The 1965 song Graham Nash wants to sing before he dies: “Give him a call for me”
What Graham Nash experienced with Crosby, Stills, and Nash was so incredibly rare.
Of course, there are countless bands in the history books of rock and roll who feel like the perfect combination, as if they were almost put together through divine intervention. But there was something cosmic happening when the three members of this Laurel Canyon collective began singing together.
It’s even more astonishing when you think about the paths that got them together. Really, Crosby, Stills and Nash had no right to form a band. While they were long-haired rockers from the same liberal generation, they hailed from three separate corners of the Atlantic ocean and so their paths had a long and winding route to follow before crossing.
Maybe they never would have, if it wasn’t for Joni Mitchell, who, while dating Graham Nash, introduced him to her Laurel Canyon neighbours and ultimately sparked the moment that changed their careers forever.
“They were having dinner with Joni,” Nash remembered. “At one point, David goes: ‘Hey, Stephen, play Willy [Nash’s nickname] that song we were just doing’, and they were doing a song called ‘You Don’t Have to Cry’. I say: ‘It’s a great song – play it again’. They play it again. I say: ‘That’s really a great song -do me a favour and play it one more time’, and the third time I added my high harmony and the world fucking changed from that moment. And that’s what Joni was the only witness to.”
It all adds to the mythology and makes the sweet alchemy of their three-part harmonies all the better. They were a band who were meant to be together, and despite all of the personal differences they experienced, they were something of a perfect band.
But that’s clearly not enough for Nash. Despite being one third of the greatest harmony of all time, he still has one dying musical wish that, to his credit, would likely stop sitting in a garden with Stills and Crosby singing ‘You Don’t Have to Cry’.
When asked to pick his ultimate bucket list moment, he didn’t pine to relive that moment once more or be given an opportunity to be in the band one more time, and overcome the constant arguing. No, he focused his sights on one of the true greats, someone he never got to collaborate with but so deeply wished he could.
Your top bucket list item, Mr Nash? “Singing a two-part harmony on ‘Yesterday’ with one guitar with Paul McCartney. If anyone has Paul’s number, give him a call for me.”
Nash is still waiting, for his name hasn’t come up on Paul McCartney’s list when the iconic Beatle is putting together his special guests for any of the shows he plays. But Nash can keep on wishing, for he has enough musical credit in the bank to have his wish fulfilled by Macca. But if he never does, he can rest easy knowing that aside from that, he lived out the musical dream of most mortals and was a part of the greatest three-part harmony to ever do it.
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