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Stephen Stills

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Stephen Stills’ name is inevitably going to be relayed back to the excellent groups he was part of (Buffalo Springfield, Crosby, Stills & Nash), but their is no denying the talent of his solo efforts.

Stills was born 3 January 1945 in Dallas Texas, United States into a military family and as a result spent most of his childhood moving from place to place. He lived in several locations with a large latino population such as Florida, Louisiana, El Salvador, and Costa Rica and gradually became immersed in the culture, specifically adopting Latin style music. His other major influences growing up included folk and blues.

In the early 60s Stills attended Louisiana State University, but left to follow his dream of becoming a musician. One of the 1st band’s he played in was an act known as the Continentals. Don Felder of the Eagles was also in this group with Stills; however, this project did not last very long. Greenwich Village soon became Stills home and he frequently showcased his material at the clubs in the area. While he was living there he formed the 9 piece vocal group, Au Go Go Singers. The group lasted until 1965 and managed to put out an album and also got the chance to tour the southeast.

The Company became Stills next project, but this act also dissolved within a short matter of time. However during their Canadian tour Stills developed a friendship with future collaborator Neil Young. Stills uprooted from New York City and headed off to LA where he became intwined in studio session work. He also auditioned for the comedy pop group the Monkeys, but was unable to get the role due to conflicting contractual arrangements.

In 1966 he formed the legendary folk/rock group Buffalo Springfield with Richie Furay and Neil Young and expanded the line up to include Dewey Martin, Bruce Palmer, Jim Messina, Ken Koblun, and Jim Fielder. The band lasted less than 3 years, but put out 3 highly respected albums within that short period of time: “Buffalo Springfield” (1966), “Buffalo Springfield Again” (1967), and “Last Time Around” (1968).

After Buffalo Springfield disbanded, Stills went back to session work, performing on albums such as Al Kooper’s “Super Session”. It was during this stint that he met ex-Byrds member David Crosby. The two musicians later connected with Graham Nash through mutual friend, Cass Elliott and the rest is history. The trio (Crosby, Stills & Nash) went on to release their classic self-titled debut and their sophomore masterpiece “Deja Vu” with Neil Young. Several other albums followed as well as lengthy tours, which included stops at two of the biggest festivals at the time: “Woodstock” and “Altamont”.

In the midst of CS&N’s heyday each member released a high profile solo album. Stills released his self-titled solo debut on 16 November 1970 to critical acclaim and commercial success. Stills recruited a deep pool of talent for this record, including Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Booker T. Jones, David Crosby, Graham Nash, and Ringo Starr (to name a few). The effort paid off as the album rose to no. 3 on the charts and eventually went gold. His follow up “Stephen Stills 2” was also a commercial success and likewise reached gold status. His 3rd studio album “Stills” was released through the label, Columbia as was it’s follow up “Illegal Stills”. Though these albums did not do as well as his first two they both were able to break into the US Albums chart in the top 30. Stills also embarked on several tours in support of these releases. One of his tours was scheduled to feature Neil Young; however, Young was forced to cancel due to throat problems. Stills and Young ended up collaborating anyways through the release of their album “Long May You Run” under the name The Stills-Young Band. This album climbed to no. 26 on the Billboard 200 and subsequently achieved gold status. Young and Stills partnership has since been admiringly referenced in the Scott Pilgrim comic book series as two of it’s main characters are named Stephen Stills and Young Neil.

In 1977 Crosby Stills & Nash released their 5th studio album “CSN”, which sold over 4 million copies and supported it with an acoustic tour. The trio toured well into the 80s, but by 1984 Still was back with another solo release “Right by You”.

From this point on he released solo albums rather infrequently. His 7th solo album “Stills Alone” came out in 1991 and his 8th studio album “Man Alive!” was issued 14 years later. His follow up “Just Roll Tape” came out only two years after “Man Alive!”; however this album was composed of recovered material recorded back in 1968.

Stills continues to tour with CS&N and has not only built a legacy for himself with this group, but has also become recognized as an endearing solo songwriter and one of the best guitarist of all time (ranked no. 28 by Rolling Stone Magazine).

Live reviews

This was a full band show at the historic 1570 seat circa 1921 Majestic Theater. It started off with a few PA problems which were resolved after the first few songs. It seemed to take him a few songs to get his voice dialed in but by "Reason to Believe", a Tim Hardin cover he was mostly in good voice. He was, however, on point with his guitar playing all night both on solo acoustic tunes, "Girl From the North Country", a Bob Dylan song, and the CSN nugget, "Find the Cost of Freedom"; as well as electric of which he played a number of different axes, seemingly changing them out every 2 or 3 songs. He ended the first 11 song set with the Crosby, Stills & Nash hit, "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" which got the crowd up and dancing and garnered him his first Standing Ovation. After a short 25 minute intermission, he began the 2nd set with CSN's "Southern Cross" before playing a few new songs from his 2013 record with The Rides. He was talkative all night with liberal song intros and stories which enhanced the experience. 5 songs in to set 2 he performed an old Vietnam era tune of his called "Treetop Flyer" which earned a 2nd standing O. He preceded the last song of set 2 with another song from The Rides called "Virtual World" with accompanying story about how texting fans inspired it. Then he closed with an extended jam featuring all 4 members of the band soloing on the old Buffalo Springfield classic,"Bluebird". The encore followed with a slowed down jazzy take on Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth" and his own "Love The One You're With" with the audience on their feet and singing along.

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I haven't seen Stephen Stills in years, and I was not disappointed in this last concert. His selection of music was just right playing a lot of the songs I hoped he would play. His easy style with the audience and sense of humor was an added treat. He spoke to the crowd often.

He still has the same voice and could really sing the songs as I remember them. His skill on the acoustic and electric guitars were amazing to watch and listen to.The audience demonstrated how much they enjoyed his show by singing and dancing to most of his songs. They were on their feet through most of the evening.

He and his band deserved the standing ovation they received at the end following two encores. It was also nice to see a performer demonstrate how much he appreciated the audience's reaction to his music and talent.

Last nights show at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee was great. I had seen Stills last summer in Salina, Kansas. I think it was the 4th stop on the Stills and Collins tour. He looks so much more happier and healthier this time around. Seemed much more confident. There was a mix-up with forgetting some of the lyrics (he sang the wrong lines at the wrong time, didn't actually forget the lyrics), but none of us are getting younger and most his audience realizes that and was forgiving. This guy is a legend. See him before it's too late.

Stills remains a superb guitar player but his voice has lost most of its range. It was still a wonderful concert because Judy Collins remains a force of nature and her voice (and the voices of the back-ups) covered most of Stills' vocal deficiencies. And, every once in a while you heard Stills hit a note or two reminding us of what a fabulous singer he once was.

I've seen Stephen Stills in concert so many times. I've seen him alone, with Crosby and Nash and with his band Manassas. It's been a long time since my last Stills concert but I can't imagine being disappointed. I just love him and his music. Can't wait to see him when he comes around my area..

He can still play his guitar real good seeing him at the Crosby, Stills. & Nash concert here in Milwaukee on May 3rd 2015 Graham Nash played the lead role with his vocals. Steven Stills can really sing yet though! And he did. But Id say would be most remembered for his guitar licks.

Saw him at Westbury 26 August 2017 last - with Judy collins.

He can still play that guitar okay - but singing with Judy Collins is not a duet I think is great, and have to say that both of them are pretty washed up.

Still - gotta keep rocking - so good on them both.

What a disappointment. Sound was bad, Still was mad. They were unrehearsed and I'm out 1000 bucks for tickets. Possibly the worst concert I have seen. Now the bot says a review must be 30 words long so....

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• Los Angeles (LA) (32)
• SF Bay Area (15)
• Denver (10)
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• Judy Collins (92)
• Stephen Stills & Judy Collins (65)
• Kenny Wayne Shepherd (23)
• Numa Edema (23)
• THE RIDES (18)

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Review: Stephen Stills’ First Solo Tour Gets an Overdue Release

by Hal Horowitz May 1, 2023, 7:30 am

Stephen Stills Live at Berkeley 1971 (iconic/Omnivore) 4 out of 5 stars

Videos by American Songwriter

Most acts don’t start shows with their most famous songs. So it’s surprising that Stephen Stills kicked off this date on his first solo tour with “Love the One You’re With,” the opening track and hit from his 1970 self-titled debut.

The 1971 trek, in support of the disappointing second album, was a major undertaking. He brought a full five-piece brass section and named the outing The Memphis Horns Tour. But the first half featured Stills, mostly alone and acoustic. The full ensemble, with another six pieces, closes the evening. Due to his enormous popularity in Crosby, Stills, Nash, and then Young, he filled larger venues like Red Rocks and Madison Square Garden. Yet for a few nights in late August, Stills took the stage in the intimate 3500-seat Berkeley Community Theater. The tapes were rolling and this condensed compilation of highlights is the much-delayed result.

It’s far from the first example of Stills in concert without his cohorts. A few previous live discs have already been released, but none from this jaunt featuring the expanded horn section and, for two terrific songs (“You Don’t Have to Cry” and “The Lee Shore”), guest David Crosby joining Stills on unplugged guitar and vocals.

It’s an inspired performance. Stills is in fine form, vocally, on guitar, banjo (a searing “Know You’ve Got to Run,” a precursor to Déjà Vu’s “Everybody I Love You”) and even pounding the piano for a ragged but committed mash-up of “49 Bye Byes” and the Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth.” The show’s first half dominates this recap with 10 titles, leaving just four longer ones with the full horn-powered outfit. Only three selections are from Stephen Stills 2 .

[RELATED: ‘Stephen Stills Live at Berkeley 1971’ Captures the Legendary Singer-Songwriter’s Solo Success]

We get a sense of Stills’ diverse talents as down-home Delta bluesman (“Black Queen”), pop star (the opening tune), sensitive folkie (“Do for the Others”), political firebrand (a breathless, Dylan-inspired “Word Game”), country-influenced religious writer (“Jesus Gave Love Away for Free” wouldn’t appear on a studio album until Manassas in 1972), and R&B band leader (a searing, nearly 10-minute version of “Cherokee,” featuring horn work from most of the brass players and a roaring Stills guitar solo). There is also a reworked/rearranged “Bluebird,” titled “Bluebird Revisited,” that lacks the original’s intensity but still exhibits Stills’ willingness to interpret older material with fresh enthusiasm. 

