|
|
|
The New York Post
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
The partnership of David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham
Nash and Neil Young remains one of the best loved relics of
the early '70s. Though they have played together in different
configurations for the last quarter-century, these sometimes
clashing musicians have a new album, their first in 11 years.
In stores today, "Looking Forward" is an outstanding 12-song
collection on which the graying players deliver the kind of
vocal harmonies that have always been key to their music.
The opening piece, "Faith in Me," is a love song with lyrics -
sung to a ska rhythm - that can be read either as declarations
of
romantic love or as statements of the bandmates' affection for
each other. And this album finds the band still intertwining
politics, social commentary and messages of love in lyrics
edged with double meanings.
The best political turns hide in plain sight on the songs "Stand
and Be Counted," "Someday Soon" and the title track,
"Looking Forward." Yet the album is at its most poignant
when Neil Young) explores his own mortality on songs like the
folkadelic
"Slowpoke."
CSN&Y has always highlighted the band members' four
distinct personalities, and "Looking Forward" plays with this
notion: Young is often dark, Nash has a knack for musical
narrative, Crosby gives the band its political edge, and
guitar-ace Stills is a jack-of-all-trades who writes about love
for love's sake.
The blend of guitars and complex male vocals is as timeless
here as it was in '74. There are no rallying anthems like "Ohio"
(written in response to the Kent State student killings), but
there are songs that rival Crosby's "Long Time Gone" and
Young's "Deja Vu."
Although the boys in the band may be fatter in the middle and
stiffer in the joints, the disc is muscular and lean, and totally
free of the strings and horns that somehow always seem to
attach themselves to ancient rockers.
This is a risk-free disc that snags an early slot on 1999's list
of
top 10 albums.
|
|
