photo by Anna Webber

Croz’s unexpected creative encore continues with his fourth studio album in five years.

CSLW

DAVID CROSBY: Michael is a wonderful guy—an amazing musician—so I asked him to produce my Lighthouse record a few years ago, and he brought Becca [Stevens] and Michelle [Willis]. The chemistry was unusually good so I went to them all and said, “For the next record, I don’t want to do a solo album with Michael producing and you guys singing a little bit. I want the four of us to do a group record. I want us to write together and sing together.” And that’s what we did.

We went into Michael’s studio in Brooklyn. We had Michelle’s song “Jam It” and we had “My Son”—that’s a set of heartfelt words that I had written to my son about 10 years ago, and then Bill Laurance from Snarky Puppy wrote the music. In the next eight days, we wrote the entire Here If You Listen record together. I’ve written with other people a few times—most notably my son James—but not many and I never dreamed that you could write with four people. The result was amazing. The chemistry was amazing. We wrote, recorded and mixed an entire album in one month. I’ve never had an experience like that before and I’ve done a lot of stuff. I was shocked.

MICHAEL LEAGUE: I grew up listening to David—my dad and mom are both big fans. And then one day, my aunt or mom told me: “David Crosby has been tweeting about Snarky Puppy.” So I went on Twitter and he had been on a three- or four-day binge posting our YouTube videos. I sent him a message and just said, “Thanks for sharing our music. Here’s my number.” And he texted me back with his number immediately. When we were making Lighthouse, I really looked to the stripped-down sound on his first solo record If I Could Only Remember My Name, specifically tracks like “Orleans,” rather than indulging in his psychedelic-trippy-jazz-fantasies or his rock-and-roll side or his more Steely Dan, full-band, produced stuff. I wanted to make a record that captured who I think David Crosby is, what I consider to be his essence. That meant using acoustic guitars with really interesting tunings; meaningful, relevant, poetic lyrics; a bunch of vocal stacks; rich vocal harmonies. He hadn’t made a record like that in a long time.

He was expecting me to bring in this horde of musicians for this super big, thick, funky, grooving record, and I wanted to do the opposite. [Laughs.] People know me as the Snarky Puppy guy, but I grew up playing folk and songwriter music and, in many ways, it’s more natural for me to make a record like Lighthouse or Here If You Listen than a Snarky Puppy record. From age one to 14, I only listened to music from David’s generation because my dad’s record collection was my record collection. I wasn’t listening to Nirvana.

THE TOWN CRIER

CROSBY: Here If You Listen is a joyful record, which, in these times, is a very unusual thing. It’s a very hard time in the United States, but people have told us that this record lifts their spirits and they really are grateful for that. The same way that war drags us down and brings out the worst in the human race, music lifts us up and brings out our best. When I realized that this band could make positive music, I figured it was solid gold and I should pay attention. Look at it this way: It’s the only contribution that I can make. It’s the only thing I can do that will actually make anything better. It’s the one thing I’ve got. I’m faced with a world that distresses the hell out of me and the only way I can lift it up a little bit is to make this music. That’s what I’m supposed to be doing.

LEAGUE: For normal people in my financial bracket, making a record is usually three intense days in the studio. Making a record with David, we take our time. So you’re around each other every day for weeks. He changed the way I think about how we should use political and social messaging in music. Snarky Puppy was very apolitical for a very long period of time. But, right now, at this point in America, if you’re apolitical, you’re basically approving of what’s happening. And I don’t think that was the case 10 years ago, during the terms of any of the previous presidents—Republican or Democrat. People could afford to be apathetic without great risk, and now we’re in a different moment.

And David has stressed the idea of the artist as the town crier—that it’s important for artists to use their voices to speak for people who cannot speak for themselves—not to take sides politically, but to speak for ideals. That had a big influence on me starting my other band, Bokanté, which is very sociopolitical in content, and with Snarky Puppy saying, “We’re not gonna be quiet about this stuff on our stage or on social media.” But then also musically, Crosby’s such a “fuck it” kind of guy. He doesn’t want to stand around and turn on the fog machine and play the hits; he doesn’t want to put the tambourine on the chorus; he doesn’t want to do all the things that the playbook tells you to do. That’s been a very impactful thing for me, personally. Just do your thing and let other people hash it out. You should do the things you believe in and not be concerned with conforming to what you think people will like.

UNTIL THE WHEELS COME OFF

CROSBY: I’ve just been lucky enough to fall into a situation that works—I have the Lighthouse Band and the Sky Trails Band with my son James, and I alternate back and forth. My next record is going to be with James and Sky Trails, and I already have one song. We have a few friends here now, like Henry Diltz, and we were just playing it for him. Really, the writing thing has not stopped—I don’t know why—but as long as it doesn’t, I’m gonna run with it until the wheels come off. All these people are terrific musicians and it’s very easy for me to create top-notch music and that is what I was born to do—that’s my purpose in life. Michelle’s too good a singer to waste, so I asked her to be in both bands.

