PRESS RELEASE
Written by Michael Jensen
The best, most enduring and original creative collaborations always adhere to a simple formula: the total equals more than the sum of its parts. Lennon & McCartney; Jagger & Richards; Gershwin & Gershwin; Rogers & Hart -by the strange alchemy of teamwork, a tally of talent can add up to more than simple arithmetic.

It's a principle that's at the heart of one of the best, most enduring and original musical partnerships of our time. The music of David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and Neil Young is something unique and distinct from its individual creative components. It's a sound instantly recognizable and eternally fresh; a perfect balance between familiarity and surprise. It is the basis of a partnership that has lasted, in one form or another, for thirty years and is the impetus for Looking Forward, the aptly titled new album from Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young on Reprise Records, and their first studio venture together in over a decade.

Comprised of twelve tracks representing new material from all of these consummate songwriters, Looking Forward is produced by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (with additional production by Ben Keith, J. Stanley Johnson and Joe Vitale). It features instrumental backing from a stellar lineup including, among others, Jim Keltner, Duck Dunn, Gerald Johnson, Hutch Hutchinson, Luis Conte, Spooner Oldham, Joe Vitale, Mike Finnigan, James Raymond, Bob Glaub and, of course, the group itself. Recorded in various studios in Los Angeles as well as Neil Young's Redwood Digital Studios at his Woodside, California ranch, Looking Forward is the first new Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young release since 1988's American Dream and only the fourth album of the quartet's career, together with Deja Vu (1970) and the live 4-Way Street (1971). The release of Looking Forward will be supported by major concerts in 2000, reuniting the foursome on tour for the first time since 1974.

On the cusp of a full-scale reunion, the next development was all but a foregone conclusion. "Neil asked us if we wanted to hear a few things he was working on to see if we could do anything with them," recounts Nash. "After that, it all just fell into place. We were obviously in the middle of a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young record."

Neil Young: "I'd recorded about fourteen or fifteen songs for my next solo record and it was too much. So I took some of them down to LA with me and when we were done playing their songs it seemed like a good time to bring in some of mine."

From the beginning, each of the four members shared a commitment to let the music lead. "All of us are really good record makers," asserts a matter-of-fact Stills. "We can step back at any time and see the big picture, without failing in love with the first thing we hear. We were able to take out everything that wasn't necessary and maintain the essential spirit of what was happening between us."

"We know what happens when Neil sings with us," continues Nash. "We know the edge that it brings, that slight ruggedness and that's very appealing."

"He did a wonderful thing by getting us all to sing around one mike again," explains Crosby. "it got the music airborne and brought us back to a very organic sound. Before, we'd do separate takes for cleanliness sake, trying to get a perfect spread. But Neil's not into perfect. He's into making you feel."

"it was fun using live vocals," adds Young, "instead of overdubbing for years and trying to fix everything that was the slightest bit wrong. I think the best records we've made, together and separately, have been when we're singing and playing and recording all at once, which is the way I always try to do it."

Aside from a vocal approach that mixes spontaneity with the seamless harmonies that have long been the group's trademark, Looking Forward also boasts the potent guitar lineup of Stills and Young, firing and inspiring each other to new heights. Stephen Stills: "I learned to be very precise playing acoustic guitar in concert for Crosby, Stills & Nash and my technique really grew by leaps and bounds. And I knew that, with Neil on board, I'd have to be playing at the top of my game."



"The way Stephen and I played is very similar to what we did in Buffalo Springfield," is the way Young describes the process. "We'd stand by each other, watching and listening to each other play and interweaving what we do. It was really an extension of what we had started back with Springfield, picking up that ball again."

Before they would put the ball back down, some four months later, the quartet would have recorded over twenty new songs. Then began the difficult and demanding process of making the cut and mixing the final selections. "We mixed from January through July," Nash recalls, "and for some of that time, Neil was away on tour. We sent the results up to the ranch and waited to hear back." He laughs. "The message we got was that Neil thought we were off to a good start."

Dedicated to capturing the elusive, always-evolving essentials of the group, Young suggested that his three partners come to his ranch to cut new material-specifically three freshly minted songs including Young's "Queen of Them All" and Nash's affecting "Someday Soon." With the new material in the can, the album quickly began to take final form.

Not, however, without a final test of the foursome's determination to make the best record possible regardless of personal priorities. "This group is a very full thing," remarks Crosby, adding with a laugh, "we're seven pounds of stuff in a three pound bag. We've got to make room for each other."

"We were really trying to be sensitive," adds Stills. "We all have opinions and they're very strong opinions, but we've also all learned the hard way to listen to each other. Being kind was very much a factor in putting this record together."

Graham Nash: "Neil put up a big piece of paper on the wall of the studio and drew four columns with C,S,N and Y at the top. And he said, 'I'm going to put a check by the songs I can't leave off this record. You all do the same. 'And we ended up with nine songs that we unanimously agreed on. After that, it was a question of balancing out the rest of the record-"


What began as pure serendipity and grew into an extraordinary collaborative experience has resulted in Looking Forward, a dozen songs that place these four artists squarely at the juncture of what has been and what has yet to be. "One of the things they used to say about us," recounts Crosby, "was that we were speaking for our generation. And I think, in a sense, that it's still true. You hear a lot of music these days about rage and frustration and anger, but not much about hope and love and forward motion. That's what we want to continue to stand up for."

It's a contention brilliantly borne out on Looking Forward, an album in which each song carries the weight of personal meaning and universal implication. "I wanted to remind people that the heart of America is still good and solid and worth fighting for," remarks Nash on the inspiration for his original, "Heartland." "You can't have ever loved a child and not asked the questions that are in this song," asserts Crosby of "A Dream For Him," his musical meditation on his young son's future. "I didn't want to be an old guy preaching," says Stephen Stills on the impetus to his extraordinary original "Seen Enough," "but I wanted to use my own experience to let kids today know that no one should judge them unless they've walked a mile in their moccasins."

"What people think of us and our music is totally up to them," concludes Neil Young. "I don't think we could ever live up to the myth that surrounds us. So we just tried to please ourselves. And vie made a better record because of it."

MICHAEL JENSEN COMMUNICATIONS