There are extraneous moments too, particularly concerning Stills’ nearly four-minute introduction of the band, which should have been jettisoned. And with just an hour of music, the spare time could have been filled with additional tunes. A second disc would be welcome since the shows typically went much longer than 60 minutes.

Regardless, what is here, including “Lean On Me,” (not the Bill Withers classic) unavailable elsewhere, is historically relevant and an often mesmerizing illustration of one of rock music’s most gifted musicians, arguably at the top of his game.

Photo by Robert Knight Archive/Redferns

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Miranda Lambert, The Lumineers & More Share Their Favorite Memories with Willie Nelson: “He’s So Kind”

© 2024 American Songwriter

Neil Young and Stephen Stills Honor David Crosby, Revive Buffalo Springfield at Light Up The Blues

By Andy Greene

Andy Greene

Nobody knew quite what to expect when Neil Young walked onstage Saturday night at the Greek Theater in Los Angeles to wrap up Light Up The Blues, a fundraising event organized by Stephen Stills and his wife Kristen Stills to benefit Autism Speaks. Discounting a surprise, two-song acoustic set at a Canadian environmental rally in February, Young hadn’t faced a live audience in nearly four years. The other performers at the show ( Joe Walsh , Willie Nelson , Sharon Van Etten, Chris Stills, and Lukas Nelson and Promise of the Real) stuck to about two songs each, but Young had top billing and it felt like he might give a little more.

The Stills family organized the first Light Up The Blues a decade ago, and it’s slowly built up over the years from the Club Nokia to the Pantages and Dolby theaters to now the 5,900-seat Greek Theater. Performers with autism are booked every year, and this time around the bill included opera singer Amanda Anderson, rapper Rio “Soulshocka” Wyles, and former Voice contestant Will Breman. All three played impressive mini sets that proved autism is no barrier to artistic greatness.

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Lukas Nelson came out next to lead his longtime band through “Set Me Down on a Cloud” and “Find Yourself,” showing off his amazing guitar and vocal chops. Chris Stills admitted that it was a “tough act to follow,” but he did his best by playing “100 Year Thing” and the tender piano ballad “Where Love Is Found.” “I wrote this song for a Hollywood movie,” he said. “They didn’t take it. So it’s for us tonight. I worked real hard on it.” Hopefully, there was a producer in the audience that’ll find a place for the song in another movie.

The emotion only ratcheted up when Graham Nash – who had to miss the show to play a gig in Munhall, Pennsylvania – appeared on the video screens. “Hello everybody,” he said. “David was my best friend for almost 50 years. I’m going to miss him terribly in my life. I think about him every day. I’d like to revisit a beautiful piece of music, David and I doing ‘Guinnevere’ at Jazz at Lincoln Center with the famous trumpeter Wynton Marsalis. Enjoy the music, and please rejoice. I’m going to miss him every day of my life.”

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Joe Walsh livened things up with a typically goofy rendition of his 1978 solo hit “Life’s Been Good.” “If I knew I was going to have to play this next song for the rest of my life I would have wrote something else,” he said before breaking out “Rocky Mountain Way.” “But we’re stuck with this one.” He may be slightly bored by “Rocky Mountain Way” at this point, but he seemed thrilled when Stephen Stills came out to trade licks on it.

After a brief intermission, Willie Nelson – just one week shy of his 90th birthday – walked out alongside his sons, Lukas and Micah, plus harmonica player Mickey Raphael, and Promise of the Real. It was a quick medley that touched on “Funny How Time Slips Away,” “Crazy” and “My Life,” and just a tiny preview of his upcoming all star birthday bash at the Hollywood Bowl next weekend.

Cries of “Neil!” filled the Greek when Young came out next, acoustic guitar in hand and harmonica rack around his neck, to open his set with the Harvest Moon gem “From Hank To Hendrix,” followed by “Comes a Time.” Bassist Corey McCormick, drummer Anthony Logerfo, and percussionist Tato Melgar joined in on “Heart of Gold,” though the Nelson brothers surprisingly remained offstage for Young’s entire set. Stephen Stills played piano on “Helpless,” just like he did at the Déjà Vu sessions well over 50 years ago.

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Young briefly left the stage so Joe Walsh could help out Stills on “Love The One You’re With” and “Helplessly Hoping,” and the night wrapped up with Stills and Young locking vocals on “Long May You Run” like they did at so many CSNY concerts in the past. But CSNY will never play again. Buffalo Springfield is now just a distant memory. But fans got to see glimpses of both groups at this truly fantastic, emotional concert. Let’s hope it inspires Young to finally get back on the road. We don’t want to wait another four years to experience a night of music like this again.

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Stephen Stills, Neil Young, Joe Walsh Share Stage at ‘Light Up the Blues’ Concert

Stephen Stills, Joe Walsh and Neil Young performing “Mr. Soul” at the Greek Theatre, April 22, 2023

Stephen Stills and Neil Young teamed once again on stage last night (April 22, 2023) at the sixth edition of Stills’ Light Up the Blues concert series at The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. The three-time bandmates performed songs from each of their previous (and legendary) collaborations with Buffalo Springfield, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, and closing with “Long May You Run,” a favorite they recorded as the Stills Young Band. Among the fellow music stars joining them for the event—organized by Stills and his wife, Kristen, to benefit Autism Speaks—were Willie Nelson and Joe Walsh. The concert marked Young’s return to the live concert stage for the first time since the pandemic. (He has previously been announced as one of the stars set to perform at Nelson’s pair of 90th birthday concerts. Those take place one week later, also in Los Angeles.)

During Young’s 11-song set, he and Stills were joined by Walsh for a sparkling version of Buffalo Springfield’s “Mr. Soul.”

The resumption of the Light Up the Blues show marked the first post-pandemic concert in the series; a May 30, 2020, edition was cancelled. The players were joined onstage by Young’s longtime touring band, Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real, plus Chris Stills, Oliver Stills, Sharon Von Etten, and many special guests. Jeff Garlin served as emcee. The event was an immediate sell-out.

Stills honored his longtime bandmate, David Crosby, with a performance of “Wooden Ships,” which they wrote with Paul Kantner. Stills was joined by his son, Chris, and Crosby’s son James Raymond.

Young has participated in the annual benefit concert several times. The 2023 edition was first revealed on Feb. 13. David Crosby’s son, James Raymond, also performed. “His singing voice sounds so much like David that it’s scary,” Stills told the Rolling Stone . Days after the benefit was announced, Stills shared news of a previously unreleased live album from 1971 that features two songs with Croz.

Watch Stills and Walsh perform “Helplessly Hoping at the 2023 benefit

The pair also teamed on Walsh’s classic rock favorite, “Rocky Mountain Way.”

Walsh also performed “Life’s Been Good.”

Related: Our recap of the 2016 edition

Watch Stills and Young perform Buffalo Springfield’s “Bluebird”

Over the years, the Light Up the Blues Concert has also featured such artists as Crosby, Stills & Nash, John Mayer, Patti Smith, Brandi Carlile, Sheryl Crow, Beck, Burt Bacharach, Don Felder, Jakob Dylan, and more, and has raised millions of dollars in support of the work of Autism Speaks, helping to drive the organization’s mission.

Garlin introduced Nelson for his brief set.

Watch Stills and Young perform “Long May You Run”

Light Up the Blues 6 celebrates people with autism, while supporting Autism Speaks in its mission to promote solutions, across the spectrum and throughout the life span, for the needs of people with autism and their families. Proceeds from the Light Up the Blues concert will go toward Autism Speaks’ efforts, which include funding life-enhancing research, increasing early childhood screening and interventions, and improving the transition to adulthood.

Related: Our Album Rewind of the Stills-Young Band’s 1976 LP,  Long May You Run

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13 Comments so far

Where’s Richie Furay ? Not here. Buffalo Springfield

Where in the article did it say that it was a Buffalo Springifeld reunion? Neil rocks with Lukas’s band!

Neil Young is and has always been one of the most overrated musicians on the planet. He’s a rough, ragged, abrasive guitarist and has an off-putting, whiny singing voice. I love Stephen Stills, but I can’t stand listening to Young. I guess opinions vary. If you like Neil Young, great. Have fun. As for me, I’ll avoid subjecting my ears to his cacophony.

Over rated? I was at the iconic Dylan 30th Anniversary show at MSG. A who’s who of the greatest classic tock artists of our time. And Neil Young with his unique voice absolutely stole the show. Not sure who you grew up listening to, but in bashing Neil Young you are certainly in the minority.

His voice is unique and quite original. My problem with Neil was his lack of discretion in his album releases. He is one of those prolific songwriter/artists who thinks every note he ever recorded was worthy of an album release. He was wrong. Maybe one in every three records he released was worth the effort. He needed an editor.

“worth the effort”? To who? Neil Young can and does release whatever he feels like. He doesn’t follow some marketing script that says only release records every three years and only if it is going to be platinum. He writes what he feels, records what he feels, and releases what he feels. That’s Neil Young.

Neil Young is one of the best artists still around. You have your opinions as does anyone but my opinion is Young is amazing. He’s truly a legend and one of my top idols of all time.

Before you go on about Neil, research his youth. He has probably overcome more problems others would never expect. I’m proud of him. We share one of those deficits. He didn’t want pity. He’s made it with class, strength, and talent.

I’m sorry. As much as I admire Stills and Young, and what they’re raising money for, that was just pathetic. Sadly, Stills just cannot sing anymore, which is tragic because he was once so vibrant vocally. And with Young lurking around the stage singing half the lyrics to “Mr. Soul” while not at a microphone just makes me wonder if these guys should just be in an old age home now. Musicians in their primes can’t just go out and do a major performance when they’ve been away from it for long periods of time without extensive rehearsals and warming their skillsets up. What makes these guys think they can just get together and play like it was yesterday? I understand the concept of fellowship doing this show, but there were just too many guitarists out there banging away on these song creating a bunch of noise overall. While you have to admire Joe Walsh’s spirit, as he seemingly wants to get in on every gig of this type that exists, he was not adding to the mix, and was unnecessary. It was all so painful, I couldn’t watch any of their songs all the way through. Every appearance I’ve seen of Stills lately on these 1-off gigs, he’s been the same. But, somehow, I was hoping for more from Neil Young who has been performing up until recent years. We still have their great records, but leave the legacy in peace.

On the other hand, Nash sounds as sublime as ever.

