From the Archives: David Crosby

Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. Here before we launch our next season of Here's the Thing at iHeartRadio in January, I thought i'd play some of my favorite shows from the archives. Next up is my interview with musician David Crosby. Crosby is a founding member of Crosby Stills in Nash and in adding the Why that is Neil Young created one of the greatest quartets in music history. Here's my interview with the late David Crosby.

And here before here before.

As you know, it makes me wonder.

What's going on c SN and sometimes why. Some combination of David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash played together for fifty years until twenty sixteen, but always Crosby. He's the constant in some of the greatest songs of the twentieth century. His composition, harmonizing and non traditional guitar tunings

All Right, I'm in the middle of my lowest point of being a complete waste roll on hard drugs. Right, it's a bitch. My phone rings Crosby. Yeah, who's this? It's Townsen. I said, bullshit. He says, no, it's Townsen. Listen, get off that stuff. Get the off that stuff. I have to watch the four letter words, right, you can let it rip. Heirs really good podcasting, and so he says, you know you fucking get your shit, fucking getta you're fucking up. Quit that shit in my face. Really seriously,

Right, that worked? So that's what That was a turning point for you. Yeah, it got me sober and you were largely or you were completely sober since then, I.

Was completely sober for fourteen and a half years.

What happened with to prison? What year eighty four? And you were how old? Forties? Yeah?

I was born in forty one and I was deeply addicted. And the only and I already tried in you know rehab places, I think four or five times failed. So the prison did it? You know, junk and freebase. That that's a prison you carry around with you. You don't get to get out prison. You get to get out, and I don't regret.

It a bit. How were you treated by the inmate population when you were in prison? Were they kind to you? Did they dig you and admire you? A full range went all the way from uh.

I like your music man to uh hey, rock star? How you doing now? Bet you wish you had some drugs, don't you?

Hey?

Warn look over here rockstar throwing up a gia some bitch oh Texas.

Yeah.

And they didn't give me an aspir They didn't even have AA meetings in the prisons, in fact, nothing.

You had no help at all. You crawled out of there. It was bitter. It was bitter, but I woke up when you get out of prison. What do you do well? Like? Like who comes around? You do if people come to you and say, let's get back to work, or what's stuff like?

As soon as I woke up, I started writing again. I'm a hugely lucky human being.

Man. I have a raison.

Here's a fact about writing and creating and drugs. The more drugs I did, the less I wrote. And you can plot the two curves crossed at a certain point, you know, And I just kept the more drugs identically stopped writing. And then about two years went by, and then I woke up in prison, remembered who I was, and started writing again. And since then it's been a steady increase and a steady increase in quality.

So I can only draw one conclusion. Now this is going to sound strange, but you come from a nice family.

Yeah, we were comforted when I got to go to good schools. I had a red juncle. My dad was a cinematographer and a very good one. Not a warm and fuzzy guy, but technically excellent. So yeah, I thought I wanted to be an actor. You know what's really funny, man, Most of the actors I know want to be musicians and all the musicians.

I don't want to be actors, right because no matter what you're doing, you can be doing anything, and music can be in your life, and therefore music will always have a more powerful place in the lives of people than any film or TV.

Any debatable, but I think you get to a lot of evidence on your side there music. The way I look at it, music all art can be and usually is a lifting force. Just as war drags humanity down and brings out the very worst in US, so music and art lift. They're lifting force. They make things better. And so I kind of think, I kind of think I'm probably the luckiest guy in the world. I think I've got probably one of the best jobs. I try to acting. I'm not really good at it, you know, I.

Don't know why you'd want to act. If I could do what you do, you could never you couldn't get me off stage with a gun. I just would play music if I could do what you do. It's fun.

I remember my dad. I remember watching my dad at a distance at you know where Burbank Airport is used to be, Douglas Field. I remember my dad climbing into the belly of a B twenty four and flying away to the war. I remember watching he went, oh yeah, he was. They commissioned directly into what was then the Army Air Corps because he had this he was already an Academy Award running.

You know, cinema photographer.

So they put him right in the Air Corps and put him in this B twenty four that didn't that was a camera plane, that's all it was. And he went all over the world. He went every sh he had, every theater reb there was.

It was gone for how long five years.

