt gold disk release in the summer of 2013.
Critical reception
''
Cash Box
''Cashbox'', also known as ''Cash Box'', is an American music industry trade magazine, originally published weekly from July 1942 to November 1996. Ten years after its dissolution, it was revived and continues as ''Cashbox Magazine'', an online ...
'' said that "Fair Game" "combines a snappy Latin rhythm, neatly interlocking harmonies, and layers of Stephen Stills' thoughtful acoustic guitar work."
It commented on the "surging guitars and piano" and "harmonic hooks" and "powerful rhythmic elements" of "I Give You Give Blind".
''
Record World'' called "Fair Game" a "mid-tempo Stills song with samba touches, with the trio's trademark vocal harmonies again standing out."
Track listing
Personnel
*
David Crosby – vocals; rhythm guitar
on "Fair Game" and "Dark Star"; acoustic guitar
on "Just A Song Before I Go" and "In My Dreams";
string arrangements on "Cathedral" and "Cold Rain"
*
Stephen Stills – vocals; guitars
on all tracks except "Carried Away", "Cathedral" and "Cold Rain" electric piano on "Anything at All"; piano, string arrangements
on "I Give You Give Blind";
timbales on "Fair Game"
*
Graham Nash – vocals; piano
on "Carried Away", "Cathedral", "Just A Song Before I Go", and "Cold Rain"; harmonica
on "Carried Away"; string arrangements
on "Cathedral" and "Cold Rain"
Additional musicians
*
Joe Vitale – drums
on "Carried Away", "Fair Game", "Cathedral", "Dark Star", "Run From Tears" and "I Give You Give Blind"; organ
on "Shadow Captain", "Fair Game", "Anything at All", "Dark Star"; electric piano
on "Carried Away", "Just A Song Before I Go"; percussion
on "Cathedral", "I Give You Give Blind"; flute
on "Shadow Captain";
timpani
Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion instrument, percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a Membranophone, membrane called a drumhead, ...
on "Cathedral";
vibraphone on "In My Dreams"
*
Craig Doerge – piano
on "Shadow Captain" and "Anything at All"; electric piano
on "Shadow Captain" and "Dark Star"
*
Mike Finnigan – organ
on "Run From Tears"
*
George "Chocolate" Perry – bass
on "Shadow Captain", "Fair Game", "Anything at All", "Cathedral", "Dark Star", and "I Give You Give Blind"
*
Jimmy Haslip
James Robert Haslip (born December 31, 1951) is an American bass guitarist who was a founding member of the jazz fusion group the Yellowjackets, which he left in 2012. He was also an early user of the five-string electric bass.
Early life and ...
– bass
on "Carried Away"
*
Tim Drummond – bass
on "Just A Song Before I Go"
*
Gerald Johnson – bass
on "Run From Tears"
*
Russ Kunkel – drums
on "Shadow Captain", "Anything at All", "Just A Song Before I Go", and "In My Dreams";
congas
on "Shadow Captain", "Dark Star"; percussion
on "Just A Song Before I Go"
*
Ray Barretto – congas
on "Fair Game"
* Mike Lewis – string arrangements
on "Cathedral", "Cold Rain", and "I Give You Give Blind"
*
Joel Bernstein – string arrangements
on "Cathedral"
Production
*
Crosby, Stills & Nash –
producers
* Howard Albert, Ron Albert – co-producers,
engineers
Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while consider ...
* Steve Gursky – assistant engineer
*
Joel Bernstein – photography
*
Gary Burden – art direction, design
*
Joe Gastwirt – digital remastering
Charts
Year-end charts
Certifications
Tour
References
Further reading
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Csn
1977 albums
Atlantic Records albums
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young albums
Albums produced by David Crosby
Albums produced by Graham Nash
Albums produced by Stephen Stills
Albums produced by the Albert Brothers