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On the playing field of the music business, Stephen Stills is a triple threat, scoring with voice, guitar and lyrics. His soaring sandpaper vocals and his distinctive guitar stylings are immediately identifiable, and as a songwriter, he has penned such hits as "For What It's Worth (1966) and "Love The One Your With" (1970) of course the list goes on. While he has often taken side trips to explore his strengths as a solo performer, Stills has achieved his greatest recognition through extensive collaborations--many with him memorably sandwiched between two excellent journeymen singers by the names of Crosby and Nash. Born January 3, 1945, in Dallas, Texas, Stills cut his musical teeth in the early Sixties as a folkie at the University of Florida, New Orleans and Greenwich Village. He then moved to Los Angeles, where he co-founded-- with Richie Furay and Neil Young--The eclectic and influential mid -Sixties group Buffalo-Springfield. This musical powerhouse made its only Syracuse appearance in fall 1967 at the Le Moyne College Athletic Centre as part of a bill that included the Beach Boys, the Soul Survivors and the Strawberry Alarm Clock. After only one Top 10 Hit ("For What It's Worth") and modest commercial success, Buffalo Springfield disbanded due to personal and musical differences. Stills kept himself afloat in the musical mainstream with the 1968 Super Session album with Al Kooper and Mike Bloomfield, followed by a more lasting and successful David Crosby (formerly of the Byrds) and Gram Nash (then a member of the Hollies). Their first spontaneous musical collaboration, during a party at Joni Mitchell's Laurel Canyon home in Los Angeles, was described by Ellen Sander in the September 1969 Hit Parader magazine: "Crosby was preparing material for a solo album after having left the Byrds, Nash, still with the Hollies, was visiting, and Stills, after the break-up of Buffalo Springfield, had been sitting around and staring at the side of a mountain trying to decide what to do next between playing sessions. Goofing around in the California living room, they all began to play and sing together. And they loved it immediately and talked about making an album. It was going to be a hassle with each of them contracted to a different record company, so music wounderkid David Geffen, a 26 year old funk imp, was called in to move minds and signatures around to make it possible. NO small feat, mind you, but he did it and then some." Super Group and Solo That celebrated and constantly re-forming super group (sometimes joined by Neil Young) achieved almost instant success with its debut album and well- received performance at 1969's Woodstock Festival. Their follow-up album, Deja Vu (which included Joni Mitchell's celebratory song, "Woodstock"), found a similar acceptance, as did the group's live album, 4 Way Street. Still's released solo albums (Stephen Stills and Stephen Stills 2) in 1971 and 1972 and also piloted two albums with the group Manassas. The Stephen Stills LP spawned two Top 40 singles, "Love The One Your With" and "Sit Yourself Down." In 1976, Stills and Young formed a brief duo project that produced the album Long May You Run. Through the mid-Eighties and into the Nineties, Stills continued to lend his support to countless benefits. Along with Crosby and Nash, he performed at the Live Aid benefit in 1985, the Welcome Home concert for Vietnam veterans at RFK Stadium, and the Hengerthon for UNICEF and Children of the Americas. The band even appeared at the dismantling of the Berlin Wall to celebrate the liberation of those living behind the Iron Curtain. His most recent LP"Stills Alone" is an appropriately titled effort, focusing on the artist's distinctive solo stylings. A few tracks contain overdubs of Stills adding vocal harmony, percussion and electric guitar, but for the most part, Stills Alone presents the singer performing solo with his acoustic guitar. One of the strongest tracks, "Treetop Flyer," tells the story of a former military pilot, trained to fly low over the tree tops in Vietnam, who now uses his aviation skills to transport contraband. Melodically and lyrically, the song is simple, direct and offers no apologies as it gives a first-person account of a modern soldier of fortune working outside the law: "Well there's things I am and there's things I'm not/I'm a smuggler and I could get shot/I ain't going to die, I ain't going to get caught/You see I'm a flyin' fool and my aeroplane is just too hot." "Amazonia" another new Stills' composition, seductively utilises a lilting, Brazilian samba as it describes the complexities of trying to save the South American rain forests. With the folkish "Isn't It So," Stills tells of his appreciation for an abandoned love: "Now many years later/I finally see/How much she did love me/ She set me free." An unusual Stills arrangement combines two of his older tunes. "Do for the Others" and "Know You've Got To Run." with the traditional folk song of misfortune and hope, "The Blind Fiddler". Thoughtful Interpreter Stills also chooses some interesting songs by other artists for this solo effort. He moans a slow, soulful version of Fred Neil's "Everybody's Talkin'" and gives a similarly thoughtful interpretation to Lennon and McCartney's "In My Life." Perhaps more surprising is the presence of Bob Dylan's "Ballad of Hollis Brown," which details a failed farmer's descent into family murder and suicide. The plight of a poor. desperate man has rarely been portrayed with such a mix of compassion and horror. Over the course of his career, Stills has remained true to the Sixties' zeitgeist. From his recounting of social confrontations in "For What It's Worth" to his blend of environmental, personal and political material for his most recent solo album. Stills has built his reputation on hard -hitting songs that bring to light some of life's darker questions. But perhaps this was never more evident than in the earlier Stills composition "4+20," in which he laments "I grow weary from the torment, can there be no peace?/ And I find myself just wishing that my life would simply cease." Other, more upbeat looks at life and love include such Stills songs as "Uno Mundo," Rock'n'Roll Woman," "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" (written for Judy Collins), "Change Partners," "Love The One Your With" and the anthem, "Carry On".
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This Biography has been copied from the Vision Records web site. No alterations have been made.
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