Well, because he wasn't a bombing thing. You know, he had to follow the bombers, but he wasn't bombing, so he didn't get thirty five and out. He kept going five years, every major theater of the war. And when he came back.

What was he like? You wouldn't ever talk about it. So life at home when you were a child is with your mother?

Yeah?

At first, yeah, and then both of them. But my dad just wasn't a real homebody, family guy.

He was off working. Yeah. And you go to boarding school I did? Yeah, Kate, what was that like?

Huh?

What were you like? Were you always mischievous? Always?

And it got me in a shitload of trouble.

Why do you think that is?

I don't know, but it's definitely true. I got thrown out of almost every school I was ever in, including Kate.

What was music in your life? Then?

Music came early and well, my mom sang in choirs. My dad liked music. He could play a mantle in. My brother played guitar. We used to interesting thing when we were growing up in the fifties, when TV started to really happen. We didn't have a TV, so we sang folk songs out of the Fireside Book of Folk Songs, and that was where it started.

Did anybody tell you then you could sing? Did they say you're a good singer?

They did notice that I was singing harmony when I was six.

And what's the first instrument you played? Guitar? My brother turned me on the guitar when you were how old? I guess maybe ten. What's the best time you think that. My son is two and a half years, it's going to be three in June. He's obsessed with simulating playing the guitar. He actually has a band with my wife. He calls her Trista, and he's mister pants, mister pants. He'll turn to my wife. Literally, I've got an on video. He'll turn to my wife and goes, Trista, what are

You'll never have a job. Actually let him.

Do you think that if you didn't When you say that, do you think if you hadn't made it as big as you made it, you wouldn't have stuck with it, or you would have stayed with it just because you loved it. I would have because I love it, right, I love it so much. Like I can't tell you I love singing.

I'm good at it, but that's not really it's there's a joy to singing in and of itself, and it's it's an elevating thing. It's totally freaking wonderful. It's very tough for me now, man, because I'm really old and getting on the road to exhausting.

Yeah. Well, it beats the crap out of me.

Yeah, because you never get more than four hours sleep in a row, and then in the middle of that you hit an expansion joint and you're awake again, and you know, and you're eating terrible food and restaurants.

When when did you when you left home, you didn't go to college. No, I went one year and you went to.

City College in Santa Barbara, which is now, oddly enough, the highest rated city college in the country. It was interesting and good, and I had one really good teacher who hooked me up about some really interesting things about semantics and language.

And No, you were sending music then no, in a band.

Then no, not yet, I was I was bussing tables at the local coffeehouse because as a busboy. They would let me sing harmony with the guy who was being paid to sing.

And what was the first band you were in?

Less Baxter's Balladiers Less Baxter, you know, band leader guy. He had seen the Christy Mitchels, which at that guy who bar his he had. I think he had three of them out there, bands like that, all named the same.

You know.

It just was a commercial operation. It was really lame. But if we was put food on the table. My brother and I were in that. And then I ran into Roger mcgwyn and Jeene Clark and where a tributaur in l a yeah bar, it's a tributary and they were singing and it was good and the songs were you know, James is pretty good writer. And so when those two have they had an act called they have an act.

They were just playing. They were in the bar. You know.

Roger had been a musician for a while and successful and played with other bands, Lime Letders, Chairman's Trio, a bunch of different people, so he knew what he was doing, and he knew that Gene was talented and that this stuff had value because it sounded a lot like Beatle songs. And uh, so I started singing harmony to him. They said, what's your name? And that works out really well. It

And you covered tambourine men. Yeah, that was our first hit. Well what did you learn about bands in your first band? What was that experience?

Like?

I learned that I had a lot to learn. I was just a young punk and I really had no idea how to actually work with people and accomplish the aim that I wanted to. I had an experienced early on when I was young. My mom took me to see a symphony orchestra in a park free show there in LA and they tuned up and they got ready and then he started the piece and it was this.

Huge, beautiful wave that hit me.

I didn't know anything was like that. You know, the symphony orchestra hugely powerful thing and it freaked me out. And the thing I've realized, even as a kid, the power came from they were all.

Doing it together. I can't believe you just said that.

It's the truth, and it really and it penetrated.

So I've always wanted to be in a band. Yeah, always. I love cooperative effort.

Competitive effort winds up at war, cooperative efort winds up atter.

