On this very day, forty-nine years ago, Crosby, Stills & Nash’s first album was released.
This is the one that included Suite: Judy Blue Eyes, Marrakesh Express, Guinnevere, You Don’t Have to Cry, Pre-Road Downs, Wooden Ships, Lady of the Island, Helplessly Hoping, Long Time Gone, and 49 Bye-Byes.
This is the one that we all bought immediately, after hearing it, most likely, on WNEW-FM, that bold free-form station that played Jimi and Sinatra, back to back, and introduced us Bronx primitives to Miles. Janis. John Mayall’s “Beano” album. Sly.
This is the one with the impeccable three-part harmonies, alternate tunings, and moody, urgent lyrics that validated our sense of malaise, heightened daily, one body bag at a time.
About the car in this photo: this is the type of VW I drove back then. It was well used, purchased from a curvy nurse in the Wakefield section of The Bronx for $735 saved from my part time job as an office boy in the bursting room, where I worked alongside 22-year old Viet Nam vets, just back from their tour and in various stages of re-acclimation to civilian life.
The car, like my co-workers, and like my country, was in serious disrepair. Every fix was followed by a new problem until, finally, it ran aground on the 1st Avenue concrete divider in Manhattan, late one blurry night.
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But hope sprang eternal. On all fronts, not just the car, of course. Ah, the optimism of youth. We kept trying to patch everything up, perhaps encouraged by the positive push of the Crosby, Stills & Nash song, Long Time Gone: “But you know…the darkest hour…is always…always just before the dawn…”
Forty-nine years later, here we are again, our country’s internal battle lines drawn. A new generation has been passed life’s baton. Millennials are full of idealism, energy and hope. They volunteer, they connect, they plan.
Much is said about the Greatest Generation. No generation is perfect; they sacrificed much, but gave the world McCarthyism, Viet Nam, environmental disaster, Jim Crow, union-bashing and Watergate.
As today’s young voters search for answers, they’ve given us new music, such as “Watch Over Us” by The Lone Bellow. Think about the layered meanings of this song, on the anniversary of that first CSN album nearly half a century ago: “Watch over us…watch over us…when my hands are tired…when my strength is gone…momma, your baby…is shrouded in sorrow…you’ve had your time…but who has tomorrow?”
Hey guys, you’ve got the baton. You’ve earned the baton. Go for it, and we’ll follow your actions in words, deeds and music.