“A must for CSNY fans.” —Kirkus Evaluations, starred review

The first ever biography focused on the formative and highly influential early years of “rock’s first supergroup” (Rolling Rock) Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young—when they were the most successful, influential, and politically potent band in America—in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of Woodstock and the forming of the band itself.

1969 to 1974 were true golden years of rock n’ roll, bookmarking a time of arguably unparalleled about CSNY: Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young musical power and innovation. But even more than some of their eminent peers, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash, and Neil Young channeled and broadcast all the radical anger, passionate idealism, and generational angst of their time. Each of the members had already made their marks in huge bands (The Hollies, Buffalo Springfield, The Byrds), but jointly, their harmonies were transcendent.

The vast psychological selection of their music, from delicate acoustic confessionals to raucous counter-culture anthems, was mirrored in the turbulence of their personal lives. Their trademark might have been vocal tranquility, but few—if any—of their contemporaries could match the recklessness of their hedonistic and often combative life-style, when the four tenacious, volatile, and prodigal songwriters pursued chemical substance and sexual joy to life-threatening extremes.

CSNY chronicles these 4 iconic musicians as well as the motion they found represent, concentrating on their leading as a collective unit and a cultural force: the years between 1969, when Woodstock telegraphed their arrival to the world, and 1974, when their arch-enemy Richard Nixon was driven from workplace, and the band (to quote Graham Nash himself) “shed it on the highway.”

Also fifty years afterwards, there are plenty of stories still left to be told about Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Small—and music historian Peter Doggett is here now to bring these to light in the meticulously researched CSNY, a quintessential and illuminative accounts of rock’s first supergroup in their fantastic hour for die-hard fans, nostalgic flower-children, and music background aficionados alike.