I'm watching Tom Petty's band play at a benefit and a friend was with me. I turned to him and I said, do you see what I'm seeing? My friend said what? And I said, they're all doing the same thing at the same time. Bingo, I said, they're all in service to and feeding. You know, in my business, not everybody's doing the same thing. They're kind of doing their own thing off in the corner.

Thereatty's band was doing the same thing.

Yeah, it was really really, very very cool. Do you find in a band does somebody always need to be in charge? Does somebody need to be the boss?

It can go both ways. And the Birds Roger was definitely the leader of the band, and.

That worked well.

Yeah, he knew a lot more than we did, and he's also an extremely talented guy and a good singer, and so it wouldn't you know. I challenged it at every turn, but he was the leader of the band.

CSNY.

None of us was willing to admit anybody else was the leader. It was and probably still is one of the most competitive situations in the history, and why he goes.

Really just that simple. And in spite of all the incredible success you've had. I mean, who's when you think of people, when you think of men harmonizing in a group, the first people that come to mind are the three of you. Why do you think that that didn't bring them any comfort?

I don't think that's what they went in for, and I don't think they realized exactly how.

Good it was.

We did really like each other when we started, and we were thrilled, you know, by each other's songs.

So you leave the Birds and and Still's leaves Buffalo Springfield, and they bring you with them.

The well Springfield through fell apart left right, which kind of his m Steven was very appealing guitar player and singer. I mean, it's really good. Remember how well he played acoustic guitar back then? Beautiful, pretty stunning, And so I started hanging out with him, and then Cass introduced me to Graham.

But when Nash leaves the Hollies, the Hollies are doing very well, aren't they very successful? Yah?

Why does he leave the Hollies? I stole him, you did? I went to work. I went to London and I told me she quit.

And how did you do that? We should quit? Why? Because he could join us.

He was at a very crux point with the Hollies. They wanted to do an album of Dylan covers. Now there are bands that should do Dylan covers and there are bands that should not do Dylan covers. That was one of the bands that should not do Dylan covers. And they were ignoring his songs. He had already written a Lady at the Island and they didn't get it. The beautiful song they had already written right between the eyes,

So it's easier to do the touring and get on stage and get that on and get that of what than it is to be. You don't go into a studio anymore because that's more intimate that died quicker.

Yeah, the money still good on the road in a band like that, you know that you you want to stay there. I mean it's big crowds, big places, big deal.

Yeah, but it got to winbers no fun. Is it about when it starts to crack, when it starts to shift? Is it because of songwriting? No one's getting that too. No one wants to sing my songs. I want my songs on that album. Yea, who's the decider? Did you guys acquiesce to producers?

No?

We uh, we always produced our records and uh and are we had what we call the reality rule. You'd come into the room, you know, virus, just us, nobody else and I sing each other or song and they either liked it or they didn't.

And if they liked it, you know.

Then we'd start figuring out how to sing it, and these are hugely talented guys.

Man, they came with a lot of stuff. So before it was the four of you, the three of you was basically pretty good. Yeah, it's okay.

You know, Neil's nickname is sometimes it's CSN sometimes why you know, and when it would be CS and Y it was a lot bigger that.

You've got to know that.

That's the reason the CSNY is always Neil's decision is because if there's twenty thousand people in the stadium, Neil put ten of them there. That's the truth. And so he's he's the one that's that's said that it's done. He doesn't want to do that anymore, and I don't think he needs to do CSM. I don't think you'll ever see it again when you say he sometimes and he comes and goes. Is that his nature in all things?

I don't know.

I've never asked him, but I think it, you know, I had to come to this decision. It's a very hard decision, man, this is a very hard time for us. I don't know if you know this, but streaming pretty much destroyed our earning power. It took half, at least half of our earning power away from us because they folks, they don't pay us for records anymore. And that's really sad. They got that deal passed us and they It's sort of as if you worked your job and they paid

David Crosby is having a renaissance, three solo albums over the past four years. We hear about his new burst of creativity and why he thinks Stills and Nash are still out there playing the hits when we come back. I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the.

Thing, a besturb.

Such a long long time, the.

Madness that's Crosby with Stills and Nash. We've heard about the band's disintegration, but not what made it great? What was the best time? Every time? Every time?

