CSN (album)

CSN
Studio album by Crosby, Stills & Nash
Released	June 17, 1977
Recorded	1976 - 1977
Genre	Rock
Length	43:50
Label	Atlantic
Producer	David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash with Ron Albert and Howard Albert
Crosby, Stills & Nash chronology
So Far (1974) CSN (1977) Replay (1980)

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[1]
Rolling Stone	(not rated)[2]

CSN is a Crosby, Stills & Nash album released in 1977, the fifth album by the group, the second by the trio configuration and the first without Neil Young since his entry into the band. It peaked at #2 on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart; two singles taken from the album, Nash's "Just A Song Before I Go" and Stills' "Fair Game" peaked at #7 and #43 respectively on the Billboard Hot 100.

Content

In the interim since their last studio album of original material, Déjà Vu from 1970, the band had only completed one project together, the 1974 reunion tour. David Crosby and Graham Nash had recorded three albums as a duo, with Crosby releasing a single solo 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.

CSN featured strong writing from all three members, the last time for seventeen years that the band would compose songs and handle vocals without major assistance from outside sources. The production of the album fit in well with the ruling aesthetic of the time as featured in other blockbusters such as the Eagles' Hotel California, Fleetwood Mac's Rumours: well-crafted, melodic songs played with precision and balance, essaying the personal travails of the authors.

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 were sweetened with a string section, a first on a CSNY project.

The album was released for compact disc an initial time in the 1980s,^[3] 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.

Cover art

Joel Bernstein photographed the trio in serious poses aboard a boat, and initial copies of CSN bore that picture on the cover. The next picture Bernstein took of Crosby, Stills and Nash was a shot of them breaking into laughter at the thought of just having posed as "serious artists." The trio later decided that they liked the second photo better, and it was decided that all future pressings of CSN should bear the "laughter" photo.^{[citation needed]}

Track listing

Side one

Side two

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 personnel

• 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"; tympani 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 Perry — bass on "Shadow Captain," "Fair Game," "Anything at All", "Cathedral," "Dark Star," and "I Give You Give Blind"
• Jimmy Haslip — 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 personnel

• Crosby, Stills & Nash — producers
• Howard Albert, Ron Albert — co-producers, engineers
• Steve Gursky — assistant engineer
• Joel Bernstein — photography
• Gary Burden — art direction, design
• Joe Gastwirt — digital remastering

References