Chapter 42: Knockin' on Heaven's Door (July 1974 - June 1975)

July 19, 1974

Neil Young - On the Beach

Released: July 19, 1974

Recorded: February 5 - April 7, 1974

Producer: Neil Young, David Briggs, Mark Harman and Al Schmitt

Track listing[1]

Side A

Walk On
See the Sky About to Rain
Pardon My Heart
For the Turnstiles
Vampire Blues

Side B

On the Beach
Motion Pictures
Ambulance Blues

Neil Young's sixth solo album - following his eponymous solo debut (1968), Everybody Knows This is Nowhere (1969), Oh, Lonesome Me (1971), Time Fades Away (1973) and Tonight's the Night (January 1974) - was not only his third album under Highway 61 Records, but also the third in what would be known as his infamous "Ditch Tetralogy". Much like his contemporaries such as Bob Dylan and John Lennon, poor old Neil had been going through personal struggles, having begun when fellow Crazy Horse musician, Danny Whitten, had died on November 18, 1972 from methaqualone overdose. For a long time, Young blamed himself for Whitten's early demise, having fired him on the date of his death. "Danny had a lot to give; he was really good," he remembered.

Following Whitten's death was the death of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young roadie Bruce Berry from a heroin and cocaine overdose on June 4, 1973. Following that was the respective releases of the live album Time Fades Away (#22 US, #20 UK) with The Stray Gators and the studio album Tonight's the Night (#11 US, #35 UK), which featured the track "Come on Baby Let's Go Downtown", co-written with Whitten.

The latest addition to Young's "Ditch Tetralogy", On the Beach, did not reach the Top 10 in either the United States (#16) or the United Kingdom (#42), but it did hit #13 in his native Canada. Although neither studio album was the biggest commercial success when they first came out, they have since received positive acclaim from critics and fans for their raw, honest emotions, being compared to the Ladders' Shine On and Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks.

August 14 - September 14, 1974

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young near Woodside, California, 1974.

NEIL YOUNG: "Yeah, my life was a living hell by this point. Two of my closest friends had died on me, and Carrie [Snodgress] and I were on the verge of splitting. The only thing that saved me from killing myself in the 70s was the company of David, Stephen and Graham and playing live with them, as well as company from artists like Bob Dylan going through similar struggles as I." (2002)

STEPHEN STILLS: "Neil probably felt his strongest when it came to playing live in 1974. We were all still working on Human Highway at this point, and there was a high demand for CSNY to play live again after we did Bangladesh." (1988)

Indeed, the summer of 1974 was a big opportunity for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young to undergo their first tour as a group since 1970, being largely managed by former Beatles roadies Neil Aspinall and Mal Evans, as well as Apple road manager Chris O'Dell. "It certainly gave us something to do!" Aspinall recalled years later. "Better than constantly being stuck in the office eight hours a day." (2006) Alongside the four main singer-songwriters, the quartet was aided by sidemen Tim Drummond (bass), Russ Kunkel (drums) and Joe Lala (percussion), and they rehearsed at Young's ranch near Woodside, California that spring before embarking on the tour in the summer.

GRAHMAN NASH: "As well as having Neil, Mal and Chris help us with dates, we'd also planned for a movie concert based at one of our shows. We'd hired Michael Lindsay-Hogg to film some of our shows, mostly from our shows at Capital Centre and Chicago Stadium; we then used some of the best audio recordings for our live album and Human Highway." (2000)

A screenshot from the concert documentary film, CSNY: Back in the States '74, released in theaters 1975.

DAVID CROSBY: "We must've performed at least forty songs during the tour, and well over a third of them were new songs, mostly written by Neil, with some by Stephen and Graham. I didn't have much to contribute, but my biggest contribution was probably our first single 'Carry Me'. Deciding on what to put out was a bitch." (1994)

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's "Back in the States '74" Tour was considered to be one of the biggest concert tours in America, even bigger than Bob Dylan and the Band's tour from January and February of that same year. The entire Wembley Stadium show on September 14 had been filmed, but none of the footage ended up on the CSNY: Back in the States '74 concert documentary film, which was released in theaters on May 16, 1975, giving moviegoers the chance to witness what they had missed or wanted to re-live in the summer of 1974. The Wembley footage, however, eventually ended up being released in 2004 as CSNY at Wembley 14/9/74 (9/14/74 for North American releases) to mark the thirtieth anniversary of the show.