Amazingly, he still does, Jeff. How does he do it?

I actually asked him that in a recent interview and he said he doesn’t know! He said he doesn’t do anything special to take care of himself. Just good genes, I guess.

I was at this show at the Greek Theatre. I was thrilled to hear some Buffalo Springfield tunes and early CSN. It was also great to see Joe Walsh. I would have been happier with less Neil Young and more Stephen.

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Stephen Stills: ‘Part of me misses David Crosby dreadfully. Part of me thinks he got out of here just in time’

The 78-year-old folk rock icon talks to kevin e g perry about woodstock and the sixties, the death of david crosby and his new live album from 1971, article bookmarked.

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I n August 1971, Stephen Stills arrived in Berkeley for the final dates of his first ever solo tour to be greeted by a surprise visitor: David Crosby . Just a year earlier their pioneering folk rock supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young had imploded in a blizzard of booze, cocaine, rampant egos and lopsided love triangles. That night, however, there were no hard feelings. “He came to see me in the dressing room before the show,” remembers Stills, who promptly invited his old friend to join him on stage. “I said: ‘Let’s do “The Lee Shore”’ and he said: ‘Alright!’ We didn’t run through it that many times – and it shows! But that’s the way we rolled back then. It was marvellous.”

Their heartfelt duet appears early on Stills’s new album Live at Berkeley 1971, which is drawn from recordings the former Buffalo Springfield guitarist recently unearthed during a deep dive into his archival vault. Now 78, Stills is speaking to me over a video call from his airy home in the hills above Los Angeles. The snowy white beard sprouting in a tuft from his chin may give him the appearance of a medieval friar but in conversation he’s mischievous and puckish, with an irreverent attitude towards his own music.

“There are some rather strange vocals,” he says of the live album, which features a solo-acoustic set followed by a full-throated electric performance backed by legendary Stax musicians the Memphis Horns. “I remind myself of… well, the term ‘barking mad’ comes to mind. We were very enthusiastic, and by the end of the shows I was literally barking because I couldn’t make the notes and everything was too fast!”

The appearance of Crosby on the album is rendered particularly poignant by the singer-songwriter’s death in January this year, at the age of 81. Stills says the news took him by surprise. “He was on his way to a last tour, and my son [Christopher] was going to play with him,” says Stills. “He just went to take a nap and didn’t wake up. Not a bad way to go, actually. There’s part of me that misses him dreadfully, and there’s part of me that thinks he got out of here just in time, if you look at the world.”

As well as Crosby’s “The Lee Shore”, on Live at Berkeley 1971 the pair also perform Stills’ composition “You Don’t Have to Cry”. The song has a special place in the mythos of Crosby, Stills and Nash as it was the first song they ever sang as a trio, although in keeping with the group’s fractious reputation there is some dispute over the details. Graham Nash says the fateful meeting happened at Joni Mitchell’s bungalow in Laurel Canyon , but Stills maintains it was actually The Mamas & the Papas’ singer Cass Elliot who gave CSN their first audience in 1968. “I remember this vividly,” he says. “She had these big fluffy pillows and couches that I sank into, so I couldn’t find a place to play guitar. The kitchen turned out to be wonderful. I sat in the corner with David on one side and Graham kind of standing around. We sang it once and he said: ‘Do that again.’ The third time he chimed in and we knew that we were done for.”

As Stills remembers things, it was the following night they repeated the trick at Joni Mitchell’s place. “I suppose because the story’s more glamorous, [Crosby and Nash] decided to superimpose that as the first time we sang it,” chuckles Stills. “That’s the story of our lives! The story of that group.” He slips into a good-natured impersonation of himself and his bickering bandmates: “‘No, I remember!’ ‘No, I remember!’”

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“Watching those boys discover their blend was exciting. It was boys in love,” Mitchell recalled later. Wherever it was they first met, it didn’t take Crosby, Stills and Nash long to cement their place in musical history. They helped define the “California Sound” with the release of their self-titled debut album in 1969, with Stills contributing classic songs including “You Don’t Have to Cry”, “Helplessly Hoping” and epic opener “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”, which was written about his imminent breakup with folk singer Judy Collins. The record has since gone platinum many times over.

Later that year, the band added Stills’s former Buffalo Springfield bandmate Neil Young to the line-up for a string of live shows, including Woodstock, before the quartet put out Déjà Vu in 1970. Cracks soon started to appear on a subsequent tour. The band who had started out in sun-kissed Laurel Canyon, wreathed in an air of pot-smoking hippy optimism, were now descending rapidly into cocaine-fuelled competitiveness and internecine squabbling. Stills, in particular, was accused of excessive control freak tendencies, and was briefly sacked from the group after playing an unscheduled extended solo set at New York’s Fillmore East when he heard Bob Dylan was in the audience.

When the group splintered, all four members released solo albums but Stills had the distinction of outselling the rest with Stephen Stills , helped by hit single “Love the One You’re With”. During the recording of the song Stills met and began a relationship with backing singer Rita Coolidge, who then left him for Nash – only compounding romantic rivalries in a group that had already seen both Crosby and Nash date Mitchell. The song’s free-love-advocating title and chorus (“If you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with”) was inspired by a line Stills heard keyboardist and Beatles collaborator Billy Preston say at a party. “He threw it off on the fly and I said: ‘That’d be a great song,’” remembers Stills with a nostalgic laugh. “He said: ‘Do it!’ So I did.”

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Stills’s first solo album is well known among guitar aficionados for being the only record to feature both Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. That piece of trivia reflects both the high esteem Stills was held in by his virtuoso peers, and his ability to ignore meddling record executives. “I was rather sneaky about it,” recalls Stills. “When their people found out they all complained. Jimi’s producer was particularly adamant about it: ‘Don’t play guitar for that son of a b**** again!’ But we had the attitude of jazz guys. There was a community of us, a potpourri of everybody intermingling all the time like the jazz guys back in the Fifties used to do.”

Less than a year after releasing his first solo album, the ever-productive Stills returned with Stephen Stills 2 in 1971. That summer he set out on a debaucherous run of shows that, thanks in part to the involvement of the Memphis Horns, was soon dubbed “The Drunken Horns Tour”. While Live at Berkeley 1971 was recorded in the intimate confines of the 3,500-capacity Berkeley Community Theatre, earlier stops had seen Stills play to 20,000-strong audiences in arenas like New York’s Madison Square Garden and The Forum in LA. “That’s why it came off as loose as it did,” reasons Stills. “At Madison Square Garden I got the crowd going so much that we put three cracks in the wall. I know because the engineer came directly to me to complain: ‘You’ve got to be careful, this thing might come down!’ He put a fright into everybody because the whole building was bobbing, which the Albert Hall can take but not one of these glass and steel things that they build over here!”

Along with the CSN tunes and solo material on Live at Berkeley 1971, Stills also plays a solo piano version of perhaps his best-known creation: Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth”. One of the definitive protest songs of the Sixties, it’s become a soundtrack staple in everything from Vietnam documentaries to films Lord of War and Tropic Thunder. Stills picks out Forrest Gump as his own favourite needle-drop, although he’s typically self-effacing about the song itself. “I can’t listen to it that many times in a row before I start to cringe,” he says, “But it’s good for the fans and for the audience because it takes you back to that time.”

He adds that the song reminds him of what he now sees as the strident atmosphere of the era. “The other night I ran across the director’s cut of Woodstock ,” he says. “It’s the funniest movie I’ve ever seen, because we were so wrong about so many things! We were all searching for enlightenment, but it turned into a lot of rants. Watching all the American kids lolling around in the mud, I remembered that there were peace talks trying to go on at the time. I thought: ‘Oh, the North Vietnamese must be quaking in their f***ing boots looking at this!’ Those ironies struck me, here at age 78.”

While “For What It’s Worth” is often associated with the anti-war protests, Stills actually wrote it about the Sunset Strip riots of 1966. That November, young hippie demonstrators – including Jack Nicholson and Peter Fonda – faced off with police over plans to enforce a 10pm curfew for under-18s and close down a nightclub called Pandora’s Box. “It was a funeral for a bar,” recalls Stills. “[The police] had just been issued this riot gear, and they all fell out in a full Macedonian battle array: ‘Let’s do it! Let’s test this stuff out on these defenceless drunken kids!’ The rest, as they say, is history.”

Live at Berkeley 1971 concludes with another Stills protest anthem, that year’s thrilling “Ecology Song”, which marries upbeat horns with pointed lyrics about corporate greed and America’s shameful involvement in the death of the planet. It could have been written yesterday. “I was rather early!” says Stills. “It wasn’t something people were writing about, because it’s kind of difficult to write about things that directly. There are some bad rhymes in there! It’s a bit preachy. You can get trapped into very ordinary proselytising, so it’s something one does with a certain amount of discretion. You can’t overdo it or you run the risk of becoming a crushing bore, but for its time it was rather forward-looking.”

Does he wish the powers-that-be had paid a little more heed to his warnings about the emerging climate catastrophe? Stills shrugs off the idea with a laugh. “The people in power are never going to pay attention to musicians and artists,” he says. “We’re fruitcakes!”

‘Stephen Stills’s Live at Berkeley 1971’ is out now

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Stephen Stills on His ‘Enduring’ Friendship With Neil Young and Butting Heads With Crosby

The rock legend discusses his all-star autism benefit, becoming an empty nester, and writing all those classic songs.

Photo Illustration by Kelly Caminero / The Daily Beast / Getty

Save for perhaps “Ohio,” when you think of the music of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young , it’s probably Stephen Stills’ songs you think of. And even if he didn’t write them himself, they sure have his fingerprints all over them.

“Stephen was the most talented guy in CSNY,” the late David Crosby once told me. “He was the one who made those records happen. He was a force of nature. We fought a lot, but he usually won because he really knew how to make great records.”

At 78, Stills is, by his own admission, mellower and more thoughtful these days. But while he has slowed down considerably, the fire to make new music still burns hot, as he tells The Daily Beast below.

The two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee is one of rock’s most enduring figures, having influenced generations with his songwriting and guitar playing, both as a solo artist and as a member of Buffalo Springfield, CSNY, and Manassas. In fact, his innovative approach to both acoustic and electric guitar, combined with distinctive harmonies, helped create the iconic “California sound” via classic compositions like “For What It’s Worth,” “Love the One You’re With,” “Helplessly Hoping,” “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” and “Carry On.” A true musician’s musician, Stills’ first solo LP is the only album to have ever featured both Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton.

