Crosby, Stills and Nash - Colston Hall, Bristol, 17th October, 2013

Nearly, But No Blubbering

I am still buzzing/affected by Crosby, Stills and Nash’s Thursday concert, and being reminded now in other ways by listening to a bootleg of their Royal Albert Hall performance on the 9^th October where the set list was very similar.

This review could be either extremely long in its unbridled enthusiasm, or brief – but still in its unbridled enthusiasm. Needs must and I will go for the latter. Or try to. One interesting place to start is in stating that on stage you had someone who played with Buffalo Springfield, someone who played with The Hollies, and someone who played with The Byrds. Consummate credibility already. And then you had the three members of their first incarnation, and then with the addition of Neil Young, and variously after that [Stills/Young, for example, and more consistently Crosby and Nash as a duo] and these guys played Woodstock and became the epitome of the West Coast sound and just so much phenomenally more. That lineage/history had massive much to do with the highly emotive state I found myself in when seeing them on Thursday.

I don’t normally sing along at gigs, but when I tried to join in with those opening first classic songs – Carry On and Questions – I found myself welling up. Pathetic I know, but I am not embarrassed to admit, and I think it was all about the expectation of going to see these musical giants but also, obviously, all that history of what they have achieved and how much their early days impacted on my youth and consequently my views and attitudes and – well, you know the powerful symbiosis that exists between adolescence and musical [and the other within: lyrical, political, reminiscence] influence. It was all there.

Needless to say I didn’t blubber at those early moments and nor did I later when I managed to sing along to other classics. And they were the classics, as well as very recent and other material along their long way together and separately. Each in fact got their solo spotlights, even if this was together but focusing on the songwriting individuality.

I’m not going to review the music because it doesn’t need that. But what matters is how they sounded now: the vocal harmonising was as outstanding as ever, Crosby and Nash in particular quite pristine. The backing band was remarkably tight and gifted in support, but it was the three up front and centre and foregrounded on the mics that carried the evening to its aural heights. Stephen Stills is known to have hearing difficulties and a consequent impact on his vocals, but this wasn’t even that noticeable on his solo contributions, and certainly not in unison. Or if it was noticeable – I don’t need to whitewash this performance – it was the simple reality of age and the years of whatever was done to affect that. And Stills’ gravelly, bluesy vocal had such an impact that evening, as did his superb guitar soloing: the crackling of the feedback controlled into the most mellow of full, beautiful sound, but also erupting into the wildest rock. The Crosby/Nash duet of Guinevere, performed thousands of times by these two, was sublime.

The gig began precisely at 8pm, the guys had a 20 minute break, and then it finished at just after 11pm, all packed with quality and even more history in the making for me. Closing songs were Almost Cut My Hair – Crosby’s vocal soaring in its clarity – and then Wooden Ships, with the encore – and as Nash said, it couldn’t be any other, not having been played yet – Sweet Judy Blue Eyes. There had been standing ovations throughout the set, and I was one of the first, compelled to react [so much better than shedding tears, no matter how joyous!], so can you imagine the reaction at the very end?!

And do you know, I’m still buzzing.