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STEPHEN STILLS : NEW YORK 1976
- I Give You Give Blind
- Four Days Gone
- Black Coral
- Taken At All
- Stateline Blows
- Helplessly Hoping
- Myth Of Sisyphus
- Make Love To You
- 49 Bye-byes / For What It's Worth
- Everybody's Talkin'
- Treetop Flyer
Label : no label
Venue : The Palladium, New York City, New York, USA
Recording Date : October 25, 1976
Length : 44:18
Quality : FM Recording (A+)
Review : Excellent FM broadcast recording for King Biscuit Flower Hour. This concert was recorded on October 25, 1976 and aired on January 9, 1977.
Review (Moshpit) : This stripped down concert appearance by Stephen Stills came in place of a much ballyhooed joint tour with Neil Young that had originally been planned. That tour was cancelled when it was reported Young developed a throat condition – although it is rumored he left in a dispute with Stills. Their joint studio LP Long May You Run, came out in September of 1976, and in order to save the summer concert season of 1976, Stills grabbed the rhythm section from CSN (drummer Joe Vitale and bassist George “Chocolate” Perry) and did the closest thing to an unplugged tour as he has ever done. At the time, Stills was actually recording and signed to three major labels (Atlantic for CSN; Columbia for his solo career; and Reprise/Warner Brothers for his project with Neil Young), and for this tour, he offered a variety of material ranging from his new studio LPs at the time, the simply titled Stills and Illegal Stills; yet to be recorded material; CSN and Buffalo Springfield hits; and even a cover of “Taken It At All,” which was a track recorded for a Crosby-Nash LP at the time, Whistle Down The Wire. Stills also offers up material from his successful first solo album (simply entitled Stephen Stills) and also from material he cut with Young for their joint Long May You Run LP. He keeps the fans happy with a few CSN tunes, most notably “Helplessly Hoping.” There is also great version of the Buffalo Springfield classic, “For What It’s Worth,” a memorable re-make of the classic Fred Neil (and Harry Nillson recorded hit) song, “Everybody’s Talkin’,” which Stills introduces as “a great song, which I wish I had written.” Other highlights include “I Give You Give Blind,” the Buffalo Springfield track “Four Days Gone,” “Stateline Blues” and “Make Love To You.” After this tour, Stills returned to his commitment in CSN, and still managed to record and release many more solo albums. He returned to a full band lineup for his future tours, but for a brief shiny moment, we saw the real and very raw Stephen Stills. Stephen Stills – lead vocals, guitar, piano; George “Chocolate” Perry – bass; Joe Vitale – drums.
Review (Bearded Gentlemen Music) : In his memoir, Neil Young goes out of his way to praise Stephen Stills, calling him a brother and a genius. They have a shared history, having met on the folkie circuit and as the core songwriters in Buffalo Springfield, not to mention their time in CSNY. It wasn’t all friendly, though. Buffalo Springfield collapsed in on itself in the late 60s, and CSNY splintered apart during an ego and cocaine fueled 1974 tour. But maybe the cruelest split of all came in 1976. Neil Young and Steven Stills were touring Long May You Run under the Stills-Young Band banner. The record had some drama in it’s making, including a moment where Young wiped David Crosby and Graham Nash’s vocals from the record, but it was a successful release, peaking at 26 on the Billboard 200. Today Long May You Run is best remembered for one of Young’s signature tunes: the title track, written for the car he abandoned in Blind River, but the other creative half of the band was in top form, too, filling half the record with his compositions. Soon, that half was supporting the joint record himself. A few dates into the Stills-Young tour, Young skipped a gig and sent Stills a telegram, closing with the laconic phrase “eat a peach, Neil.” While Young could make up dates later in the year with Crazy Horse, Stills was locked into gigs and the tour rolled on. He was backed by just two musicians: bassist George “Chocolate” Perry and drummer Joe Vitale, both of whom had worked with him before. Still, it was a stripped down affair: no lengthy guitar workouts, no harmony vocals, none of the usual trappings from his gigs with Young, Buffalo Springfield or CSN. As the King Biscuit Flower Hour taped his show at New York’s Palladium on October 26, everything was clicking. The surviving show isn’t quite a representation of the full gig. It’s been chopped down for broadcast and cut out of sequence. But it’s a great sounding show and flows well, with the occasional erratic cut back and forth. And the music is top notch. It opens with Stills on piano, singing “I Give You Give Blind,” then so new he tells the audience he’s reading it off a sheet of paper. It’s a driving piece of rock, Stills banging his piano. He slows down for a more soulful version of “Four Days Gone.” Three songs into this tape comes the first song from the album he’s touring: “Black Coral.” “This is a song about a special place I got to go,” he says before launching into the song. It’s a little overstuffed on the album, but it works gorgeously here, stripped to it’s bare essentials: Stills singing, making occasional stabs at piano and a jazzy backing from Vitale and Perry. There’s a bit of an edit here as the tape shifts to a solo Stills, alone with an acoustic guitar. He plays a cover of Graham Nash’s “Taken At All,” then a quick version of “Statesline Blues” before settling into the older CSN number “Helplessly Hoping.” It loses something of its charm without Nash and Crosby, but it’s also a showcase for Stills driving, pounding acoustic guitar (which, now that I think about it, was another Stills aspect Young went out of his way to praise). After a short break, it’s back to the full band and Stills at the piano for a slow, moody “Myth of Sisyphus,” before Stills picks up his electric guitar and plays the opening lines of “Make Love to You.” “You know when you’re in the bar, running your scam by the chick,” says Stills by way of explanation, “this is what the band should be singing.” It’s restrained: Stills playing is mostly strumming or bluesy lines, nothing like his freewheeling playing on CSNY jams like “Carry On or Southern Man.” There’s another quick edit and Stills is back at the piano for a speedy run-through of “49 Bye-Byes,” which he deftly segues into an equally speedy “For What It’s Worth.” While it only faintly resembles the original, it sounds like Stills is having the most fun he’d had all night, almost daring Vitale and Perry to keep up with his speedy piano runs. Then it’s back to the acoustic guitar for another cover of Fred Neils’ “Everybody’s Talkin’,” before Stills says “All right, let’s get down to business,” before kicking into the last song on the recording: “Treetop Flyer,” a bluesy song, with Stills’ guitar so dry it practically kicks up dust. It’s about a pilot who runs booze, guns, and probably drugs, too, across the border: “I fly low, I’m in high demand.” It’s a great tune and one of the first songs he recorded as a solo artist, but for some reason it didn’t see release until 1991’s Stills Alone. Here the recording cuts out, right as the announcer says there’ll be more after the break. Around here, the tour cut out too. Stills moved on to new projects, releasing Thoroughfare Gap a couple years later, then a new CSN album the year after. But this recording is a nice snapshot of him at an interesting junction: abandoned by his friend, on the road touring an album he probably wanted to get away from. He occasionally sounds upbeat, but generally he sounds like a man alone on an empty stage: not exactly overwhelmed, but certainly wishing he was back down by the black coral.