Below, Stills talks about his Autism Speaks/Light Up The Blues benefit concert happening this weekend, the glory days of Buffalo Springfield and CSNY, his enduring friendship with Neil Young , and his new live album, Live At Berkeley 1971 , taken from his legendary ’71 tour.

The Autism Speaks/Light Up The Blues shows have really grown over the last decade or so that you and Kristen [Stills, his wife] have been doing them. Tell me a little bit about how they started and why, and how you go about choosing the artists you ask to do them.

That’s three questions.

It is three. [ Laughter. ]

Yes, I can count like a horse. Well, my son Henry has Asperger’s [syndrome, a form of autism spectrum disorder], and that brought us into the world of the spectrum. And what I’ve discovered about the spectrum is that all the best people are on it, including me and most of my friends. So there’s a fine line between dysfunctional and interesting. And that’s not to make light of it. It was a brand-new thing, and just becoming a little epidemic, when he was first diagnosed. There was a lot of mystery and false assumptions about it. And so we’ve tried to lay those to rest. For instance, there is no cure—but there’s coping. And there’s lots that you can do to get to a normal life. There are varying degrees of it, of course, but like I said, if you’re not on the spectrum, well, all the best people are.

All the cool kids.

Yeah. Exactly.

And it seems in the decade you’ve been doing this, the perception has really changed, hasn’t it?

Yes, of course. But we can’t go to sleep. That’s one of the reasons we keep doing the shows. God knows it eats up half my year. My wife Kristen’s the producer, of course, and she’s gotten very adept at it, and she has a really good staff and everything. But getting artists this year was difficult because once the pandemic broke, everybody was like, “Oh, I want to work, I want to work, I want to work.” So a lot of people were booked. But a lot of people were playing fairly close to the gig [in Los Angeles], so we were able to nab them. So I guess it worked out.

Oh, any hints?

Willie Nelson, for one. And of course Neil Young, who sort of handed this off to me, the big charity thing. He wrapped up his Bridge School Benefit and said, “OK, Stephen, it’s your turn.” It really is a labor of love, but it’s a labor. It’s just a lot. And I’d especially like to reassure everybody that we’re raising money for the right organization and the right cause. But the place is small, so the thing sold out quick. We’ll have to do it again, but not till next year. But Willie has a show at the Hollywood Bowl, like, two weeks later, and Neil and I are going to drop in on his show, or so the Soviet commies would have us believe.

The disinformation campaign.

Yes, well, God help us if Neil Young became predictable. [ Laughter. ]

Well, let’s talk about that. That is an enduring partnership. Through all the ups and downs of Buffalo Springfield, and all the ups and downs of CSNY, you guys have always seemed to be able to work together in a musical partnership that really endures. Talk a little about why that partnership works so well from your point of view.

While we were children, we were mad . [ Laughter. ]

Hotheaded kids.

Yeah. It was Fort William, Ontario, which is now known as Thunder Bay. I was there with another little folk group. We were headliners and we did two shows on Saturdays, and this guy Gordy, who was the head of the thing, said, “Oh, I’ve got this pal I want to put in between you.” And it was Neil. He was doing exactly what I was doing in New York City, which was write folk songs with an electric guitar. [What] Neil was doing—it was fabulous. It was an eye-opener, and the band was sort of at loose ends, so we spent a week together, being introduced to each other and Neil introducing me to Canada, and we’ve been pals ever since. And that is an enduring thing. I mean, whatever happened, we were always pals.

Why do you think that relationship works so well?

Well, because when we met, we were children. We were too young to hold grudges and all that stuff. And we were never that competitive, because we were so different. Although there were a few moments on lead guitar, but… I don’t know. We don’t misunderstand each other. With everything else, Neil and I always knew who we were together. We’re brothers. And brothers, you know, disagree, and get back with each other. Crosby used to talk about how we butted heads, and I call them glancing blows, but we ended up numb-skulled due to them. And anyway, we didn’t spend enough time together! You know, I just saw, last night, for the first time in years, the director’s cut of Woodstock . And that’s the funniest fucking movie I’ve ever seen. At 78, looking back on that, I was rolling. I was howling at how naïve and how earnest we all were.

Baby-faced.

Yeah. Well, I miss that chin. [ Laughter. ] And I was also very, very liquid. And I had more hair. And could sing higher and lower. Actually, I guess I can sing lower now. But it was hilarious because I was thinking about [how], you know, they were trying to force negotiations with the Vietnamese, and I kept thinking to myself, “Well, they were quaking in their boots watching this shit.” [ Laughter. ] Just, you know, ironies abounded. It was at once startling, embarrassing, and exhilarating at the same time, to see all of us and what we were about back then. We were certainly earnest in our search for enlightenment.

Yeah. The beginning of the journey. It’s a beautiful thing. You’ve obviously performed as a duo with Neil many times, and although Graham will be in Pittsburgh on the night of the show, I have to imagine David’s spirit is going to loom large. Your son Chris, who was going to tour with David, will be there, and David’s son James Raymond will be performing. Talk about all the legacy that’s going to be on stage at this show.

We don’t have time.

Moving on! [ Laughter. ]

Because everybody booked themselves, we didn’t have a time to rehearse. But I’ve got Promise of the Real backing me, and those kids, I can’t say enough about them. They’re just great. They’ve got the one thing you can’t teach, which is attitude. They’re wide open and just positive. And nothing’s personal. So I can go through the nitpicking that it takes to put together some of my arrangements, and they don’t think twice about it, and they keep trying until we get it. It’s been real refreshing for me, because we’re all rusty. Neil and I spent the first two weeks of rehearsing, just the two of us, trying to remember all the Buffalo Springfield songs and then playing the records and going, “Oh my God. That wasn’t even close!” [ Laughter. ] So we’ll be doing a couple of those. It’s going to be neat. Of course, Neil’s more interested in acoustic stuff, and I’m committed to the band. I really like playing in electric music, as you know.

Henry Diltz

You brought up working with a band. I want to talk about the new live album . I’ve always loved your 1975 live album, which was actually taken from the same ’71 tour, but this album is much longer, and it’s warts and all. The performances are just as they were, so the feel and the vibe of it is amazing. Talk a little bit about that ’71 tour and why it took so long for this particular show to see the light of day.

Well, I’d forgotten about it. [ Laughter. ] Actually, we found it during a deep dive in the vault. And the first thing that struck us was that the recording is just great. The horn players, The Memphis Horns, were great. And Steve Fromholz, even though he was far too big to have as a partner for me—he was, like, [Mike] Finnigan-sized—he and I were a great blend on guitar. So this is the rest of that era, and yeah, some of the singing is like, I don’t know, I think I closely resemble an irritated dog. [ Laughter. ] And everything is real fast and it has a lot of energy. But it’s real powerful, too. Dallas Taylor [the drummer] had a lot to do with that feel. I would design the arrangements and then I would go back up in the balcony of the theater where we rehearsed and I’d watch while Dallas put the band through their paces. It was just fabulous. What a great ensemble.

I want to talk about your playing. I’m not sure younger musicians, or even younger fans, realize how highly regarded you were among your peers at the time. You were playing with Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. You were in that league, as far as they were concerned. But does it bother you that younger fans may know you for the songs but might not think of you as a first-class guitarist first?

What do you mean, “were?” [ Laughter. ]

Well, you’re still here, so you get to tell the tale.

Well, I just spoke to Eric last week, so those relationships and that respect is still there. Now, I’m stealing from Jeff Beck—things like front tension and using the volume knob and really intricate stuff. Though I’ll never be as good as Jeff Beck. Ever.

Well, that’s a whole other…

We lost the greatest one of all, I think, this year.

He was fabulous, although he was very hard to track down and play with because he was the original “I quit the band to work on my car.” He literally did that. “Where’s Jeff?” “He went home.” “Why?” “Well, he got the new small box Chevy and he wanted to build it and put it in the 32.” He was like that, meticulous and mercurial, but a great guy. We’re going to miss him. So anyway, there’s a lot of that in my playing now. I was pretty good back then, but I’m better now, and have some sober time under my belt, so I’m playing with a lot more clarity. I’ve picked up the banjo again. And I don’t get to play bass on stage, but I play a lot on the records. I love playing bass.

Talk a little bit about your songwriting process. There are some amazing songs on this record, songs from the Springfield records and CSNY, but your first couple of solo records and Manassas were really amazing achievements. Do you even remember your writing process from that time?

No. [ Laughter. ] I went on a tear. I mean, I had a decade of just nonstop productivity and then started running out of gas. Now, they come a little slower, but they’re a little more thoughtful and much better lyrically. Although some of those lyrics are pretty good, there’s some bad rhymes in there. Oof. There’s some stinkers. But that’s just me. I had a great time doing it, when the songs would just fall out. Some of them would happen in 15 minutes and some of them would happen in five months, as I was crafting them and trying to nail that illusive third verse.

I’d love to know what we might expect from you after this. Will you be working with Neil? Will you maybe be making another record? Maybe with Judy Collins again?

I have no idea. Honestly. I’m waiting for the next thing to appear. I mean, you can’t get me away from here, now that I’ve gotten used to being a homebody and sitting down with my children at night for dinner. But once the youngest finally goes away to college, then I’ll be an empty nester and I’ll probably be out there more. But travel just sucks these days. And the thought of a 14-hour bus ride is… frightening. But we’ll see what happens.

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"If I was young now, I'd probably be stalking Taylor Swift. We have affairs, we make it dramatic and write hit songs about it" - Stephen Stills on the romance that drove a classic and the making of his first solo album

Growing tired of the tensions in CSN&Y, Stephen Stills moved to the UK to record his debut album, with a little help from Jimi, Ringo and Eric

January 1970. Stephen Stills is about to become of the highest paid rock stars on the planet. Thanks to his contract with Ahmet Ertegun’s Atlantic Records, Stills and his superstar kings of harmony mates – David Crosby , Graham Nash and Neil Young – are on a $1 million per album guarantee. Each. Once the quartet’s Déjà Vu tops the charts two months later, they can renegotiate. 

It all seems so easy. Stills bossed the critically acclaimed Buffalo Springfield and was architect of the CSN phenomenon. Next thing, he finds himself in London feted as a rock messiah. Bumping into Paul McCartney at Apple Records’ Savile Row HQ, he is told laughingly: “Leave some room for the rest of us! Don’t get too successful – this is only a small island.” 

