An album of the time | Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young - Deja Vu
Episode description
On this episode of Vinyl Verdict, Bell, Jamie and Plouffe listen to Jamie's next pick, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's "Deja Vu". Released in 1970, the album was one of the first albums released by a rock supergroup. David Crosby had previously been the guitarist in the band The Byrds, Stephen Stills and Neil Young had both been guitarists in the band Buffalo Springfield, and Graham Nash had been the lead singer of The Hollies. As a trio, CSN released their debut album in 1969, to immediate success and followed that up with a tour that included a stop at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair, where they were joined by Neil Young. Following this, they got together to record what would become "Deja Vu", between July 1969 and January 1970. Each member of the group contributed multiple songs for the album. The sole cover, "Woodstock", was written by Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Contemporary reviews were favourable, and the album sold 500,000 copies in its first two weeks, and then followed that up by spending 88 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100. Today, the album is regarded as a classic of its time, with Rolling Stone naming it variously the 147th, 148th and 220th greatest album of all time, and the Library of Congress selected it as a significant work for its archive in 2023. But how will the boys rate it? Is it too of its own time for them? Come along and find out!