For years at the beginning, every time we'd go on stage, we would just kill it. We could sing together. Nash is a fantastic harmony singer. He absolutely hates my guts. That's not fun to work.

But why do you think that's that's the case.

I could tell you, but it would be personal stuff and be better than be better if he told you. Yeah, because you know he said, he said, he said, some unfortunate stuff happened in his life, some of which is his fault, some of which isn't, and he blames me for it. And he mostly blames me because I shot my mouth off about Neil's girlfriend and pissed off Neil, which ended, see us, that's my fault, and it's it

Bam on the net immediately wow.

And Neil says, okay, that's it, no more than oh wow. And I went on stern and he said, why do you feel man? I said, I didn't have any right to do that. It was I shot my mouth off, and he's pissed at me, and so I want to apologize to him and Marrow. I want to apologize, sir. I'm not really in a position to judge other people. I'm the one who wound up in prison.

A mistake.

Yeah, you know what I did, But you know what mistage? These days, everybody's just waiting pounds you never, you never, you never.

You know, there's no forgetting. I mean, everybody knows the story. I guess. I was fighting for custody of my daughter and I'd have to go to court and spend twenty five thousand dollars just to get my kid on the phone. You know, they're going to coach the child how to answer the phone. She was like eleven. And so I leave this message on my daughter's voicemail, screaming at my daughter on the phone. I go go nuts because I've gone through all these stages of that. Now what I did.

No, And it's the people that we're up against here are very very good at assaulting any vulnerability they see in the people who criticize them. And we do criticize them, both you and I do, because they are doing a

But you've been p for a long time, haven't always. I mean I read online where you were doing riffs on stage. I don't know if it was Monterey or where were you riffs about JFK's assassination.

I said it was an assassination. I said the Warren reports a lot. Yeah, and it is. It was absolutely not true. But being an activist is kind of like, you know, I had heroes. Man Secret is a hero of mine. Joan Bia is a hero of mine. These are people who actually put their lives on the line.

You know.

Harry Belafani, he walked from someone in Montgomery, arm in arm. It was rifles in the bushes. Plenty of people wanted to get them. I did a documentary about music and activism, and he's one of my heroes because he was very brave. I wrote a book about it. That's why we made the documentary. Working on a new book now, got named Jeff Benedict. Started out about politics, but I think it's going to be about the whole United States of America and democracy and what happened.

What do you think is going to happen. It's fascinating, man. I don't think we know.

Okay, okay, we didn't protect our democracy well enough. What's gonna happen? I really don't know. I'm very encouraged by these kids. I was very hugely encouraged to keep them active. Oh they don't let that fire, Doug die out. It's not gonna and we don't. We're not in charge of them. They are gonna do that, and they are pissed. I don't understand. They're being handed a world that's in deep danger ecologically and a broken democracy. I don't think they

Uh huh.

Women's March, the women at the United States of America may save the United States of America. We need more of them in Congress.

Maybe Stormy Daniels is going to save the country. Yeah. I thought it was interesting that you saw everybody attack David Vidout, a kid that was the leader of the Florida Movement. It becomes this lightning rod for all these right wingers, especially Hannity, who I've always been, you know, just just throttled Hannity whatever I can because he just died. Because he drives me insane, because because first of all,

At that place Shoe's Beach, Yeah, Jones Beach. He came out there and he was very you know, he is peacock. You know, he's like very full of himself himself. Hi, Bill O'Reilly, nice to meet you. And I said, mister O'Reilly, stop using my song. And he said what I said, I didn't give you permission. If you use my song anymore, I'm going to see you. He said, why don't you come on my show and talk about it.

I said, talk about it?

I said, you bully. You just interrupted me three words in I'm not going to come show. You disgusted me, and he stopped. Boy, I don't like him at all. I don't like any of them because they're they don't really even believe what they're ranting about. They're ranting because it makes them money.

That's how they pay out multimillion dollar settlements. But handed the attacks this guy and a lot of people. He's a good kid. That's why they attacked me. Because he's effective, because it's working. He's believable. These people have They assassinate characters of leadership. They have a leadership assassination program. Anybody on the other side is going to it. Was going to get an attraction and get anything done. They try to kill it. They try to kill it.

