STEPHEN STILLS

Author: Joe Smith
Journal: OFF THE RECORD, An Oral History of Popular Music
Date: 1988 (Warner Bros. Books)

A veteran of Buffalo Springfield, Crosby, Stills and Nash, and a number of solo appearances and records, he's a great guitarist and a charismatic player in the golden age of rock 'n' roll.

I have some marvelous tapes sitting in a box of me and Jimi Hendrix - waiting to find out exactly who is in charge, so I can get permission to finish them the way we intended.

We got to be good friends. I'm a southern boy who was taught to play music by the same people who taught him. We wound up being in England at the same time. In England I was called a "gray" because I had some soul, and I ate at the best soul food restaurants, and I was a part of the black community.

Jimi had a hard time relating to anyone, but he could talk to me. We formed a deep bond. We would play clubs. I would play bass or rhythm guitar, and he would play lead guitar. I sort of followed him around like a little puppy dog waiting to learn how to play guitar. He always thought that was silly because he was actually learning acoustic guitar from me. But he was so shy, so impossibly shy. If you weren't playing real close attention, you would swear he didn't like anybody.

But I was a good rhythm guitar player, and I could sit there and play idiot guitar all day, and all the while Jimi was teaching me how to play lead.

Neil Young and I had a similar approach to folk music as it related to rock 'n' roll, and in Buffalo Springfield Neil and I would imitate each other on guitar the way Jimi and I imitated each other on guitar.

Buffalo was a happy band. However, when we got to our first session and we went into the studio and cut this one song, the voice came over the talk-back saying, "No, that's too long. Play it faster."

Neil and I looked at each other and said, "We better learn how to work this shit ourselves.'' So from then on, it was a race to see who could learn the most about making records, about electronics and engineering, the whole nine yards. He worked on one aspect, I worked on another aspect, and Ahmet Ertegun was there to finance the studio time.

But the band lasted for such a short time. I remember we were headed back east to do the Johnny Carson show, the first rock 'n' roll band to be on the Carson show, and Neil quits the night before we're supposed to leave. We fell prey to the whole entourage system. Everybody had to have his own entourage, and it got stupid. We forgot the initial brotherhood.

I remember David Crosby and I doing a concert for one of the free clinics. The Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, and God knows who else was there, and we all ended up at Alan Pariser's house. I will never forget the conversation. We were all sitting around and I said, "You know, we ought to do one of those things with a whole bunch of new rock bands."

And Alan looks at me and says, "Where would you do it?"

And I say, "Oh, where they hold that jazz festival, in Monterey."

He says, "That's interesting," and we continue to party. The next day he calls me up and says, "Will you come and talk to Ben Shapiro?" I walk into this little place in Hollywood and Alan says, "Tell him what you told me the other night."

So I say, "I think there should be a pop-rock festival up in Monterey.

And Ben says, "Who would you have?"

So I rattle off some names, and I say, 'Who knows where it can go? I could be just like that damn jazz festival, or the other one in Newport."

They say, "We'll get back to you." Two weeks later. I'm in the office begging Andrew Oldham for a spot on the bill. We get to Monterey and Lou Adler is telling me maybe we'll get to play on Saturday night. But Neil's not in the group, so I get David Crosby to come and sit in with the band so at least there's somebody sitting in, and probably that was the only way that Buffalo Springfield, which was this unimportant little band, could get a spot on the bill. After the band split up, I got myself a little place in Topanga and tried to keep my associations open, keep the door open. I was invited to join Blood, Sweat and Tears, but the thing with David and Graham Nash was just starting to pull together.

There was a time when I thought Crosby, Stills and Nash could rule the world. But I never said we could save it. I just said, "There's something happening here " I suppose I just tried to keep things open-ended. I tried to do what I was doing in the best spirit of the troubadours.