Affixed at the start of two era-defining rock bands, ‘REMEMBER MY NAME‘ (Dir A.J. Eaton, 95 mins, 2019) would appear a strange title for a documentary overview on the career of David Crosby – anyone with even a passing interest in rock music aware of his connections with Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and on occasion Neil Young.
To the initiated Crosby was the outspoken mouthpiece for the late-60s counter-culture, of whom the two aforementioned line-ups were the musical embodiment – arriving at ‘spokesman of a generation‘ status after first coming to prominence as rhythm guitarist of L.A. folk-rock pioneers The Byrds.
Yet for all his fame as a singer and musician (just a few minutes into this absorbing film he makes the point of being the only member of CSNY to have never written a hit by way of explaining why he continues to work into his late-70s), Crosby garnered almost as much publicity for the years spent embracing the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll ethos – expressing astonishment, along with relief, at not succumbing to an early death like many of his rock star friends.
Indeed, during nigh-on twenty years of deep indulgence, ending with him serving jail time for drugs and weapons possession in the mid-80s, Crosby somehow avoided the ‘rock casualty’ epitaph to instead live on as the foremost example of ‘rock wreckage’ – surviving three heart-attacks, hepatitis C and developing diabetes to the extent it requires virtually around the clock medication.
But for all his physical frailties Crosby remains sharp of mind, reflecting on his life and times with great candour, wit and poignancy, expressing pride in some of the music bearing his name (among others), but also huge remorse at time lost to addictions (‘I regret the time wasted to being smashed‘) and friendships now consigned to the past – ‘all the main guys I made music with, McGuinn, Nash, Stephen, Neil, dislike me. Really dislike me.’
There is however, no sense of bitterness or spite attached to what are fascinating reflections, renowned rock critic and screenwriter Cameron Crowe, who as a 16 year-old first interviewed Crosby in 1974, often pushing for clear answers – Crosby not needing too much encouragement in speaking with affection about Jerry Garcia, stating his dislike of Jim Morrison or comparing his late-60s love affair with Joni Mitchell to ‘falling into a cement mixer.’
If by the end there is a slight feeling of melancholy it stems from the fact an ageing Crosby has to keep leaving a wife and home he clearly loves in order to tread the concert boards (some scenes in the documentary recorded whilst undertaking a 2017 US tour), although even then it comes with the buoyancy of putting new music before an audience – Crosby undergoing a creative rebirth by releasing four solo albums, with a fifth in the works, since CSN played their last note in 2015.
Describing himself as a ‘chubby little kid who wanted attention,‘ Los Angeles-born Crosby speaks of a close relationship with his mother (she is at the core of ‘Carry Me‘ arguably the best song he was ever written), but one of almost total detachment from a cold, distant father, noted cinematographer Floyd Crosby, winner of a Golden Globe for his work on the 1952 western ‘High Noon.’
Citing the Everly Brothers as an early musical influence, particularly enraptured by their two-part harmony singing, Crosby then became enthralled by Bob Dylan and crossing paths with fellow devotee Jim McGuinn they put together an ensemble who would become The Byrds. Aiming to ingrain the folk music Dylan was purveying with Beatle-styled pop sensibilities, in the summer of 1965 the merger produced ‘Mr. Tambourine Man‘ – The Byrds taking this Dylan composition to number one in charts around the world.
In setting the folk-rock train in motion, before the year was out they were being touted as the ‘American Beatles.’ Innovative in their music and feted by fans and critics, Crosby recalls, ‘it’s not always a positive to win early and big,’ pointing to the fact (he had) ‘a big ego, but no brains.’
Already gaining a reputation for being opinionated, from the stage at the 1967 Monterrey Pop Festival, he harangued the lone-gunman findings of the Warren Commission established to investigate the assassination of President Kennedy, this the final straw for the other Byrds, who fired him from the group shortly afterwards – McGuinn, in a contemporary interview, stating Crosby had become ‘insufferable‘ and someone ‘the rest of the group didn’t want to be around.’
Out of The Byrds, in a Florida coffee house he discovers Joni Mitchell (‘the best singer-songwriter of us all‘), with whom he began a brief and tempestuous love affair culminating in him producing her 1968 debut album ‘Song to a Seagull,’ Crosby admitting, ‘I didn’t do a very good job with it, but did manage to capture her essence.’
