release date: Mar. 11, 1970
format: digital (1993)
[album rate: 3 / 5] [2,96]
producer: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
label: Warner Bros., Japan - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Carry On" (3,5 / 5) - 2. "Teach Your Children" - 4. "Helpless" (4 / 5) - 9. "Country Girl"
Debut as Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and the follow-up to the album Crosby, Stills & Nash by Crosby, Stills & Nash from 1969. The album was originally released by Atlantic Records and at the time the band was perceived as a super-group, which could become America's Beatles. This may be seen in the light of the fine reception of the Crosby, Stills & Nash debut album and also the great successes by Neil Young and Buffalo Springfield - needless to say, the expectations were there.
The music is, in my mind, a strange pot of genres and styles - some tracks are entirely folk rock, others are a mix of that with blues rock and psychedelic rock, which brings to mind bands like Jefferson Airplane and the like [e.g. track #2. "Almost Cut My Hair" by David Crosby], or: a mix with country rock [e.g. track #3. "Helpless" by Neil Young].
The album was well-received, although, not all critics agree in the positive feelings (see Rolling Stone review from 1974 at the bottom). It went all the way to the top of the US albums charts, and it's enlisted in various best of lists including "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die".
I don't really like it that much. There's too much psychedelic rock of the Woodstock era going on with jazz rock and fusion rock in the arrangements to my liking, and I have to confess that I never liked the music by neither Graham Nash nor David Crosby that much. I think the best songs on the album are material by Stephen Stills and Neil Young respectively. Some songs like track #7. "Our House" scream: The Beatles!, or track #2 "Teach Your Children": The Byrds! in a way that makes you wonder on which album by either you'll find the original. Best track is the simple classic "Helpless" by Neil Young. That song just seems out of tune with the rest as being the only pure country rock and singer / songwriter compositions on the album, and basically fits much better on his album After the Gold Rush released 6 months later. In more recent interviews, Graham Nash has put it into words how it was to work with Neil Young at this stage, where Young was still in his formative years. Nash points to the fact that they just thought they would continue their initial work as an extended Crosby, Stills and Nash-project, but that they all felt how strong the influence was from Neil Young, and listening to his contributions - which they had no expectations to - completely blew them over. Also, as they finished the recordings to the album, Young would go into the studio to record his landmark album After the Gold Rush released Sep. 1970.
[ allmusic.com 5 / 5 stars - Rolling Stone denies it stars ]