They don't like it. And now I'm I'm tiny, I'm not really worth coming after it, but they do come after me. I'll give you a perfect example, I shot may mouth off yesterday whenever it was his hotel got cockcire, I said, burn baby, burn, stupid. And then a guy dies fifty emails you heartless, worthless son of a bitch. Somebody died and you loved it.

I don't love it.

Yeah, I don't want to be sometimes, duh. I don't want anybody to die fifty like raging. I'm going to kill you, you low, cheesy motherfucker.

You can't communicate in the media at all the way you thought you could or wanted to. Yeah, very carefully.

YEA.

The place I go where I can speak as long as I want to, and I'm completely uncensored, and I'm welcome, and nobody's got to is Howard Stern. I whenever I want to talk about something, I want to talk about an issue. If something's bothered me, I go on Howard. It's the best. These are the nighttime shows. Some of them are my friends. I like them. They have their purpose promotionally, six minutes on the couch and out. They have their function in the in the promotional world. But

He's a really interesting thing. You know what happened with Howard? He grew up right, He started be out being you know, hey, I'm gonna have strippers on my radio show, all right, Gabie.

Not so shit?

And then he kept encountering stuff and learning stuff, and you watch him he matured.

Eventually they realize Letterman and Howard in their own way, they realize they're enough them just sitting there talking to is enough. You don't need any more of this crap.

I think Howard learned a lot and became smarter and became much He's a serious, a serious guy to talk to.

Now.

I feel the same way you do. I felt completely free to say pretty much anything. I honestly felt you say the thing about the fire at Trump's building. But don't we all get pushed to the point where I mean, there's things I almost hit send on Twitter that you wouldn't believe, right right in line with what you said about Birdie, Yeah it was. We get pushed to that point. Yeah, well they make us mad exactly. You love this place, right, You believed in this democracy all your life. You think

We're going to ruin.

Everything, and well they're ruining it, you know, and that's really bad. And yes, I get pissed. And every once in a while I make a mistake. I'm nineteen eighty nine. I made a mistake that maybe there was one in ninety one to two. You're supposed to smile. It was a joke.

But why was it a joke? Because I make mistakes every day. I'm sorry. Okay, can I get it now? I'm so earnest. Right now, I'm a little too earnest. I want to ask you about your son. His name is Raymond, James Raymond, James Raymond, and you were separated, didn't see him a while ago, re united.

Yeah, his mom put him up for adoption, and when he was just about to have his first child, his parents said, well, you know, I shouldn't know what the genetics are. You should find out who your dad is. So he tracked and he found it and he said, nah, no way, Oh.

He didn't know. No. How old was he at that point, probably almost thirty, So he didn't know you were his father.

No, No, he did a wonderful thing, Alec. He normally does. Meet ups go very badly. You know that somebody brings too much baggage. How come you left me?

And Mom?

We weren't good enough for you?

It's usually bitter. It's usually a bitter pill. Well, he came and he gave me a clean slate.

He gave me a chance to earn my way into his life, which was one of the kindest things anybody's ever done to me. And he and I became very close and we write extremely well. Because he's a better musician than I am. Anybody tells you it's not genetic.

Have him come talk. That's interesting. Yeah, that's interesting.

He's a wonderful musician, much better musician than I am.

A really good writer. We're taking a break. Stay with us. Do you still have your band together, CPR?

Well, that's that band has evolved now into the sky Trails Band band. Now I am in two bands, So the Lighthouse Band, that's the one I'm working with down John right now. It's an acoustic band, mostly vocals. And you here recording. Yeah, we're here recording right now. We're making our second record. My other band, Skytrails Band. That's CPR, me and Jeff p Var and my son James Raymond and this jazz bass player from Estonia named my Eigen

Not at all.

Really, these people are much better writers and much better singer than those guys are now right, These people still love it, They.

Love making music. They're not doing it for a paycheck. They're doing it because do you think the other two are really just doing it for a paycheck at this point? Yeah? Yeah, I think that's the only thing they do. What are they going to do? Do you think that they're going to follow you inform another band and keep going there? You know they're working.

Stills was working with Judy Collins, he's been a friend forever, and Nash be not working.

Were there people that you wanted to play with? Like, was there a dream of somebody you wanted to play with you and get to play with who do you want to play with? Johnny? Really? And why didn't you? She was my old lady.