Alongside older CSNY songs such as "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes", "Love the One You're With", and "Immigration Man", the quartet also performed songs from side projects such as Manassas' "Johnny's Garden", Stephen Stills' "Word Game", Crosby and Nash's "Military Madness" and Neil Young's "Only Love Can Break Your Heart". Among the newest songs introduced on the tour were "Traces", "The Lee Shore" (written back in 1970), "Fieldworker", "Hawaiian Sunrise" and "My Angel".

December 6, 1974

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - Hawaiian Sunrise

Released: December 6, 1974

Recorded: August 15, 19-21, and 27-29, September 14, 1974

Producer: CSNY and Joel Bernstein

Track listing[2]

Side A

Love the One You're With
Wooden Ships
Immigration Man
Traces
Change Partners

Side B

Almost Cut My Hair
Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Military Madness
Déjà Vu

Side C
Teach Your Children
Word Game
Pre-Road Downs
Suite: Judy Blue Eyes

Side D
Helpless
Black Queen
The Lee Shore
Fieldworker
Hawaiian Sunrise

Side E
Johnny's Garden
Don't Be Denied
Long Time Gone
Old Man

Side F
Our House
Guinevere
My Angel
Chicago
Ohio

Although it had initially been planned to be released in the summer of 1975, the triple live album Hawaiian Sunrise found itself being put out on December 6, 1974, close to the Christmas rush. The album hit #6 in the United States and #2 in the United Kingdom, kept off of the top spot there by Paul McCartney & Smile's Band on the Run.

Many had been expecting the long-gestating Human Highway album and found themselves disappointed when they got a live album instead. Between this and the 1973 compilation So Far, it was believed that Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young had basically sold out and were not even ten years into their career as a group. "Neil took the criticism very hard," Stephen Stills remembered. "The performances were probably the one time during his 'ditch' saga he felt genuinely happy and critics savaged what we put out. It was hard to not feel sorry for him during that time." (2005)

Despite the mixed to negative reception upon release, Hawaiian Sunrise eventually became a critical favorite. In a 1999 review by Rolling Stone, it was "practically a career retrospective for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young in the first five years they put out material together. Fourteen classics from the first four studio albums, eight songs from their side projects in the early 1970s, and five songs that are exclusive to this collection, this is a live album that every music fan should own, even if they're not the biggest fans of wooden music."

Most of the live recordings were taken from the Capital Centre Landover (August 19-21, Maryland) and Chicago Stadium (August 27-29, Illinois) performances with "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" and "Long Time Gone" both taken from the August 15 Nassau Coliseum Uniondale performance in New York, and "Our House" and "Guinnevere" from the Wembley Stadium performance. Among the tracks that wasn't included was Neil Young's "Goodbye Dick", a short song written in response to disgraced ex-President Richard Nixon's arrest on August 9, 1974 after being declared guilty for obstruction of justice in the Watergate scandal.

April 11, 1975

Neil Young - Homegrown

Released: April 11, 1975

Recorded: September 14, 1974 and November 1974 - January 1975

Producer: Neil Young, David Briggs and Elliot Mazer

Track listing[3]

Side A

Homegrown
The Old Homestead
Deep Forbidden Lake
Give Me Strength
River of Pride (White Line)

Side B

Star of Bethlehem
Little Wing
Danger Bird
Love is a Rose
Pushed It Over the End [w/ Crosby, Stills & Nash]

Neil Young had recorded his seventh solo album alongside the final sessions for Human Highway, with the majority of the songs being written following his break-up with Carrie Snodgress, and so the tone for Homegrown was dark. Almost twenty songs had been written and recorded for the album for possible inclusion, but out of them, nine ended up making the final album, plus a live CSNY track, "Pushed It Over the End". Among the tracks that were left unreleased at the time included "Separate Ways", "We Don't Smoke It", "Vacancy", "Try", "Mexico", and "Florida".

Homegrown marked the fourth and final album of Neil Young's "Ditch Tetralogy" (though some could potentially include Hawaiian Sunrise as part of the saga, making it a pentalogy), and was the best-selling album of the saga, reaching #7 in the United Kingdom and #9 in the United States, his first solo Top 10 showing in either country since Oh, Lonesome Me. Although critical reception at the time was better than Time Fades Away, Tonight's the Night and On the Beach, they weren't as strong as those for Everybody Knows This is Nowhere or Oh, Lonesome Me. Today, Homegrown is regarded as a landmark album for Neil Young, who even said that along with Tonight's the Night, it was the closest he had ever come to art.

But the best was yet to come...

