Who knew David Crosby had this in him?
Quite a few folks, apparently, judging by the enthusiastic packed house that turned out for his nearly two-and-a-half hour Thursday night concert at the Bilheimer Capitol Theater.
But not me. Crosby has long resided on the far periphery of my musical interest — as a former Byrd, as a member of Crosby, Stills & Nash (and Young), as a writer of ethereal folk-rock songs that I admired but was not usually stirred by. And as a notorious near-death junkie who pulled himself from the abyss and got clean.
Time for a reappraisal. At 77, Crosby remains a prototypical California hippie. He strolled onto the stage dressed in black, his trademark rust-colored wool cap flanked by falling shards of unruly white hair, matched by a decades-old walrus mustache. He bantered with one of the bellowing fellows who feel it’s their right for the price of a ticket to carry on a discussion with the act on stage (God, I wish they’d shut up). He mused that Thursday had all the makings of a good night.
Crosby’s vocal chops are far stronger than they have any right to be. His pitch wavered at times — which septuagenarian’s doesn’t? — but his voice has maintained, or recovered, its range and is capable of surprising power. Near set’s end, Crosby held a high note, then held it some more, held it for quite a long time, just to show that he could.
Crosby has enjoyed a creative renaissance in the last half-decade, releasing four albums of new material since 2014 (after a 21-year fallow period). Thankfully, he did not use this concert as a showcase for his re-energized output. He sprinkled a few new songs in with the stuff people came to hear: “Deja Vu,” “Eight Miles High,” “Guinnevere,””Wooden Ships,” “Almost Cut My Hair” (performed late in the set with maximum gusto), and a masterful version of “Long Time Gone” (for me, the show’s most revelatory song).
Crosby blended these classics with more obscure fare that included “In My Dreams,” a 1977 CSN song that opened the show, “The Lee Shore” and “Delta” from 1982. He set the latter up with poignant anecdote: Holed up in a house in Santa Barbara, California, ravaged by drug abuse, he scribbled out some lyrics. His friend Jackson Browne stopped by, read the words and elicited from Crosby a promise to finish the song. With no piano on hand, Browne coaxed Crosby into a car, drove him to Warren Zevon’s place and put him in front of a keyboard. Crosby worked for awhile, then looked to slip away and get high. Browne stopped him. “You promised,” he said. Crosby stayed and finished the song.
Who knew David Crosby would have a band like this? Five brilliant, locked-in musician-singers led by keyboardist James Raymond, the band leader who just happens to be the son Crosby gave up for adoption in 1962 and was reunited with three decades later.
Crosby’s songs are ethereal, elliptical, rife with tempo changes, key changes, sudden stops and starts, and range from full-wattage rock to moments of near-whispering intimacy. It takes a crack musical unit to execute the material, and this bunch elevated it. Add in artfully performed vocal harmonies by four of five and it made for a potent arsenal.
Guitarist Jeff Pevar was the ace, delivering a steady stream of solos that strutted versatility and imagination, whether it was a hair-raising wah-wah freakout, a delicate chord cloud, or spikey single-note runs. Others got into the act, too, most notably Michelle Willis, a Canadian singer-songwriter who played soulful breaks on a Rhodes-style electric piano.
True to his hippie roots, Crosby remains the committed ultra-leftie, which he displayed but did not belabor during the show. He cracked that if things got worse here, Willis had promised to put them up in her garage in Canada. A crowd member yelled out, “Does that include us?” (OK, good one).
Along these lines, Crosby and company encored with a rabble-rousing, sing-along rendition of the Neil Young protest anthem “Ohio.” While the song refers to an infamous incident in 1970 when Ohio National Guardsmen shot and killed four students during a protest at Kent State University, it did not sound dated.
Neither does David Crosby.
This article appears in May 23-30, 2019.