I produced her first record. She arguably the finest singer songwriter of our times. I think probably pretty definitely the best writer, even better than Paul or either one of the Pauls or Randy, or even better than James Taylor, who is one of my real heroes in life. And most people come down to it's her, Bob, And she's so much better musician than Bobbs.

Bob's a great poet. She's a great poet and a great musician.

Wow, stunning singer, which is all over now because she got had a really bad thing happened to her.

Dylan, but I worked with him. What was that like? Was it everything you hoped they would be?

Bob is such a piece of work man. I went in and he says, Hi, you do it, And he kissed my wife's hand. She's never watched it since. And he says, come on, let's.

Go do it. And I said, Bob, I haven't heard this. Oh, come on.

Because he loves to get you out on the edge. He wants that edge stuff. He wants it so I said, Bob, you got to sing me this song. So he says, okay, he sings me the song. I see, okay, now let's go to it. So we go in the other room and he does it completely different. He's such, he's really he's a piece of work, trust me, and I love him and I get along great with him because I don't butter his toast.

You know, I.

Think that's that's comfortable for him. People I'd love to work with there are still a bunch man, but I think the younger people still have a lot of joy in it.

You know.

It's still really exciting for him, and that produces a different quality of music.

Unquestionably, we had build back hold to our hour little hard guy here the night.

M h.

That's sign from young bird here, that's entry somebody here exactly.

Right when we returned some of the truly great questions you all submitted for this legend of rock and roll, and a few of the less than great ones. I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.

She shall be As she turned Bougis.

Down this slope to the hall. We have some questions that were posed by people on our here is the thing Twitter side. Yeah, you know, we went on on our Twitter page and we asked people and it really worked like a charm. You were kind of amazed how many people We're gonna bring me the questions, bring those in here? But ah, is that you, Adam? I want to picked us a couple of these that I really really liked. One of them is from a woman named Barbara Fisher, and she says, one of my all time

I wish it were actually Hero. I'm not really sure what I was talking about. What happened is I was working on that set of words until Collins heard him and he wrote the music. And this is the closest I came to ever having a hit. Really, I never have it because I write the weird shit. I'm not really sure what I was talking about. I wish I could give you a clear and concise answer what I was trying to say, but I'm not sure.

Bill Vora Nicos and Bill if I mangled your name, I apologized Bill Vornicos. I think this is a funny question. Who was a rival artist or band during the sixties or seventies that you couldn't stand or thought sucked other than Jim Morrison. Did you think Jim Morrison sucked? Yeah? Absolutely, really poser, really poser. You thought he was not a good singer, not a good singer? No, no, why do you?

Oh my god, I don't think he was a good singer.

And when you say that, who is a good singer to you? Oh? Man, I mean other than the three of you? Who's a good singer?

James Taylor?

Wow, brilliant singer? Well, because he's just more honest, more straightforward?

What what?

What? Much more talented? Wow? No, Morrison was a poser.

Anybody that wants up having a wave their dick at the audience, you know, it's like they're pretty desperate.

He was a poser.

Trust me. I That band was no good. They never swung. Ever, they didn't have a bass player. He played terrible bass on a keyboard, really badly, and it was awful.

I don't like him.

I never There were bands earlier than that that I didn't like. Paul Overer in the Raiders. I mean, come on, I set the bar pretty high. The people that I liked were Jimmy Hendrix and Janis Joplin and cass Ellie had Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan.

Yeah, that's those are your basic box set of the greatest.

Those are all my friends, and there are all people that I think are really talented.

No, I didn't like the doors at all. Well, we have a woman here the question. I'm motivated by you because you were so blunt about Morrison. I'm so blunt about this question. Her name is Renee Champagne. Now that's that's a that's a cool name, Renee Champagne. But the question is a terrible question. She says, what is the most memorable moment of your career so far? And why? That's a terrible question.

When you are terrible question and you get those two right now, and we try to explain to him, and when you get into the good stuff, it's all apples and oranges. There isn't a best. Clapton wasn't better than Hendrix. Hendrix wasn't better than Clapton.

I got another one here that I really really liked. John Packer. Is his name? Our contributor here from Twitter, John Packer said, Hugh Masekela described how you helped him move out of addiction and how that transformed his life. How did he find you? Cass?