Even for a sophisticated southern man like Stills, born in Texas, raised and schooled in the finest private establishments that Florida, Louisiana, Panama and Costa Rica have to offer a military brat, this is surreal. “Going to Apple while The Beatles were breaking up was heavy for a kid from Tallahassee. Also life-affirming: ‘Huh? I’m in a studio with the fucking Beatles?’ 

“I wanted to escape all that American madness,” says Stills today. “The whole Californian/Troubadour scene was driving me nuts.” 

An example: the Rolling Stones had stayed in Stills’s LA home on 3615 Shady Oak Road in Laurel Canyon during the autumn of 1969, base camp for the Let It Bleed tour, culminating in the Altamont Speedway fiasco where Stills and co. also played, though in the end they refused to allow their performance to be included in the film Gimme Shelter . 

Taking a break from a CSNY road trip, Stills returned one afternoon to find Keith Richards zonked out in his favourite hammock, while Mick Jagger was lying by the pool with a slew of famous groupies, Miss Pamela and Angel included. The fact that they’re naked is par for the course, but their pharmaceutical activities make the guitarist nervous. 

He’s used to strange visitors – Jim Morrison was a regular acquaintance; indeed, CSN drummer Dallas Taylor would give Jim Morrison his first-ever bag of cocaine at 3615 – but the patrol cars parked out front scare Stills. He tells the Stones to “take it easy, guys”. The last thing he needs is another high-profile bust. 

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Things are also tense in CSN&Y, and during some time off, Stills decided to stay in England with his new Fab mates, renting Ringo Starr’s Tudor mansion Brookfield House, a 350-year-old year sprawl in Elstead, Surrey. 

“I wanted a break from the West Coast,” he says. “The Summer of Love can fuck right orf, know what I mean?”

In February, Stills met up with old friend Jimi Hendrix – “We were like two lonely Americans in England, no different to the English in Los Angeles who sit round all day talkin’ about bloody Arsenal” – and the pair started jamming at Brookfield. On other wild nights, when the guitarists used to jam together at the Scene club in New York, Stills was offered the role of bass player in a revamped Experience. 

Now there was talk of another trio with Hendrix and drummer Buddy Miles. Why not? Stills was desperate to record away from the frustrating confines of Crosby, Nash and Young, where everything was filtered down a hippie four-way street. Despite all the love and peace, there was lots of misunderstanding, and the quartet would split up in dramatic fashion after a backstage row in Chicago. 

Stills and Young had a rivalry based on friendship and friction. So while Neil went back to America to finish his After The Gold Rush sessions, Stephen stayed in his English pad, or slummed it in a suite at The Dorchester. He had just participated in the making of an album for soul/gospel singer Doris Troy, one of Apple Records’ many vanity projects (Doris will cover his Buffalo Springfield tune Special Care ), as well as his collaborations with George Harrison and Ringo – Gonna Get My Baby Back and You Give Me Joy, Joy – and he was loving his life in good ole England. 

“I’m relaxing at the Bag O’ Nails and Ronnie Scott’s in Soho. I’m a happy man finally. So I started on my first solo album. People said I was a taskmaster – well, I was. This was my gig. I locked the gates of Ringo’s old mansion, I had a cook come in, and I rehearsed my boys to death. I was an insomniac. I’d wake them in the middle of the night and make them play. Chances are they were, er, awake already.” 

Stills took to stockbroker belt Surrey like a duck to water. “I loved all of it,” he says. “The fresh-mown grass, the spring air. I even played cricket; I learnt the rules. I was driving my Bentley and my Rolls and your roads were empty.” 

With near neighbours including Ron Wood and Eric Clapton , Stills embraced the life of an English gent. He dug into his pocket and gave Ringo £100,000 in old money. Brookfield was his. England was his. He was on a roll. By late February he’d written more than 20 new songs.

In early March Stills decided he was ready to record his magnum opus. Dallas Traylor, drummer for CSNY, was flown in to join a core band including bassist Calvin ‘Fuzzy’ Samuels and percussionist Conrad Isidore, already living in London. Island Records’ tiny Basing Street studio was chosen for the sessions. The old church won out over Trident Studios, where Stills recalls a bad night of tape mangling with Crosby, Nash and Neil “and brown shit all over the place. They couldn’t handle the crappy Scotch tape we’d recorded on.” 

Besides, he knew the area: Notting Hill’s Basing Street was close to the old Moscow Road W10 flat in Bayswater that Steve used to share with Dave and Graham in 1968. The flat, adorned like a psychedelic knocking shop, was next to a butcher’s, where a sign on the counter read: “All joints must be re-weighed before purchase.” Ho ho, they think. A fiver changed hands, and the sign was nailed to the boys’ front door. 

Stills’s affection for England grew apace. Months before Neil Young stepped up, he’d tracked down Steve Winwood to the Traffic house in Berkshire and implored him to join forces with the Byrd, the Buffalo and the Holly. Winwood wasn’t convinced. “He was too shy,” claims Stills. 

Slightly put out, he began to write for his solo album. First things in the bag were 4 + 20 , which Crosby insisted had to go on Déjà Vu , and a rough version of Find The Cost Of Freedom that Stills punted to Dennis Hopper for the soundtrack to Easy Rider . “I wrote it for the final scene, where the dude gets blown away as his motorcycle burns. I played it for Dennis but he was in a fog and just didn’t get it. I was depressed about that for years.”

Again Crosby intervened, and the song was saved for the B-side of CSN&Y’s Ohio single. As tit-for-tat, Stills withdrew his song Do For The Others , written on the rebound from his dalliance with lover Judy Collins, and kept it for his own album as an acoustic number without the original assistance of legendary fellow swordsman Graham Nash .

Trouble was, at this rate, Stills was never going to win the foot race with Neil Young to get his record out. Young was working on his third project and Stills only had the worthy but unexciting Super Session (’68) collaboration with Al Kooper , Mike Bloomfield and various Electric Flag alumni to add to his post-Buffalo Springfield CV. Even then, he only played on Side Two, and got third billing. Tsch. 

Itching to make his mark, Stills enlisted trusted CSN engineer Bill Halverson. Before Halverson’s arrival, Stills and Hendrix tried a demo called Old Times, Good Times , a nostalgic piece about lost youth, though Stills had only just turned 25 and Jimi was 26. This song would be used; another Jimi jam, known as White Ni**** , won’t be. Oddly, Old Times shuffles neatly along but Hendrix’s contribution is straightforward, no pyrotechnics at all, just a tasty bluesy rhythm captured by engineer Andy Johns. Blink and you miss it. 

Next in the can is the basic version of Love The One You’re With , minus the backing vocals that, when added later at Wally Heider Studio 111 in LA, give the song its irresistible commercial quality. Stills’s Anglophile immersion is heard in the opening line of the chorus: ‘And there’s a rose in a fisted glove, and the eagle flies with the dove.’ 

“That’s an allusion to something iconically English,” he says. “The Battle of Hastings and all that. The fisted glove is chainmail. That had struck me deeply as a kid, and it’s one of the reasons I moved to England, because Britain meant so much.” 

He’d end up commuting from LA to England for seven years, and in conversation he actually sounds more English than American now. 

Stills loved “the English studio method. You stuffed the union rules we had in America, and the way you recorded was very inventive. Andrew Loog Oldham started all that. Plus it’s not just a joke from Spinal Tap , because you guys really did want to know what happens when you turn it up to eleven – and then use an acoustic guitar with a Fairchild Limiter and really fucking smash it so it sounds electric. Plus, all the equipment in England was ex-government or from the BBC, and everyone was adventurous – y’know, all the tricks that mother hen George Martin used on The Beatles? ‘As long as you don’t set the studio on fire!’”

Another reason for Stills’s creative burst related to his love life – or lack thereof. Having split from former blue-eyed muse and lover Judy Collins during the making of the CSN album (Collins falling for Stacy Keach while she was acting with him in a production of Peer Gynt), that troubled relationship would be replaced by a long-distance liaison with Rita Coolidge, who Stills had had his eye on ever since he’d seen the young singer doing back-ups on Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs And Englishmen tour . 

A naïve Native American Cherokee squaw, fresh out of Florida State University, Coolidge suddenly became the most wanted woman in Hollywood. Leon Russell courted and wrote Delta Lady for her. Joe Cocker dragged her to bed for some Yorkshire pudding. Nothing was sweeter than Rita. Yet she had no idea why she drove these blue-balled rock stars nuts. 

“Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined what was in front of me,” Coolidge recalled. “From Joe Cocker I got a degree from Rock And Roll University, in two months.” 

Stills was “obsessed”, and doesn’t deny that now, the rogue. “Was Rita my muse?” he says today. “How shall I put this… If I was young now, I’d probably be stalking Taylor Swift. It’s the same thing, innit? We have these affairs of the heart, and when it’s over we make it as dramatic as possible and write hit songs about it. Me and Rita were an item. We remained friends, and there’s always a little twinkle when we see each other and remember ‘back in the day’. I’m looking at a picture of her right now and she’s gorgeous, just gorgeous. And her voice was like honey.” 

Rita has been heard to say of her old flame: “Oh, Stephen! He is such a stinker!” Even so, she was delighted to catch up with Stills when the tongue-tied lothario happened to meet her in London, recording backing vocals for Doris Troy’s album with his pals Delaney and Bonnie Bramlett. 

Careening round town with new friends and without a girlfriend, the sentiment of Love The One You’re With rang true for the writer, though he’d copped the title from hanging round with Doris and Billy Preston, who used to jive each other Afro-American style: love the one you’re with, sugar. 

“It isn’t the paean to promiscuity that snotty ones would have you believe – it’s very straightforward,” Stills insists. “Feminists have criticised it but that’s bollocks. It works both ways. Girls today have figured it out. Men aren’t in charge any more. Don’t care what you think. They go to the bathroom and say [does commendably accurate chavette impression, suggesting he watches TOWIE on cable]: ‘I’m ’avin’ ’im.’”

Stills reckons Love The One You’re With was “always good to me but it was a bit of a jingle. Musically it has layers of meaning. There’s a second line New Orleans thing and a fuzzy Caribbean feel. Of course, everyone I knew had to be on it.”

