{"id":806515,"date":"2020-04-17T13:50:58","date_gmt":"2020-04-17T19:50:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=985558"},"modified":"2020-04-17T13:50:58","modified_gmt":"2020-04-17T19:50:58","slug":"david-crosby-on-live-musics-uncertain-future-and-why-he-hasnt-given-up-on-reuniting-csny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/music-news\/david-crosby-on-live-musics-uncertain-future-and-why-he-hasnt-given-up-on-reuniting-csny\/","title":{"rendered":"David Crosby on Live Music\u2019s Uncertain Future \u2014 and Why He Hasn\u2019t Given Up on Reuniting CSNY"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Crosby<\/a> had a busy 2020 lined up, with three separate tours, major shows with Phil Lesh, Joe Walsh and Jason Isbell, and a lot of new music to make. At the moment, Crosby has no idea if any of that is going to happen. \u201cI don\u2019t want to be sitting at home, man,\u201d Crosby says on the phone from his Santa Ynez, California home. \u201cI\u2019m 78. I only got a few years left. You know that. I don\u2019t want to spend them sitting on my butt. I got a lot of music in me still.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Crosby is doing his best to make the most of his hiatus from the road. He\u2019s cleaned out three lockers. He made a \u201cfirst-class breakfast,\u201d and caught up on music ranging from Miles Davis to Bulgarian folk. Crosby is hurting financially right now, but he acknowledges it\u2019s nothing compared to young artists. \u201cFor musicians, it\u2019s a fucking nightmare,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Right before he started self-isolating, Crosby<\/span> sent off an e-mail to Neil Young<\/a>, making the case for a Crosby, Stills<\/a>, Nash & Young reunion. The group hasn\u2019t toured since 2006, and the reasons why are examined in the 2019 documentary Remember My Name<\/em><\/a>. Here, Crosby talks about the possibility of the band playing again, the difficulty of being a musician during the pandemic, creativity, and why he hasn\u2019t given up on our country yet.
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Is it a particularly creative time right now?
<\/b>I want it to be, but you can\u2019t legislate it. When it happens, it\u2019s some sort of internal chemistry that\u2019s unpredictable. The minute you do have an idea, though, you have to go for it. Don\u2019t go out to lunch or something. My son James is on an absolute tear. He\u2019s been writing like a maniac the last month. Just hotter than shit. You don\u2019t know how the stress will affect people. But a lot of us see it as a challenge, to surf it, to get on top of it, and control our destiny. But it\u2019s difficult man, these are hard times for everybody.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Does this chapter remind you of anything else you\u2019ve lived through?
<\/b>It reminds me of a couple of different periods. It reminds me of the Vietnam War, trying to get people to pay attention to us and saying we shouldn\u2019t be there. It reminds me of the Civil Rights era, and how frustrated we were with people being racist, and it reminds me, sadly, of Kent State. There are guys at the top of our government right now would dearly love it to be a police state, and they admire it. Our President, those are the only guys he likes \u2013 dictators. The situation is very bad. We have an absolute idiot running the country and now we have run into a real serious problem. And he\u2019s not capable. He\u2019s not capable of dealing with breakfast, let alone the problems of the country. So that\u2019s all very tough. I think it\u2019s real hard times, man. I have two real positive happy songs I want to put out right now and I\u2019m trying to convince the record company people to let me do it, because I think these are really down times. <\/span>
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The live streams seem to be really really changing music.
<\/b>People sitting in their living rooms on an iPhone, playing you songs \u2013 it\u2019s so fucking real. I like all my friends who are doing it, particularly Jason Isbell<\/a>. I like how he\u2019s doing it really well. Benmont Tench did a really nice one.<\/span><\/p>\n

Have you seen any of Neil\u2019s<\/a>? They\u2019re incredible.
<\/b>No, I didn\u2019t. Well, he\u2019s usually really good. What can I say? I haven\u2019t liked his writing lately so much. I keep waiting for a song that really makes me feel something. He set  the bar very high, man. \u201cHelpless.\u201d \u201cCountry Girl.\u201d \u201cOld Man.\u201d \u201cA Man Needs a Maid.\u201d\u201cCortez.\u201d It\u2019\u2019s Neil. He wrote a lot of great songs. So it\u2019s tough for him. Everybody is always going to compare his work now to his work in the past. Same thing everybody does to all of us. And it\u2019s hard to maintain a very high level. I\u2019ve been very fortunate; I\u2019m working with other people who are immensely talented.<\/span><\/p>\n