Cass Elliott, the same person introduced me to Graham and one of my best friends.

In the world, A truly wonderful woman. Yeah.

She introduced me to Hugh and he and I and she used to hang out together a lot. Hughes was a very talented guy. He played on Rock and Roll Star. That's his trumpet on Rock and Roll Star.

I don't want you to answer these questions, but I just want to read them to you because that's so interesting to me. Jeffrey Paris says, if you had six fingers instead of four, what will we hear from your guitar?

Jeffrey Paris used to be the captain on my boat.

Is this somebody you know? Oh?

I know, very somebody you know. He's one of my best friends.

If you have six fingers on your hand rather than for what will we hear from your guitar?

Clapped it?

Is he somebody you admire? Oh?

Hell yes, But more than his musicianship, I admire his courage. What happened to him, would have put me back on. He didn't go. He stayed sober in the face of that. My god, man, that's courage. He's a very brave guy. And you know, most people just have never really looked at it and thought about what it must have taken from him. But I admire his courage as much as I admire his guitar playing. And I think he's an even better singer than he is a guitar player.

Three last questions. Gloria Bernstein, who's a friend of mine. Gloria Bernstein wants to know what's your favorite movie of your dad's.

But the one they got the Academy Award for it is also a stunner. It's called Taboo, and it was a black and white silent movie.

It's that far back. You ever visit him on the set? Oh yeah, lots of Yeah, yeah.

I wanted to do your job. Man.

I'm so glad you didn't. I'm so it worked out well for all of us.

Oh, you know, it's not easy for every part in film and TV. There's a thousand people trying.

One last question from these, what are five albums you could never do.

With Jony's Blue Asia, Steely Dan, my favorite band, sad that he died not I'm friends with Donald and Though and I got to give two to Steely.

Dan, Gaucho.

Pepper's Starry Peppers loved a classical piece called Theme from Thomas.

Tallis very fun. William, so you know about that. I'm the announcer for the New York Philharmonic. You're on public radio. I love that. How is your health and what recommendations do you have to people, especially people in your business, to take better care of their health. I think a lot about that now what I might have done?

I think, you know, my health has always been a very serious issue. I had a hepatitis. See, I had to have a liver transplant. I spent seventy two days in the hospital at UCLA before they saved my life. Oh is it really pretty pretty terrible? I've been a diabetic for thirty years at least. My doctor, who is a crusty old guy at UCLA named Gary Geitnik, you gotta do better with his diabetes.

Ok, Gary, thank you? How do I do that? He said? Eat less food?

I said, oh, Gary, thanks, that's so simple. Oh wow, you cleared it right up for me. You're so kind you ask eat less food. I mean it, you're eating too much. Turns out he's right. There's a delay period between when you're actually full and when you feel ful about twenty minutes, and you keep eating because it tastes good. So what I do is I order a regular meal. I don't order sugar, but I order a pretty regular meal,

Do you campaign for people, for candidates ever anymore?

I am very reticent about it because they turn on you. I've been campaigning for a friend of mine named Dena Steele down in Texas. She's running where it's home for you now you live where Sentien is up by Santa Barbara. I've been campaigning for Dana because she's a friend and I know she's an honorable person, and she's running for Congress in the thirty sixth district in Texas, and I think she might win, even though she's an uphill battle.

Yeah, I do.

Sometimes if I know the character.

Of the person, I have to do something with you that'd be fun. I'd love it too. Man out Nelly Alchemy, I know it. You know, we've got to give it a guy.

I love this country man.

I'm not giving up.

I Am not going to roll over and put my paws in here. I Am going to keep fighting until I am dead.

The inexhaustible creative engine that is David Crosby. He actually worked in film. Recently. He and his son James wrote a song for the documentary Little Pink House about the human story behind the Supreme Court's Kilo decision, where a town tried to bulldoze the woman's Little Pink House to make room for commercial development.

They put it in the movie and they're trying to you thy can qualify as for an Academy Award.

We traveled of course love and can put it next to my dad, David Crosby. He chose the music for today's program, and there's both joy and pain in it. I'm Alec Baldwin. You're listening to here's the thing from iHeart Radio.

Six seven weeks now, six.

Ships on the Waters.

You know the way it's supposed to.

S the show.

Speed talking about very free.

And active people.

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