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David Crosby
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"...people really want to hold out their hands to each other and feel unity within their community and family and country with their peers. We have always felt that music is a healing thing. I’m sure that it is, and there is no question that it helps unity happen."
"I think part of our job is to reflect our times and to reflect the people that we come from and show them to rest of the world and to ourselves. Hopefully, we can do that in a way that is insightful enough that it’s inspiring."
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3.28.02
Looking Forward: David Crosby Muses on Politics, Life, and Music
by Ian D'Giff
David Crosby is one lucky man. Forget about the fact that he's a two-time inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (as a founding member of both The Byrds and Crosby, Stills & Nash), David Crosby is just lucky to be alive. Here's a guy who kicked hard drugs while in prison, survived a devastating motorcycle accident, battled the IRS, and lost his home to an earthquake. Then he goes and gets a life-saving liver transplant and twice becomes a father within the span of a year. A musical revolutionary of the highest caliber, Crosby is currently on the road with the same band that turned in what many consider the definitive performance of the original Woodstock Festival, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Crosby recently took a break from the supergroup's busy "Tour of America" to speak about his life, his loves, the state of the Union, the state of the band, and just how lucky he truly is.
Musictoday: Tell us a little bit about the "Tour of America" and it’s relationship to September 11th.
David Crosby: Well, you know, we wanted to tour anyway, but Neil felt, and I think he may be right, that people really wanted to see us. My personal feeling is that when people go through something really, really awful like that; there’s a period of shock. The country went into shock for a little while, just because we really couldn’t accept that much pain all at one time. Then there’s a period of mourning, when you really do accept what the loss was and how bad it was. Then there’s a period when people really want to hold out their hands to each other and feel unity within their community and family and country with their peers. We have always felt that music is a healing thing. I’m sure that it is, and there is no question that it helps unity happen. We all felt that we had entered that time and this would be a positive force. And, you know, that’s who we are and what we do.
Mt: Let’s dive a bit deeper into the concept of music as a healing agent.
DC: I don’t think there’s any question that it is. I’d be hard pressed to tell you how, but I don’t think there’s any question that it does help human beings feel better. That "each man is an island" thing is true, but music is a bridge and it bridges that gap wonderfully well and it allows us to reach out to each other. I think that’s a tremendous healing force. If you face tough times alone, it’s completely different than if you face tough times with the support and love of people around you.
Mt: Speaking for my generation, I’m thirty now, we’ve never lived through anything like this before and there seems to be this overwhelming vibe of uncertainty with regards to the future. I think many of us are looking at you guys, as representatives of the original Woodstock generation, for guidance and reassurance that we can pull through this and things will, in fact, get better.
DC: Well, if that’s the case, I’d be proud to accept the job. There is ongoingness; there is a future; and there is, usually almost always, a way to make things better. We believe that. Now maybe our optimism is a little naïve, I don’t know. To me it fits; it fits the world and it fits me. I think that our belief in our country and our belief in our principles are valid. I think that we’re a great country of great people and I believe in us. I think that, yes, this kind of event where terrorists killed thousands of people in one shot is a real body blow—this really hurt us. I think if you hadn’t been through a war, if you hadn’t been through any tough times, it would smack you in the face. I think it did that to all of the people under thirty in this country. I would put it to you this way: I think we’ve been living in a kind of idyllic bubble. "This is America, this doesn’t happen here." Well, the truth is, we’ve kind of joined the rest of the world. Now we know what it’s like to be an Israeli—you go to the market everyday and some days you don’t make it.
Mt: Neil Young: when he enters the fold of CSN, something incredibly special happens. Can you verbalize it?
DC: It’s like putting nitroglycerin in the mix. [laughs] Neil is like an elemental force. Neil is like asking the tide to join your band or, more aptly, asking a hurricane to join your band. He’s an immense and turbulent elemental force. He’s a brilliant songwriter and a brilliant guitar player and a great singer; he’s just an amazing man and he’s very committed to making the best music he can make. He’s a very exacting taskmaster; he really, really works at it hard. So, when you put two guitar players of the quality of him and Stephen Stills up next to each other, you’re going to get explosions, there is no way around it. It’s like putting fire and gasoline in the same container—it’s gonna go off.
Mt: I read that during the Looking Forward sessions, it was Neil who really simplified things a bit by getting the four of you stand around and perform on one mic.
DC: Well, that’s something that we had done back in our early days a lot, and he encouraged us to do it again. Just as he’s demanding, he’s also supportive. He’s a tremendously gifted guy, in terms of what music is doing in a room, and his analysis of things is usually very, very, very clear and very insightful. I like working with him. I love working with Crosby, Stills and Nash—just the three of us—too, it’s a completely different band.
Mt: Let’s talk about the relationship between musicians and socio-political activism. Do you feel that there is an inherent responsibility to address certain issues and situations through song?
DC: Our job is primarily to entertain you, to help you feel things, to crystallize feelings for you, and also to just make you boogie. I think other parts of our job are as the troubadour—the teller of tales from far away places so you’re aware of things that you might not have been—and also as the town crier: "It’s eleven-thirty and all’s well," or, "it’s twelve-fifteen and it’s not so damn good." "Something is lurking over here that doesn’t make any sense, somebody shine some light on this." I think we do all those jobs and I think we’re doing them pretty well. I think part of our job is to reflect our times and to reflect the people that we come from and show them to rest of the world and to ourselves. Hopefully, we can do that in a way that is insightful enough that it’s inspiring.
Mt: Has your perspective on social and political situations changed since you first began your career as a recording artist?
DC: Very little. I’m still pretty much of a rebel. I think that most of the causes that we espoused when we started were absolutely right on. Human rights, civil rights—we weren’t wrong. All people are created equal and everybody has a right to freedom and the pursuit of happiness. The stuff in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights is all correct. We believed in that from the get go. I think we were right that war is a bunch of crap. You know, peace is better than war, there’s no question. There are times when you have to defend your self, yes, and we’re in one of those. I think basically, our value systems are the same. God, you know, politics are involved with everything, and it’s at a state right now that where it’s been very degraded. The win that we just got on campaign finance reform could make a real difference, although the five thousand or so people that control most of the money in the world are already working on ways around it. But I think it was a tremendous win, though I think that as long as the government is for sale, it won’t be answerable to the people that elect the officials. I think we have to work towards a more honest government. It’s supposed to be a representative democracy. The idea was to have an informed electorate and a representative democracy and not "the guy with the most money and the cleverest TV ads gets the keys to the kingdom." That’s not what they had in mind. I think we continue to be politically active, though we don’t all agree with each other about things. I’m a liberal about most things, but I personally think we should abolish the welfare system; it stinks. I think if you pay people not to work, you make bad people. I’m sure I’ll piss off a lot of people with that, but that’s what I believe. But on the other hand, I don’t think that we should be giving corporations these huge breaks and making us pay for it. I am particularly enraged by Enron. This blatant "Yeah, we stole hundreds of millions of dollars, and we’re keeping it and to hell with you; we’re going to stonewall you.
Mt: The concept of freak-flag flying: is yours still out there?
DC: Yeah, mine’s still flying. I still consider myself outside the mainstream of normal American Squaresville, but that’s OK. The strength of this country is that it allows us to have all kinds of different belief systems and different races and religions and ways of living our lives. That’s our strength, that’s what this is all about. I think it’s great that I can live here and be an American and be a staunchly believing Constitutionalist American and have hair down to my shoulders and be a hippie. I think that’s good.
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