Manassas

This was really fun to listen to. A bit much to take in at once, but nice nonetheless. Feels like listening to a lot of extra Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young material without the vocal harmonies. There's a bit more focus on groove here, some funky guitar playing, longer jams and influences from Louisiana Rhythm & Blues. The songs all had this semi ''outtake'' feel to them, which was explained by the way in which this album came to be. Stephen Stills is a real workaholic and eventually he was only allowed to do a few takes per song.

Don’t know why I never listened to Stills more. This is a really solid country-rock album from the heart of that era. Stills + Byrds vet Hillman rip it up here - the best stuff is the close harmonies and gentle pretty country stuff, but they veer into wah-wah blues rock and some slide-guitar ABBesque stuff too and it’s actually pretty good. Then there’s some acoustic folky stuff that’s a bit more boring. Nothing groundbreaking, but I wanted to add almost every song to my country-rock playlist, just to fill it out. Extremely dad core easy going stuff.

So long. so little going on

It’s amazing that a man who has spent so much of his life in proximity of Neil Young could never learn a thing or two about writing good songs.

So. Very. Bland.

This Stephen Stills album has a lovely vibe, and is very listenable, but if I was to be harsh I’d say it sounds like Neil Young if he had no hits. To Stills’ credit, I enjoyed every moment but even with a killer sound, over the course of 71 minutes, it would have helped if at some point it coalesced into a straightforward single. There are weirder and wilder moments where you feel in a slightly more dangerous and exciting territory, but it never fully commits to this either.

Blues rock that is better than what typically shows up on this list. Some variety and interesting mix ups. 3/5

It’s not the kind of thing I’d ever reach for, but I enjoyed my time with this. He’s a very good musician, and you can’t deny the musicality is on-point throughout. There’s some real nice guitar in here, some really great grooves, and some nice keys. I’m much less into the country stuff.

I was expecting the worst. Over an hour of country music. But I actually quite liked the album. I probably won't listen to it again, but it wasn't hard to listen to either. 3/5

Side 1: I'm grooving. The transitions between songs are crazy good.
Side 2: Sneaky switch into Country, but it's really not too bad.
Side 3: Back to grooving and there's some cool space synth action happening.
Side 4: Grooving harder -- they are playing their ass off and completely win me over with Treasure - Take One. I'm a sucker for longer instrumental joints.

I do see the vision behind the 4-side concept, and I think it's part of why even the Country one worked for me. There's a real sense of progression throughout these parts, with each of their respective sounds evolving and merging together towards the end.

Although I'm unsure of how often I'll come back to it, there's so much cool stuff happening that I can't help but bump it up to 4. Unexpectedly great.

Standouts: Jet Set (Sigh) • How Far • Move Around • Right Now • Treasure - Take One

Ein ambitioniertes Doppelalbum, das Stills’ Vielseitigkeit zwischen Country, Rock, Folk und Latin zeigt. Die Band spielt tight, die Produktion ist warm, doch nicht jeder Song zündet. Ein spannender musikalischer Flickenteppich – manchmal etwas zu ausufernd, aber definitiv hörenswert.

The problem with Spotify is that it ploughs through all the tracks on an album, one after the other, with no consideration for the natural breaks that were designed into a vinyl record.
Hence I was really enjoying this...and then it suddenly changed and I wasn't ... and then it changed back and I was again.

On second listen and after some research, I discovered that the album is split into 'themes'. So you get a natural break when you get up to turn a record over.
I sadly also confirmed that I really can't abide more than about 3 minutes of bluegrass at a time.
If I was a record executive in 1972, then my advice to Mr Stills would be ...keep sides 1 and 4 for a single album, release side 3 as an EP, and just dump side 2 on a bonfire.

In summary, I'd have given this a 5 but side 2 spoiled it.

Yet another enjoyable album. It's a tad too long, like most double albums, it'd be better with some editing.

Passable country

Anything CSNY (or its components thereof) has so far been pretty mid for me. Not bad, but doesn't do it for me. 2*
Highlights: the end of jet set

More blues rock. COUNTRY blues rock, at that. Not that it's actually bad, I'm just burnt out on the genre. Everyone complains about britpop being overrepresented on the list, for me its blues rock.

It's very hit and miss for me. Some great folk rock tunes like Both of Us (Bound to Lose), It Doesn't Matter, and Colorado, but then there's country stuff like Hide It So Deep, Don't Look At My Shadow, or Jesus Gave Love Away For Free or blues tracks like Jet Set (Sigh) that just do nothing do it for me. Really its the country and blues tracks that let this album down for me, the folk rock stuff is great. Once in a while you'll get a song thats a bit too close to Grateful Dead like How Far, but still.

Overall, good album, I'm just burning out on blues rock type stuff.

I miss Crosby, Nash, and sometimes Young. This is pleasant to listen to, but I don’t remember most of it. Side 4 was pretty good and I liked Colorado, but I don’t see myself returning to the vast majority of these tracks.