Your last few albums have been great.
<\/b>I think so. And I\u2019m halfway through another one. I don\u2019t know why I\u2019m bothering; they don\u2019t pay me for them. Part of the dynamic that\u2019s going on now with musicians is that we came into it having already lost half of our income. They don\u2019t pay us for records anymore, no matter what anybody tells you. It\u2019s like you did your job at Rolling Stone for a month and they paid you nickel. It\u2019s not only not paying you, it\u2019s insulting you at the same time. And they\u2019re making billions of dollars. When you talk to people in the record business, [they say], \u201cWow, the regular business is booming!\u201d Yeah, that\u2019s why.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know if you know this, man. But what happened is the guys who invented the technology went to the main record companies and they said, \u201cHey, imagine a world where there\u2019s no physical object. No records, no CDs, no covers, no packages, no shipping, no distribution companies, no cover, no lyrics, no nothing. You press a button, you send it and you collect the money.\u201d And the record companies went, \u201cHoly shit. What do we have to do to get that?\u201d And the guys who invented the technology said, \u201cAll you have to do is change the pay structure. Instead of paying the artists so much money that they\u2019re all rich rock stars, pay us that money.\u201d And the record company said, \u201cYeah, we could do that.\u201d And this is the kicker: \u201cGive us a piece of your company.\u201d And they did. I don\u2019t know if this is true, man, but here\u2019s what I heard: Those three main record companies are currently splitting a take off of the streaming companies that is like $17 or $19 million a day. I\u2019d love to know if it\u2019s true. And the money goes right around the artists, we don\u2019t get any of it. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"Crosby,<\/p>\n

Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young<\/a> in the 1970s.<\/p>\n

Ray Stevenson\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

I don\u2019t mean to rant about it, but the real crime is what it\u2019s doing to the young people who are trying to earn their way into the business.  I know a bunch of them who are monstrously talented, and they can\u2019t fucking earn a living. They can\u2019t make any money off of CDs. And then they shut down live performance. <\/span><\/p>\n

What performances have you lost?
<\/b>Well, it\u2019s grim, man. I lost Phil Lesh\u2019s birthday<\/a>, right? I was really looking forward to that. I was looking forward to playing with and we had plans on doing \u201cLaughing\u201d and \u201cCowboy Movie\u201d and things that we cut together. It was a pretty exciting weekend looking like a real thrill, a bunch of really great players coming in that respect Phil and think he\u2019s a really great musician. That\u2019s gone.<\/span><\/p>\n

I have always felt very strongly about Kent State in Ohio. And Joe Walsh was there then. Joe wanted to play a benefit for them. And I volunteered to open for him. And he said he\u2019d love it, because he knew that we would be singing \u201cOhio<\/a>\u201d together at the end of the show.  That\u2019s canceled. And then you have dates coming up right after that. I got three tours this year because it\u2019s the only time I can make my living, support my family, keep my home. I had three tours. I just lost the first one. Then I got one in August-September and then I got another one in November-December. The one in November-December is really killer. Marc Cohn, who is a dear friend of mine and one of the best singer songwriters in the country, called me up and said he and Shawn Colvin want to do a tour with me.<\/span><\/p>\n

I love both of them to pieces. I think they\u2019re two of the best singer songwriters alive. <\/span>So we\u2019re gonna do a really fun thing. We\u2019re gonna do a Nashville song circle, where we go out and all three of us stay out there the whole night and trade songs. It should be fucking wonderful because, man, they can really lay it down. I\u2019m looking forward to it, but I might lose that, too. If I lose all three of them, well, then I\u2019m going to lose my home. I don\u2019t have any savings. I won\u2019t be able to make the rent. I won\u2019t be able to make the mortgage. So I got to tell you, for musicians, it\u2019s a fucking nightmare. <\/span><\/p>\n

Would you want to go back on the road if you could?
<\/b>Fuck no! Right? I\u2019m wondering how that\u2019s gonna work until there\u2019s a cure. What [I think] \u2018s gonna happen is this: We\u2019ll be able to tell you in each region when it\u2019s peaking. And when it starts to peak, then people are going to start figuring out what to do afterwards, and then they will start rebooking all of us work and then we will go back to work and then the world will go back to roughly normal except we have an idiot for a President. <\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s scary to imagine all the baby boomer artists going back on the road.
<\/b>I\u2019m a textbook case, man, I\u2019m 78 years old. I\u2019m a transplant, so I have a suppressed immune system. I\u2019m a diabetic, type-two, for 30 years. I\u2019m absolutely the center of the demographic. I worry about it.<\/span><\/p>\n

What music have you been turning to?
<\/b>I\u2019m listening to stuff that\u2019s really more meditative. If you turn on the TV, it\u2019s all frantic, everything\u2019s frantic, and they\u2019re doing that on purpose because it sells products. I listen to, well, Michael Hedges. Miles Davis, particularly Sketches <\/em>[of Spain]. I listen to Snarky Puppy, a really good jazz band. I listen to Weather Report. <\/span>Heavy Weather<\/span><\/i> is still one of my favorite records on earth. I\u2019ve been listening to the new Sarah Jarosz<\/a> record, which is stunningly fucking good and which follows on the heels of I\u2019m With Her doing stunningly good stuff. I still listen to Joni a lot because I think she was the best of us. I listen to David Gilmore. The first record that the Bulgarian National Radio Folk Orchestra, called Music From Bulgaria<\/em>. I still listen to that record. It changed my life. The best vocal work I\u2019ve ever heard anybody do.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll tell you what I\u2019ve been listening to this morning, man. Somebody in Italy got hundreds of people to sing \u201cHelplessly Hoping,\u201d and aggregated them together. It\u2019s so emotional. Look it up on the net, man. I actually teared up. That\u2019s what I\u2019ve been listening to this morning.<\/span><\/p>\n