They were sensational – and each on-stage album from CSN&Y feels sensational too. Not that there were too many of those releases capturing David Crosby, Graham Nash, Stephen Stills and Neil Young in their prime: only 1971’s “4 Way Street” would count as such, with “CSNY 1974” from 2014 documenting the quarter’s second coming, with a few moments in the “Woodstock” and “Journey Through The Past” soundtracks rounding off the foursome’s officially available early-era concert recordings.
Here’s why “Live At Fillmore East, 1969” which will be out on October 25th is a historic thing.
The platter that Neil Young hinted at as early as in April of this year and that he and Stephen Stills mixed from the original eight-track is much more interesting than its predecessors not only because it comes from a single venue and a single date, September 20th – although there were two shows performed there but also because it leans on the players’ solo material to a lesser extent.
Comprised of two sets, acoustic and electric, the band’s repertoire on the night included “Our House” and “4 + 20” which would surface on “Déjà Vu” in 1970 – the former addressing Joni Mitchell, who inspired the song and was in the Fillmore to hear Graham Nash serenading her – and “Find The Cost Of Freedom” which would appear later as a B-side of the “Ohio” single. Factor in Buffalo Springfield’s “I’ve Loved Her So Long” and pieces from the ensemble’s debut LP, and the significance of the forthcoming release becomes impossible to overestimate.
After famously playing their second show at Woodstock in August 1969, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash, and Neil Young spent the rest of the year touring and writing songs for what would become Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s 1970 debut, ‘Déjà Vu’. A newly discovered multi-track recording of the band’s September 20th, 1969, concert at the historic Fillmore East in New York City captures an early moment from that first tour. The setlist spotlights soon-to-be classics from CSN’s self-titled debut and Young’s Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere with “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” “Helplessly Hoping,” and “Down By The River.” 2xLP and CD are out everywhere on October 25th.
“Live at Fillmore East, 1969” contains an acoustic portion—featuring performances of “Helplessly Hoping,” the Beatles’ “Blackbird,” Buffalo Springfield’s “On the Way Home ” and “Broken Arrow,” Déjà Vu’s “4 + 20,” and more—and a shorter electric portion featuring “Sea of Madness,” “Down by the River,” and more.
In a statement, Graham Nash said, “Hearing the music again after all these years, I can tell how much we loved each other and loved the music that we were creating. We were four people revelling in the different sounds we were producing, quietly singing together on the one hand, then rocking like fuck for the rest of the concert.”
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
The Fat Angel Sings 