Pop music headlines from Las Vegas to London are hailing the return of acoustic music. Eric Clapton won umpteen Grammys for his acoustic "Unplugged." Neil Young and Rod Stewart are winning rave reviews for their acoustic albums.
All of which probably has Graham Nash and David Crosby chuckling in total disbelief. The return of acoustic music? These two acoustic troubadours have been playing to sold-out concert halls for almost 30 years.And making a pretty fair living at it, mind you.
Graham Nash and David Crosby (Stephen Stills, traditionally the third wheel in this trinity, is not part of this tour) returned to Utah, this time to the acoustically perfect Abravanel Hall - a setting that offered a rare opportunity to hear vocal harmonies in perhaps the finest setting imaginable.
And the result was, at times, absolutely stunning. From the opening "Military Madness" to the encores "Our House" and "Teach Your Children," the walls echoed with the sounds of transcendent splendor that sent shivers up and down the spine.
As CSN shows go, this was the finest in more than a decade. The duo was playfully loose and comfortable when bantering with the audience, yet when it came time to deliver tunes they were musically and vocally precise - more so than any time in memory. And they actually looked like they enjoyed playing music, that it was anything but a job to them.
That mentality (and the more acoustic bent to the overall concert) may have had a lot to do with the absence of Stills' sometimes disruptive personalty. Replacing him on lead guitar was Jeff Pevar, a virtual unknown who somehow managed to return to C&N's music what Stills had long ago lost: the emotional power of subtlety.
Pevar's guitar rarely dominated a song, but instead snaked its way effortlessly through tunes in such a way that complemented a David Crosby vocal or a Graham Nash piano. Yet when the time did come to solo, he proved himself a worthy master of the craft.
Most of Sunday night's show was of the golden chestnut variety. After opening the show with "Military Madness," Nash offered up a purely acoustic version of "Wasted on the Way," after which Crosby delivered a sensational "All Along the Leeshore."
Nash again took center stage for "Just a Song Before I Go," then gave the stage back to Crosby for a breathtaking cover of "Deja Vu." For the most part, Sunday's show featured both songwriters taking turns in the limelight, but always offering just the right touch of vocal or musical accompaniment.
One of the evening's best was Nash's "I Used to Be a King," from the classic "Songs for Beginners" LP, and "Cold Rain," about people stuck in dead-end jobs. Nash also unveiled a new song titled "Unequal Love," wherein he painfully observes ". . .the price you pay is the pain won't go away . . . when all the love you give won't come back at all." The crowd gave him a standing ovation.
While Nash may be the romantic half of the duo, Crosby is unquestionably the poet, as well as the sentimental favorite of the crowd who gave standing ovations for virtually every tune he played. Among his best were the powerful "Man in the Moon" and "Thousand Roads," the latter from a just-released solo LP.
Of course the duo played most of what the crowd expected them to: "Long Time Gone," "Marakesh Express," "Wooden Ships," "To the Last Whale," etc. But it wasn't so much what they played, it was how they played it. Powerfully. Emotionally. And with the conviction of artists who have rediscovered their first love.