This Lighthouse Band has a real chemistry. All I did was notice it and say, “This is a joy and it creates stunningly good music.” And to be in one great band is a joy. To be in two of them is ridiculously lucky. It’s just exactly what I needed. It made me feel—I’m at the end of my life, the end of my creative career. I probably have a few years left. But when you get to this point, you look around and you say, “I’ve got a certain amount of time. How am I gonna spend it?” And the idea that I get to work with these two bands makes me feel like the luckiest guy in the world, man. Leaving CSN, that was like diving off a cliff. But I didn’t have any other choice. If I had stayed there—it was starting to make me feel unhappy with music and that’s a price I don’t want to pay. So I did have to leave there and I was very shaky and very worried about my future.

I felt like I was doing the right thing, but I was definitely nervous about it. To fall into something
as good as the Lighthouse Band and the Sky Trails Band—I’m the luckiest guy in the world.

LEAGUE: Since I met David, he just hasn’t stopped—hasn’t stopped creating or touring or writing music; he’s incredibly prolific. The dude’s possessed right now. And at this stage in his life, that’s a very rare thing. But from what Jan, his wife, has told me, when we met, he was just coming out of the opposite phase—not being super happy and not being super productive. Then, he just broke through this wall and, since then, the waters of inspiration have been flooding. Almost like he can’t get it on the page fast enough. It’s insane. It’s very special.

CLEAN ENERGY

CROSBY: The first time Michael and I got together, we wrote three songs in three days. I’ve never done that in my life. He’s an incredibly creative guy. He’s a guy that you want to be friends with—trust me. The first time I met [Becca and Michelle] was in New Orleans with Michael doing We Like It Here, the benefit record for musical education that they do every couple of years. It was definitely a first date. They knew who I was, they’d heard my music before, but what happened was a fresh thing. It wasn’t based on CSN or CSNY—my first solo album was the inspiration for the Lighthouse record in Michael’s mind. It just was a chemistry that happened.

You can’t deny it when you see it; you just have to go along with it. It’s too powerful. I have to paddle faster to keep up with them. You don’t want to be working with people who are planning to make money or planning to be famous or be a celebrity. That’s the wrong energy. You have to pick people who have a clean energy. When you do run into the right energy, when you run into people who want to create really good music, you’ve gotta treasure every second of it, man, and go for it as hard as you can. It’s just not a common thing. Snarky Puppy made me smile and I couldn’t hold still. I was having too much fun. And that’s when I fell in love with them.

I’m all about fun. I’ve got a Ph.D. in fun. I came up with a different way of doing “Woodstock” and I taught it to Becca; she played it better than I did and that’s become our new standard. The first time we did it, when we hit the chorus, the audience started applauding right in the middle of the song. We looked at each other and went, “Oh, boy, we got one now.” We couldn’t resist recording it for Here If You Listen. I don’t know what’s going to happen with Woodstock and the anniversary next year. Something silly will happen—they’ll try to do it again and, of course, you can’t do anything like that again. You can only do something new that you call by the same name.

LEAGUE: As a 34 year old, being around someone like David has completely altered my perspective on life. I imagine it is like living with your grandparents, where they know so much more than you. [Laughs.] Every mistake that you’re about to make in your life, they’ve made. With all that wisdom and all that knowledge comes a certain approach to living where you don’t take things for granted—you really savor and enjoy the important moments, especially emotional ones. Considering how many experiences David has had in his life, how many mistakes he’s made, how many great decisions he’s made and how much art he’s contributed to the world that’s changed the course of genres of music, it’s transformative.

His contribution to folk and folk-rock, and how much color he’s put into that music harmonically, is tremendous. So I definitely consider myself a different person after being with him all this time. You also see the fragility of someone who has gone through a lot in their life, and it makes you value every bite of food you take and every nice moment a little bit more in a different way.

TREMENDOUSLY TALENTED CHAPS

CROSBY: There aren’t a lot of them, but there are some people who are doing great work right now. I’m crazy about Chris Thile and Punch Brothers. I think they’re just absolutely, stunningly good. I’m crazy about I’m With Her. They just knock my ass in the dirt. They might be the best band in the country right now.

And there is Jason Isbell—he’s a good writer, man! He can write words! Listen to “If We Were Vampires” and if it doesn’t move you, I’ll give you $100. Drive-By Truckers threw him out and
I think they made a mistake. He’s a tremendously talented chap. Of course, he was a drunk, and now he’s sober. And that makes a huge difference. And so does Amanda Shires, his lady. She’s
a virtual powerhouse and a real aid in his life and in his music. I heard that Jason was doing “Ohio,” so I emailed him and said, “Listen, I think it’s really good that you’re singing ‘Ohio’ because that’s just exactly the song that needs to be sung these days. That is a song for our times.” So he said, “I wish you could come sing it with me at Newport Folk” and I said, “What time does the bus leave?”‘ And I went and we did “Wooden Ships” and “Ohio” and we tore it off.

This article originally appears in the December 2018 issue of Relix. For more features, interviews, album reviews and more, subscribe here.