The following year he joined forces with Stephen Stills (ex-Buffalo Springfield) and Graham Nash (ex-Hollies), Nash describing how their distinctive three-part harmony sound, aligned to a mesh of acoustic guitars, was born within forty seconds of their first vocal performance, a subsequent debut album becoming an immediate best-seller. While often complimentary about Young as an artist, Crosby refers to assimilation of the Canadian songwriter-guitarist into a trio already dubbed ‘a super group‘ as ‘we thought squeezing four guys into a space where you could only fit three would be explosive – and it was.’
Hence the exuberance surrounding the formation and success of Crosby, Stills and Nash soon becomes dissipated by clashing egos and although they recorded the excellent ‘Deja Vu‘ album with Young (March 1970), the mood was blighted further by a tragedy that would cast darkness over his life for many years to come – namely the traffic accident death of girlfriend Christine Hinton (21) in September 1969.
In a scene of great resonance Crosby recalls, ‘I couldn’t deal with Christine’s death at all and spent a lot of time crying. Didn’t know what else to do. Very often when we were recording ‘Deja Vu’ I’d sit on the studio floor and start crying. I was in a terrible place.’
When Crowe puts to him a quote from Nash of him never being the same after he identified Hinton at the hospital, Crosby agrees, remarking, ‘He’s right – and Nash stuck with me for a very long time.’
In a segment that is equally emotive Crosby visits Kent State University, Ohio, where on May 4 1970, four students protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia were shot dead by National Guardsmen, his anger at those responsible showing no sign of abating. In the aftermath CSNY voiced their anger in scorching Young-composed protestation ‘Ohio‘ – which Crosby hails as ‘the best job of being troubadours we ever did.‘
Throughout the 70s reunions of the trio and quartet occur, yet all the time looms the spectre of his spiralling drug abuse. Images of him on stage with Stills and Nash in the early 80s are truly disconcerting due to his vacant, expressionless stare. Less and less creative as he becomes beholden to cocaine and heroin, by the time of his 1985 arrest and incarceration, Crosby indeed looks a pitiful sight, managing to overcome his addictions during the nine months spent in prison.
Crosby is characteristically candid in revealing how and why his drug use became so all-consuming, laying out the cost in both emotional and financial terms.
‘The drugs became more important than anyone or anything – including the music,’ he asserts, ‘I blew all the money and pretty much lost everything. I let those guys down badly, that band went down the tubes because of what I was doing.’
Despite on-going health issues impacting on his new found sobriety, Crosby found redemption in marrying long-time partner Jan Dance in 1987, CSN (and sometimes Y) remaining a high-profile concert attraction well into the new century, only for both bands to splinter in the second decade – Nash unequivocal on who was to blame for the implosions:
‘Crosby ripped the heart out of Crosby, Stills and Nash – and CSNY.’
Quite what Crosby did to cause the fracture of CSN remains a mystery as neither Crosby or Nash are pushed on the subject, although Crosby describes in detail an on-stage altercation with Nash during a CSN tour in 2014. The antipathy Nash feels toward his former cohort is evident in a cringe-worthy December 2015 performance of ‘Silent Night‘ for President Obama at the White House – the likelihood being it will amount to their swansong as Nash shows no inclination of ever working with Crosby again.
There is less ambiguity with regard to why the door appears closed on CSNY, Crosby admitting ‘I shot my mouth off about Neil’s girlfriend,’ (calling the lady in question, actress Daryl Hannah, a ‘purely poisonous predator‘). Although he has since apologised to the couple, who are now married, Crosby tempers the comment by adding, ‘over the years we have all hurt one another and said terrible things to and about each other.’
Living with the threat of suffering another heart attack (‘sometime in the next two years‘ he surmises), this largely excellent documentary leaves the impression of Crosby being anxious to cram as much new music as possible into what time he has left.
It does, however, seem unlikely it will involve any of the names with whom he is best remembered and most identified – the roller-coaster ride that took them from Woodstock to Live Aid and many points in between and beyond, apparently over.
In pushing Crosby for clarity on the state of his relationship with Young, Crowe asks if he could show up on Neil’s doorstep ‘to patch things up.’
‘The thing is I’m not mad with Neil – Neil’s mad with me,’ says Crosby ruefully, adding, ‘but the truth is I don’t even know where Neil’s doorstep is anymore.’
This article was first published on May 6 2021.
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NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of ‘MONTY’S DOUBLE‘ – an acclaimed thriller now available in paperback and as an Amazon Kindle book.