June 20, 1975

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - Human Highway

Released: June 20, 1975

Recorded: June 28, 1973 - December 16, 1974

Producer: CSNY and Joel Bernstein

Track listing[4]

Side A

Carry Me*
See the Changes
Human Highway
Prison Song*
Love Art Blues*
As I Come of Age
And So It Goes

Side B

First Things First
Little Blind Fish
Grave Concern*
Revolution Blues*
Homeward Through the Haze
Myth of Sisyphus*
Through My Sails

The resulting Human Highway album was a mixture of both live and studio tracks. Of the eight studio tracks, "See the Changes", "And So It Goes", "First Things First", and "As I Come of Age" were all recorded during the initial 1973 sessions, the latter of which being written as early as 1971. The remaining four studio tracks and the six live tracks were all recorded in 1974. After Human Highway's summer 1975 release, it hit #1 in both the United States and the United Kingdom, being hailed as their greatest album since Déjà Vu, and a return to form after Hawaiian Sunrise.

The album was preceded that May by the single "Carry Me"/"Myth of Sisyphus", which hit #5 in the United States and #9 in the United Kingdom. This was later followed by "As I Come of Age"/"Grave Concern" (#12 US, #20 UK) and "Human Highway"/"Homeward Through the Haze" (#8 US, #26 UK) in August and October, respectively, with the fourth and final single "Prison Song"/"Through My Sails" (#15 US, #38 UK) being released in January 1976.

Human Highway's mixing of live tracks and studio tracks was considered an achievement for the 1970s with studio tracks fading in and/or out of live tracks, an idea by Neil Young. Although Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young popularized the concept of mixing live and studio tracks, they were not the first group to put out a hybrid album; the Grateful Dead had put out Anthem of the Sun in 1968, which combined multiple studio and live recordings of each song, although it was usually classified as a studio album.

Regardless of any misconceptions, Human Highway was nominated for Album the Year at the Grammy Awards, but lost out to Paul Simon's Still Crazy After All These Years. Despite this loss, it still holds up as one of the best records of 1975.

Footnotes

1. All tracks are sourced from On the Beach excluding "Pardon My Heart", taken from Zuma.
2. All tracks are sourced from CSNY 1974, reedited to form six album sides (they can also be edited for two CDs). Sides A-C are mostly from Capital Centre whilst Sides D-F are mostly from Chicago Stadium.
3. Tracks are sourced from American Stars 'n Bars ("Homegrown", "Star of Bethlehem"), Hawks & Doves ("The Old Homestead", "Little Wing"), Decade ("Deep Forbidden Lake", "Love is a Rose"), Hitchhiker ("Give Me Strength"), Zuma ("Danger Bird"), and CSNY 1974 ("Pushed It Over the End"). The mid-1970s recording of "River of Pride (White Line)" can be found on the Chrome Dreams bootleg.
4. The studio tracks are sourced from disc three of the CSN box set ("See the Changes", "Homeward Through the Haze"), Stephen Stills' Stills ("As I Come of Age", "First Things First"), Graham Nash's Wild Tales ("And So It Goes"), and Neil Young's Zuma ("Through My Sails"). "Human Highway" and "Little Blind Fish" can both be found on the Rarities Volume 2: 1970-1974 bootleg. All live tracks marked with an asterisk (*) are from CSNY 1974.

Author's Comments

Well, happy (belated) birthday to myself! Yep, I've just turned twenty-five last Friday, and as a late birthday present from me - if that makes any sense - I give you all my take on the lost Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young album, Human Highway, the bridge between Déjà Vu and CSN (1977), but in this case, there four albums between the 1970 and 1975 albums, and there will be one more album before we get to CSN (1977).

Although the main focus of the story is CSNY, much of it is on Neil Young, especially with a slightly modified On the Beach and my own take on what Homegrown could've been like had it been released, also supposing that Tonight's the Night had come out in 1974 as I think was intended. And yes, I'm aware that Neil Young's official(ish) version of Homegrown will be coming out this year, and when that happens, I'll likely be replacing those from my version ("Homegrown", "White Line", "Star of Bethlehem", "Little Wing" and "Love is a Rose", according to a potential track listing) with the official recordings, and maybe insert one or two of the previously-unreleased songs. We'll see how it goes when it comes out, but for now, I'm happy with how my take on Homegrown stands.

Album cover for Homegrown is taken from soniclovenoize's version as can be seen here, mostly because some versions of the cover I've seen on Google searches were too low-resolution for my liking.