Taking the basic cut back to LA, Stills had Halverson multi-track the chorus. “Half of ’em couldn’t sing it properly, not surprising since I had Nash, Crosby, Mama Cass, John Sebastian, Rita and Peter Tork on it [the uncredited Monkee was renting Stills’s Shady Oak home and would later buy it], and they immediately cocked up the phrasing. Eventually it came out like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir so it had some crack. My original was crisper.” 

Halverson recalls, “They warmed up eventually, Stills made sure they did. We added extra percussion to the steel drums Stephen learned in London. He amazed me how he’d pick up a new instrument and teach himself as he went along.” He wasn’t called Captain Manyhands for nothing. 

The debut’s second most famous track is Go Back Home , featuring Eric Clapton. The Englishman had been working on his own solo debut in LA with Halverson when he got the call from Stills: come to Basing Street! 

“Eric finished his record there,” says Halverson. “He used the one and only studio when Stephen was off. Clapton turned up and on one degenerate evening the two guys jammed on an endless version of The Champs’ Tequila [the drink of choice at this time]. 

Halverson adds: “I played Eric the Go Back Home track and he said, ‘Oh, that’s great, it’s so easy,’ plugged into a tiny Fender Champ amp, ran through it once and ripped his solo out. Stephen wasn’t even there! Immediately afterwards Clapton recorded the Let It Rain solo for his own record – maybe the two best solos he’s ever played were done within an hour of each other.” 

Halverson would later cut the 14-minute version into something practical. 

Stills says they also attempted an electric version of the album song Black Queen , a poker player’s allegory to a dark female card that appears in your hand and fucks it up. “We tried to emulate Robert Johnson’s off-kilter Crossroads, but my own version worked better for some reason.” 

Black Queen dated back to ’69. Stills had played it with the Grateful Dead in December at the Thelma Theatre, LA, growling it à la Ron ‘Pigpen’ McKernan. “Can’t remember that, but if you were round the Grateful Dead you don’t remember anything,” he says now. He also made it an acoustic staple on the CSN&Y tour. 

In London, Stills got Halverson to turn all the lights off while he walked round the darkened studio searching for Black Queen ’s mood. He’d sunk two pints of tequila (hence the eventual credit for Jose Cuervo Gold) but he nailed it. Pissed as the proverbial. “I was really drunk when I did that, as you can hear,” he laughs.

Halverson adds: “It’s recorded live, with Stephen working the mics as if he’s giving a performance. My task was to be ready for him. We never slated a take. It’s like when he did Suite: Judy Blue Eyes [on Déjà Vu ], he played acoustic in the dark, and that’s another piece of pure magic. My job was simple: know when to press ‘Play’.” 

Halverson says the sessions were a doddle. His only problem came when recording Church (Part Of Someone) with London backing singers – the heavily pregnant Judith Powell, Larry Steele and fiancée Lisa Strike, and Tony Wilson from Hot Chocolate. “I couldn’t understand this cockney choir,” Bill says. “Sounded like a foreign language when they were talking to Stephen. But once they opened their mouths and sang, it was fine. They spoke perfect American English.” 

The end result was perfect: Harlesden meets Hollywood. 

Ahmet Ertegun turned up in London to check on his artist and found Stills having trouble with a complex song called To A Flame . He suggested that his Turkish-American colleague Arif Mardin guide him through an orchestral arrangement. This was duly accomplished using the London Symphony Orchestra’s string section and members of Canadian ex-pat Maynard Ferguson’s orchestra (again, all uncredited on the album). 

“He sat me down at the Dorchester Hotel and forced me to approach it as if I’d gone back to music school and learnt composition,” Stills says. “When we were ready to record I played the vibraphone and assumed Arif would take the baton but he gave it to me and I ended up conducting – celli, bassoons, violins, French horn, oboes, trombones – and I was in a full body sweat. Arif [who arranged Church too] dragged that out of me note by note. It was an extraordinary journey and I was as thrilled with that as anything I ever did. Oh yeah, and Ringo played the tom-toms.” 

Gawd bless ’im. The arrival of Stills’s landlord, accompanied by Beatles road manager Mal Evans, coincided with a remarkable week in which Ringo had been told to “fuck off out of my house” by McCartney, and received the test pressing of his own solo venture, the standards LP, Sentimental Journey . All things considered, Ringo was in fine fettle. He knew the Beatles were on the verge of announcing their split and he felt like a free man. 

Halverson: “I’d met Mal while recording Badge for Cream but meeting Ringo was a thrill. He added so much presence to To A Flame, and I was glad he was so incredible; I’d read all those stories about how he didn’t play on Beatles tracks, that Hal Blaine or Bernard Purdie did his parts. His contributions to that song, and to We Are Not Helpless , were so orchestral, his timing was impeccable and his feel exemplary. I don’t know if he ever played any better.” 

Meanwhile, if Stills’s unrequited infatuation with Coolidge inspired To A Flame – it was his favourite song – Cherokee was a love letter to the raven-haired lovely Rita, personified here as his ‘Southern girl’ with ‘ The secret she keeps, like her soul so deep .’ 

The most blatantly biographical song he’d written, Stills played the chivalrous suitor. He’d loved, he’d shone, he had a fortune and he had fame – or so he said – but he only wanted to ‘ get next to the lady from Tennessee ’. He almost did, when she sang choir on Go Back Home and We Are Not Helpless . And her name was always first on all the credits. Shucks.

Once the album was finished, Graham Nash finally got the long-distance lovebirds together – by mistake – when he invited Coolidge to a CSN&Y concert in June 1970. Nash gave Rita Stills’s house number, where he was staying, but when Stephen answered, he told Coolidge, “Graham’s not available but I’ll be happy to have you as my guest.” 

A stormy two months later, Nash persuaded Rita to try him for size, which she did, breaking the bad news to Stephen as they sat by the Sherman Oaks pool. Stills was not amused, but since Coolidge would shortly elope with Kris Kristofferson, they were both dumped. A ‘ wearisome vigil… was I misled? ’ was how the singer saw it a year later on It Doesn’t Matter . 

In September, the album cover was shot at Stills’s cabin spread in Colorado.

“I had this place in Gold Hill because I couldn’t breathe in the smoggy San Fernando Valley,” Stills recalls. “Judy Collins introduced me to Colorado. I loved it ’cos it’s air-conditioned outside, innit? Photographer Henry Diltz came to see me. We hiked off to the creek and did the shots as the first snow fell in the mountains. The front cover was apropos of nothing. I sat on a chair and strummed guitar and I had a papier-mâché pink giraffe, a present from Rita, perched next to me.” 

On the back cover, Stills can be seen riding a horse called Reno. “A Hollywood wrangler loaned him to me. He was a movie star horse, just my type. The football shirt I’m wearing is a Number 41 from Gainesville High School, my alma mater, where I pretended to play football, linebacker. But I was too wee. I only weighed eight stone.” 

Diltz came bearing bad news with his Nikon. Jimi Hendrix had just been found dead at the Samarkand Hotel, Notting Hill. “We sat up the whole night talking, telling stories and remembering Jimi. When dawn came up, everything was blanketed in white. I grabbed my camera and Stephen grabbed his guitar. The cover was shot within hours of Jimi’s death.” [Actually photographer Diltz dates it as four days later.] Fittingly, Stills dedicated the album to Hendrix, a man whose death shook him cold. “Assholes would keep on giving him things, and he’d forget what he’d taken,” he says. “I loved that guy. He was a god.” 

In the end, Stills lost his race with Neil Young, their love-hate relationship exemplified by the fact that while Stephen sang on the After The Gold Rush LP, he didn’t ask Neil to reciprocate. The reviews for After The Gold Rush were uniformly celebratory – quite right too – but those for Stills’s November debut were utterly scathing, almost as if “the 1960s are over. And it’s your fault.” 

In America, initial DJ copies of the record credited it to Stephen Stills, Graham Nash & David Crosby, and were heavily stickered by Atlantic with a list of the star guests, implying the artist wasn’t big enough to carry the project unaided.

Having been busted in August 1970 for cocaine and barbiturate possession in La Jolla, California (cops crawling along a motel hallway found him incoherent and “combative”), Stills found himself ostracised. Rolling Stone slammed his solo effort, saying all the songs sounded the same, the reviewer admitting: “I didn’t even bother listening for Eric Clapton’s lead on Go Back Home.

Robert Christgau, ‘Dean of American Rock Critics’, gave it an academic C+ and would soon describe Stills as “the ultimate rich hippie – arrogant, self-pitying, sexist, shallow”. 

Never one to bear a grudge, Stills now says, “That guy’s a cunt. A fucking right cunt. Fuck him. Am I supposed to stop my fucking career because some asshole that doesn’t know what the fuck to listen to because it isn’t popular enough is off down the hall and his mate is buggering him in the shower? Fuck him! I don’t even care that Lester Bangs and all that bunch of cunts can’t find their way to their bathroom. They can’t play the guitar to save their fucking lives. So FUCK THEM! Is that vicious enough?” He laughs. “I particularly hate Rolling Stone .” 

Small wonder, really, since they’d call his second solo effort “a fifth-rate album by a solid second-rate artist who so many lower-middlebrows insist on believing is actually first-rate.” 

One burst of Anglo Saxon later, the admirable Stills concludes: “If you let reviews stop you, mate, you’d never have had the Sex Pistols or The Clash .” 

By way of a softener to our breed, he adds: “I’m glad you like the record and that you’re talking to the man who made it. And also the producer. Who else could have produced it but me? How could anyone else have achieved that divergence with that much of an arc? That’s my favourite album. I love the whole thing.” 

God bless Stephen Stills and his fisted glove. Still feisty as fuck. Long may he carry on, and not lose his head.

Stephen Stills Live At Berkeley 1971 is out now. This feature originally appeared in Classic Rock 187, published in August 2013 .

Max Bell worked for the  NME  during the golden 70s era before running up and down London’s Fleet Street for  The Times  and all the other hot-metal dailies. A long stint at the  Standard  and mags like  The Face  and  GQ  kept him honest. Later, Record Collector  and  Classic Rock  called.

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10 Best Crosby, Stills and Nash Songs to ‘Teach Your Children’

W hile Crosby, Stills and Nash (CSN) songs didn't chart as singles (for example, "Ohio" was banned from many stations in the U.S. when it came out in 1970), their influence is nevertheless staggering today, as they are now staples in the American songbook.

If you haven't already, now's the perfect time to play some of these songs for future generations, starting with these 10...