This is so not my kind of thing. I hate CSN/CSNY and can't really think of a reason to listen to Buffalo Springfield. And the whole southern/country/rock blending, it's just not for me. I mean there is some good instrumentation and particularly some good guitar parts on this record but for some reason it just doesn't click with me. Maybe because it just sounds so much like a product of it's time. I don't think that's a necessarily bad thing, but it doesn't really seem to have anything new or different to offer. I liked a song here and there from this album but wouldn't seek it out or play it again in full. I found myself hoping it was almost over only to look and see that I wasn't even halfway through. 2.5/5 and rounding down because even though there were some great sounding guitars here and there, I was bored of it much too quickly.

Great discovery for me!

I’m at a 5.

Just like “Something/Anything?” by Todd Rundgren, this album also has 4 individually titled sides, each with their own particular vibe, and just like that album, I split this into 4 miniature albums. Once again, it really worked.

Side 1, taking up the first 5 tracks, is titled “The Eagle”, and it’s rad as hell – sort of an “Americana bossa nova” vibe to the whole thing, blending the 70s rock sensibilities of bands like Chicago or Boston with a little bit of Afro-Cuban percussion and riffs. Not a single miss there – just 17 minutes of pure jams that clicked really, really nicely for me. It’s a stellar start to the album.

Side 2, taking up tracks 6-11, is titled “The Wilderness”. It’s a REALLY nice set of country music tracks, with a bluegrass lean that really appeals to my sensibilities. Great fiddle solos, excellent use of the steel guitar, some lovely texturing by the piano, & some really nice lyrics throughout to create some vivid midwestern imagery. The only vague knock I have is that Stephen Stills doesn’t have the full country twang that some of his contemporaries have, but he sounds great regardless. I deeply enjoyed it; special shoutout to “Don’t Look at My Shadow”, which has a perfect finish to the entire side / first half of the album.

Side 3, tracks 12-17, is titled “Consider”, which doesn’t really have a specific theme, but it’s just a great variety set. I really liked it – lots of bouncing around between genres & styles of rock, jumping around from influence to influence. “It Doesn’t Matter” feels a lot like a Byrds track, “Bound to Fall” feels like a Beatles cut (sort of White Album-y?), “How Far” feels a lot like Simon & Garfunkel, “Move Around” feels sort of like a David Bowie track, & “The Love Gangster” has a bit of Jimi Hendrix in it that really pulls the funk together. It’s a super fun set of tracks, and it might be my highlight of the whole album.

Side 4, tracks 18-21, is titled “Rock & Roll Is Here To Stay” – I was in the zen state for a lot of it, so my analysis won’t be as fruitful, but I liked it a lot. Certainly a rock-driven side, & even though there’s a bit of a homogeneity that emerges after leaving the zen state, it’s really enjoyable in the moment. There’s some great percussion patterns, some really smooth guitar melodies, vocals that glide kinda like silk, and some really nice solos that carry a good chunk of each track. “Blues Man” is a lovely tribute to Jimi Hendrix, Al Wilson & Duane Allman, who all happened to die in 1970 & 1971, all in their 20s. It’s a strong way to end a side called “Rock & Roll Is Here To Stay,” and a solid way to end the entire album. In a weird way, this might be my least favorite side, but only because I didn’t feel like I was as engaged by the content of the tracks, and more so mesmerized & sucked in by their soundscapes and vibes. It’s still a really good set of tracks, though.

As a whole album, there’s really not a single miss here. This is weighed down a bit by its length, so I understand why this has a 3, but for my money’s worth, Stephen Stills has proven himself a very, very, very capable artist outside of the vague mythos of CSNY. Obviously, this is “Manassas”, but it’s a band Stephen Stills put together to act as a backing band to perform tracks he wrote entirely by himself. It’s listed on Spotify as a solo Stephen Stills album, & that’s honestly kind of fair. I’d be remiss not to give an incredible amount of credit to that backing band though – they killed the instrumentals on almost every track here. The songwriting isn’t as sharp as the sharpest stuff on the CSN/Y albums we’ve gotten, but it’s certainly not dull. When it clicks in the most vivid ways, it really clicks, especially so on Side 3.

It’s a shorter double album, thankfully sitting at just 74 minutes, but if you treat it like 4 mini-albums of around 18 minutes each, it’s a really fruitful set of tracks with a wide variety of styles & soundscapes that never really manages to miss. As a whole, this feels like it’s gone underappreciated in the larger canon of 1970s rock, & that’s kind of a shame. I really, really liked it, & I think it’s worth giving a 5. I’m very glad it’s on the list. Good on you, Stephen Stills (& all the other people you credited on the cover that I’m too lazy to type out).

Urgh, a double album by the most annoying member of The Byrds? Oh wait, its by his other band Manassas but he's such a fragile ego it gets billed as him only....

Too long, too rambling, too indulgent, too little drugs (on my side) and, simultaneously, too many drugs (on their side)