10. Woodstock

Year released: 1970

Album:  Déjà Vu

Bottom Line: Woodstock

"Woodstock" is the only song on this not written by any members of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young (CSNY). Joni Mitchell wrote it, and it appeared on her album "Ladies of the Canyon," but CSNY released it first. Their version is arguably the most well-known. 

Mitchell was dating Graham Nash at the time of the Woodstock Festival, which she didn't attend on the advice of her manager, as she was scheduled on the "Dick Cavett Show" soon after and didn't think she'd make it back to New York City in time. (CSNY played the festival and appeared with her on the show.)

Mitchell based the song on Nash's description of what it was like to be at Woodstock and later said , "I don't know if I would have written the song if I had gone. I was the fan that couldn't go, not the performing animal. So, it afforded me a different perspective."

Crosby agreed, saying she nailed the event's vibe. "She captured the feeling and importance of the Woodstock festival better than anyone who had actually been there."

9. Wooden Ships

Year released: 1969

Album: Crosby, Stills & Nash

Bottom Line: Wooden Ships

David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Jefferson Airplane's Paul Kantner wrote "Wooden Ships" at the  height of the Vietnam War  from the point of view of survivors attempting to escape a nuclear war's aftermath and create a new civilization. 

As the group travels, they eat "purple berries" — "Say, can I have some of your purple berries? Yes, I've been eating them for six or seven weeks now, Haven't got sick once, Prob'ly keep us both alive" — which are iodine pills to stave off radiation sickness.

Those left behind aren't so lucky: "Horror grips us as we watch you die, All we can do is echo your anguished cries, Stare as all human feelings die, We are leaving, you don't need us."

After the song came out, fellow musician and friend of the band, Jackson Browne, asked Crosby what happened to the people left after the travelers embarked on their journey. Crosby callously responded, "Well, **** ’em."

It was an answer he later regretted. There is, however, a silver lining — Browne was so shocked by Crosby's comment that he penned his classic 1973 "For Everyman" in response.

8. Teach Your Children

Album: Déjà Vu

Bottom Line: Teach Your Children

Graham Nash wrote "Teach Your Children" for his former band, The Hollies, but they never ended up recording it because he never finished the song.

Nash, a photographer and collector of images, loaned his image of Diane Arbus' photo, "Child with Toy Hand Grenade in Central Park," to a California gallery. The gallery placed it next to a photo of Alfred Krupp, a German arms magnate, who provided his country with arms during the two world wars. While looking at the photos next to each other Nash " realized right there that we had better start teaching our children better; otherwise, civilization was in jeopardy."

It was then that he was able to complete the song. Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead played pedal steel guitar on the song, in turn for vocal harmony help on the Dead's "Workingman's Dead" and "American Beauty" albums.

Bottom Line: Ohio

In May 1970, images from a student protest at Ohio's Kent State rocked the world. Four students died during this demonstration against the Vietnam War when the Ohio National Guard opened fire on protestors.

After seeing the photos in Life magazine, Neil Young was moved to write "Ohio" in just a few hours. While Young takes the lead vocal on the track, it is Crosby's voice you hear at the end of the song singing, "Four!" "Why?" and "How many more?" According to Young, Crosby cried when the recording was finished. The lyric, "Tin soldiers and Nixon coming" was said by Crosby to be "the bravest thing I ever heard."

Nixon came out publicly against the song, and some radio stations banned it, but today, it is regarded as one of CSNY's best. 

6. Long Time Gone

Bottom line: long time gone.

"Long Time Gone" opens the "Woodstock" movie (the festival was CSNY's second-ever gig) and is one of Crosby's contributions to the band's self-titled debut LP. 

The late 1960s were indeed turbulent, and Crosby was simply demonstrating the frustration and disappointment of the chaos that was the time.

He said , " It was written the night Bobby Kennedy was killed. I believed in him because he said he wanted to make some positive changes in America, and he hadn’t been bought and sold like Johnson and Nixon — cats who made their deals years ago with the special interests in this country in order to gain power. I thought Bobby, like his brother, was a leader who had not made those deals. I was already angry about Jack Kennedy getting killed, and it boiled over into this song when they got his brother, too.”

5. Southern Cross

Year released: 1982

Album: Daylight Again

Bottom Line: Southern Cross

"Southern Cross" ushered the band into the MTV arena. It was a heavily rotated video on the channel in 1982. 

Written by Stephen Stills, it is based on another song released in 1975 called "Seven League Boots" by Rick and Michael Curtis. Stills took basic parts of the song and added lyrics and a new chorus to "polish it." He based it on a boat trip he took to clear his head after a divorce.

Crosby didn't sing on the song when it was recorded (he wasn't in the band at the time), but he's present in the video and has sung it live. 

4. Our House

Bottom line: our house.

This simple love song was written by Graham Nash and recalls the time he spent in a relationship with girlfriend Joni Mitchell. The couple lived together in Los Angeles' Laurel Canyon. 

As he explained it, the song describes just an ordinary morning in the couple's lives: "On Ventura Boulevard in the Valley, there's a very famous deli called Art's Deli. And we'd been to breakfast there. We're going to get into Joni's car, and we pass an antique store. And we're looking in the window, and she saw a very beautiful vase that she wanted to buy. I persuaded her to buy this vase. It wasn't very expensive, and we took it home.

"It was a very grey, kind of sleety, drizzly L.A. morning. And we got to the house in Laurel Canyon, and I got through the front door and I said, 'You know what? I'll light a fire. Why don't you put some flowers in that vase that you just bought?' An hour later, 'Our House' was born, out of an incredibly ordinary moment that many, many people have experienced."

3. Almost Cut My Hair

Bottom line: almost cut my hair.

This Crosby-penned tune describes the dilemma of cutting one's hair and leaving the counterculture movement to join normal society. The song was one of a few of the era to popularize "letting your freak flag fly" by growing your hair long.

While Crosby called his lyrics "juvenile" later in life, he also said the song has a "certain emotional impact," as it was likely the most political song he ever wrote. And yes, at one point, he was faced with this decision.

2. Just a Song Before I Go

Year released: 1977

Bottom Line: Just a Song Before I Go

"Just a Song Before I Go" was written as the result of a bet between Graham Nash and his drug dealer who was taking Nash to the airport from his home in Hawaii. With 15 minutes to go on the drive, the man challenged Nash to write a song in that time for $100.

Nash composed it on the spot, and it peaked at No. 7 on the Billboard charts.

1. Suite: Judy Blue Eyes

Album: Crosby, Stills & Nash 

Bottom Line: Suite: Judy Blue Eyes

Stephen Stills wrote this song to win the heart of his former girlfriend, folksinger Judy Collins. The couple had dated for about two years, but things weren't working out. She left, but Stills gave their relationship one more college try with the song.

One night, in a Los Angeles hotel room, he sang the song to her. While she was blown away by it, she said, " Oh, Stephen, it’s such a beautiful song. But it’s not winning me back."

Nevertheless, the song went on to be a smash hit for the band and is one of their most well-known to this day.  Though the two went on to marry other people, they remained friends and even went out on tour together in 2022. She says , "Stephen and I managed, through all these years, to keep a friendship. Louis [her husband] and Stephen became best buddies [during the tour], which is the tops. Having a friendship that lasts 60 years is pretty awesome and pretty rare."

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The Great Read Critic’s Notebook

Cass Elliot’s Death Spawned a Horrible Myth. She Deserves Better.

The Mamas & the Papas singer was known for her wit, her voice and her skill as a connector. For 50 years, a rumor has overshadowed her legacy.

Credit... Michael Putland/Getty Images

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By Lindsay Zoladz

• May 9, 2024

Onstage with her group the Mamas & the Papas at the Monterey International Pop Festival in June 1967, Cass Elliot, the grand doyenne of the Laurel Canyon scene, bantered with the timing of a vaudeville comedian. “Somebody asked me today when I was going to have the baby, that’s funny ,” she said , rolling her eyes. The unspoken punchline — if you could call it that — was that she had already given birth to a daughter six weeks earlier.

“One of the things that appeals to so many people about my mom is that there’s a certain level of triumph over adversity,” that daughter, Owen Elliot-Kugell, said over lunch at the Sunset Marquis Hotel in Los Angeles on a recent afternoon. “She had to prove herself over and over again.”

Elliot was a charismatic performer who exuded infectious joy and a magnificent vocalist with acting chops she did not live to fully explore. July 29 is the 50th anniversary of her untimely death at 32, a tragedy that still spurs unanswerable questions. Might Elliot, who was one of Johnny Carson’s most beloved substitutes, have become the first female late-night talk show host? Would she have achieved EGOT status?

Half a century after her death, her underdog appeal continues to inspire. Last year, “Make Your Own Kind of Music” — a relatively minor 1969 solo hit that has nonetheless had cultural staying power — became such a sensation on TikTok that “Saturday Night Live” spoofed it, in a hilariously over-the-top sketch in which the host Emma Stone plays a strangely clairvoyant record producer. “This song is gonna be everywhere, Mama,” she tells Elliot, played by Chloe Troast. “Then everybody’s gonna forget about it for a long, long time, but in about 40, 50 years, I think it’s gonna start showing up in a bunch of movies, because it’s a perfect song to go under a slow-mo montage where the main character snaps and goes on a rampage.”

“S.N.L.” didn’t make a single joke about Elliot’s weight — something that was unthinkable half a century ago. During the height of her fame, Elliot seemed to co-sign some of the jabs at her expense with a shrugging grin.

“No one’s getting fat except Mama Cass,” the Mamas & the Papas sang in tight harmony on the self-mythologizing 1967 hit “Creeque Alley.” After the infamously tumultuous group broke up a year later, Elliot was a frequent guest on “The Carol Burnett Show,” where she occasionally went for the cheap laugh. In an otherwise uproarious sketch about two prudish women browsing a store’s “dirty books” section, Elliot holds up a book titled “Eat and Lose Weight” and says, “I got as far as ‘Eat’ and then I didn’t understand the rest.”

“As she had learned early on, the best way to deal with an uncomfortable situation is with humor,” Elliot-Kugell, who has her mother’s cascading hair and dry wit, writes in her new memoir, “My Mama, Cass.” But, as she said over lunch, that doesn’t mean her mother was always laughing on the inside. “That pain had to go somewhere,” Elliot-Kugell told me. “When I think about some of the things that had allegedly been said to her during her lifetime, you can’t hear that over and over and not let it hurt.”

But of course, the most enduring joke at her expense was the one she didn’t live to tell, or to rebut. Have you heard the one about the ham sandwich?

For years, the origin of the story that Elliot died from choking on a ham sandwich — one of the cruelest and most persistent myths in rock ’n’ roll history — was largely unknown. Then in 2020, Elliot’s friend Sue Cameron, an entertainment journalist, admitted to publicizing it in her Hollywood Reporter obituary at the behest of Elliot’s manager Allan Carr, who did not want his client associated with drug use. (Elliot died of a heart attack, likely brought on by years of substance abuse and crash dieting.) But that cartoonish rumor — propagated in endless pop culture references, from “Austin Powers” to “Lost” — cast a tawdry light over Elliot’s legacy and still threatens to overshadow her mighty, underappreciated talent.

ELLIOT’S SISTER, LEAH , coined a phrase for the strong, brassy way everyone in their family sang: “the Cohen Honk.”

Cass was born Ellen Naomi Cohen into a music-loving household in suburban Baltimore. Her stage name partly came from her father’s penchant for calling his spirited daughter “the mad Cassandra.” She was a precocious, uncommonly bright child who, in the years after World War II, liked to ask dinner guests what they thought about the “world situation.” In high school she was known for her bold, slightly unkempt personal style that flew in the face of 1950s decorum. According to her biographer Eddi Fiegel, Elliot sometimes wore “wild combinations of Bermuda shorts and high heels, with white gloves to cover her bitten-down nails.”

Many people in Elliot’s life trace her struggles with her weight to when she was 6 and went to stay with her grandparents while recovering from ringworm. They fed her well, as grandparents sometimes do, and she quickly became self-conscious about her size. By high school, she had been prescribed Dexedrine, an amphetamine then used as an appetite suppressant. “The thought that something is wrong with you is bad enough,” Elliot-Kugell writes, “but the idea that a pill or a drug might fix you can be even more dangerous.”

Still, Elliot showed remarkable self-belief. The book recounts her telling anyone who would listen “that one day she was going to become the most famous fat girl that ever lived.”

She struck a deal with her parents: If she moved to New York and didn’t find musical success in five years, she would come home and study a more respectable field, like medicine. She left home in late 1960; “California Dreamin’” was released in December 1965. She later told an interviewer: “I really just made it under the wire!”

Broadway was Elliot’s first love, but folk music was the style of the day. She brought her own distinctive flair to it in her early groups, the Big 3 and then the Mugwumps, which featured a Canadian tenor named Denny Doherty. After the Mugwumps’ split, Doherty fled to the Virgin Islands with his new friends John and Michelle Phillips to work on material for a yet-unnamed group. Elliot had sung with them casually while they were all hanging out — at least once when they were all on LSD — and she knew her voice was the missing piece in their sound.

But John, the bandleader, was brutishly reluctant. According to Scott G. Shea, a biographer of the Mamas & the Papas, Phillips “had a vision in his head” of “a group that not only sounded like an electrified Peter, Paul and Mary, but also looked like them.” Shea puts it bluntly: “Michelle was to be the centerpiece, and, in his mind, Cass was too fat to even be considered.”

The group projected a chumminess that was central to their appeal, but few people know how hard Elliot had to push to become part of the band. She showed up unannounced in the Virgin Islands hoping to ingratiate herself, but Phillips wouldn’t budge until an act of fate intervened. While walking down the St. Thomas alley that the Mamas & the Papas would later immortalize in song, debris from a construction site hit Elliot on the head and knocked her unconscious. John Phillips would later claim that Elliot’s concussion caused her vocal register to change, and it was another of those stories Elliot learned to repeat with a self-deprecating joke.

“The real story is that John didn’t like my mother’s look,” Elliot-Kugell writes. She believes “he made up the story about a fake increase in vocal range to justify his choice to finally add my mom to the band months later.”

Elliot went solo after the short-lived group’s demise, buoyed by the success of “Dream a Little Dream of Me,” a Mamas & the Papas single on which she sang lead. The final solo album she released, in 1973, had a pointed title: “Don’t Call Me Mama Anymore.” “The moniker of ‘Mama’ had always felt like a reference to her size — that is, ‘Big Mama’ — and she hated that,” Elliot-Kugell writes.

Elliot remains an underrated heroine in the story of the Laurel Canyon scene, not only as a musician but also as an amiable hostess who knew how to link up like-minded people. Doherty liked to call her “the Puppeteer.”

In 1964, she introduced her friends John Sebastian and Zal Yanovsky; they became the Lovin’ Spoonful. When she heard that David Crosby and Stephen Stills had begun making music together, she suggested they add a high voice to the mix, and brought them Graham Nash. “I will give you a hundred dollars,” David Crosby told Elliot’s biographer, “if you can find a single person who says they hated Cass.”

But there was also something bittersweet about Elliot’s kinship with all these men. “I think part of the reason they all adored her is they weren’t threatened by her,” Elliot-Kugell said. “She knew more about these guys and had a relationship on a deeper level than some of their own wives or girlfriends had.” She added with a wry chuckle, “Did that mean she didn’t want to jump into bed with half of them? She probably did!”

Elliot’s unrequited love for her bandmate Doherty was perhaps the hardest to bear, especially after he and Michelle Phillips had an affair that nearly broke up the band before their first album was even released. Elliot had been smitten since the night they met, at a Greenwich Village bar where they each threatened to drink the other under the table, and eventually decided to drink … under the table. As he put it in his one-man show about the group’s history, “I knew she loved me, and I loved her too, but not like she wanted me to. She did weigh 300 pounds, and I wasn’t man enough to deal with that.”

The most difficult passages of “My Mama, Cass” are those in which Elliot-Kugell reckons with her mother’s persistent loneliness. “After the shows, when they’re screaming her name onstage and she’s bowing, she was the only one going back to the hotel by herself,” she said. “Everybody else had someone, and she didn’t.”

Elliot’s need for love and companionship is what drove her to the decision — relatively radical for a famous woman in the late 1960s — to become a single mother. When she learned she was pregnant at the height of the group’s success, after a brief fling with its touring bassist, she was defiant in her decision to raise the child on her own. “As it turned out,” Elliot-Kugell writes, wrenchingly, “my mom’s desire to have someone in her life who wasn’t going to up and leave her was what led to her desire for a child. It’s how I came to be.”

WHEN I FINALLY got Sue Cameron on the phone, she was calling from the Atlantic Ocean, “somewhere between Bermuda and Portugal.” A journalist for more than 50 years who has published a book titled “Hollywood Secrets and Scandals,” she sometimes gives lectures on cruise ships. She was happy to reminisce about her old pal. “She had a big smile and this wide open face, very happy to see people,” Cameron said. “You just would immediately love her and want her to be your best friend.”

Cameron met Elliot when she interviewed the Mamas & the Papas in 1966; they realized they were neighbors and quickly became “sit-by-each-other’s-pool kind of friends.” Cameron has stories, like the one about the night they ran into Ann-Margret and Elliot delivered the perfect one-liner about her massive engagement ring (“I could skate on that”); or all the times Elliot would walk around with a credit card in her shoe because she didn’t like to carry a purse.

Her most painful memory is her final dinner with Elliot at Mr. Chow in the summer of 1974, before Elliot left for London. She’d never seen her friend so happy. “It was just a magical moment,” Cameron recalled. “It was just, like, the crescendo of her being. She’d had some TV specials, she was now going to go do a big nightclub act. Everything was fabulous.”

After a two-day stint of partying in London, Elliot told her friend Joe Croyle — a dancer in her show who was crashing with her at Harry Nilsson’s pad — that she was going to take a bath and turn in early because she was exhausted. Croyle figured she would be hungry too, so he fixed her a sandwich with ham, the only thing he could find in the fridge, along with some Coca-Cola. The ham sandwich, the cruelly cartoonish symbol that would come to define Elliot, was actually a gesture of care: a friend making her a meal she never got to enjoy.

Cameron heard about Elliot’s death in the newsroom of The Hollywood Reporter, where she was working at the time: “I kicked into professional mode and said, no one else is going to write that obit. I’m going to do it.” She tracked down Carr by phone in Nilsson’s apartment. “He could barely speak,” Cameron recalled. She asked what happened, and he said he didn’t know. “‘Oh, wait,’” she recalled him saying. “‘I see a half-eaten ham sandwich on the night stand. That’s good. You tell everybody that she choked on a ham sandwich, do you understand me?’”

“And I did it,” she added, “because I wanted to protect Cass.”

What was she protecting her from? “I was not aware of a lot of drugs,” she said. “I just wasn’t one of those people. And I had some suspicion around the time that she was going to London that she was on some sort of pills, but I didn’t really know anything.” In a split second, Carr and Cameron decided there was less shame in a woman ridiculed for her weight choking to death than there was in her having a drug problem. “What a terrible thing,” Cameron said, “but I was in too much of a state of shock to clean it up.”

She, too, is confounded by the story’s persistence. “Of all of the things I’ve done,” she said, “this ham sandwich has followed me my entire life.”

That story had long haunted Elliot-Kugell, too, though she felt some closure after Cameron privately divulged its origins to her when they met for lunch in 2000. Elliot-Kugell is cleareyed about what probably caused her mother’s death: “I mean, look. She was up for 48 hours, and she was at a party. Do the math.” But she doesn’t want to dwell on that. “The thing that was really important for me was that I didn’t want to write a salacious book,” she said.

In some sense, any memoir by a child of the Mamas & the Papas exists in the shadow of Mackenzie Phillips’s 2009 bombshell, “High on Arrival,” in which she accused her father John Phillips of sexual assault. But Elliot-Kugell’s memoir belongs on a different shelf entirely. It is a humanizing portrait of a woman whose legacy has, for far too long, been reduced to an outdated urban legend.

And it is a tale of an imperfect mother and a grieving daughter, of loss and long delayed catharsis. A few weeks before we spoke, Elliot-Kugell went to visit her mother’s grave. “It’s always weird when I go there, because I never know what to say,” she said. “But that day felt a little different because when I went up to the grave, I just said, ‘Hi.’ Like the way I would greet one of my cousins, or somebody who I know really well who I haven’t seen in a while.”

“I thought to myself, ‘Why, why why does it feel like this?’” she said.” All at once it dawned on her: “After going through this experience, I feel closer to her.”

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