Forgotten Favorites: Manassas
Some albums are just too good to let slip away beneath the sands of time, so each week Bill Melville pulls one out, dusts it off and offers it up for your renewed consideration ...
Stephen Stills usually gets accolades for his work with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills Nash & Young, but not for his third supergroup.
While Stills' solo albums were often uneven, Stills hits the motherlode with the self-titled double-album Manassas.
That this 1972 effort remains largely unexplored in the age of jam bands is downright baffling.
For the group Manassas, Stills brought together former Byrd/Flying Burrito Brother Chris Hillman, Dobro player Al Perkins, keyboardist Paul Harris, bassist Fuzzy Samuels, percussionist Joe Lala and ace session drummer Dallas Taylor into the fold.
Many of them previously appeared on Stephen Stills 2, but here they become a true band. And what a coming-out party they threw.
For sheer talent, it's hard to beat that lineup anywhere in the 1970s. While rarely spun today, Manassas is arguably Stills' masterpiece, a bold declaration for someone with his musical pedigree. The band creates the 1972 equivalent of the sonic leap Wilco would take two decades later with Being There. Few of the 21 tracks feel like filler.
While their past seem to predict a blues and folk-rock affair, Stills and Company embellishes it with country, Latin beats and the occasional bout of R&B funkiness.
Song of Love flexes its muscles quickly with organ and buzzing blues guitar chords.
Rock & Roll Crazies/Cuban Bluegrass veers into the Americana tone of the Band before delving it some Latin rhythms, which also round out the jam on Both of Us (Bound to Lose). They follow it with the sparse electric blues Jet Set (Sigh), which strikes a skillful contrast.
Anyway brings all that instrumental prowess in an amazingly smooth fashion - these professionals never get in each other's way.
Fallen Eagle soars through Appalachia; it brings the politics rooted in CSN, but this song could have been hatched a century earlier in some West Virginia coal-mining town.
Jesus Gave Love Away for Free has a gentle Burrito Brothers vibe that nonetheless remains the province of Manassas.
For Hide It So Deep, he turns lost-love country ballad conventions on their ears, thanks to a crack honky-tonk arrangement with Hillman's delicate mandolin tremolo. Don't Look at My Shadow restores some rock to the country; it's a front porch jam for the ages, with pitch-perfect harmonies and Perkins' guiding Dobro.
Colorado is one of Stills' best, propelled by a wall of acoustic guitars, piano and Dobro. There are no thematic or instrument diversions, just harmonies adrift on a sweet melody.
On It Doesn't Matter, Stills and Hillman share the vocal and songwriting duties with tremendous effect. One of rock's most criminally underrated talents, Hillman shows his musical prowess. At first it recalls Long Time Gone, but rapidly evolves into a beast of Manassas' own creation.
But the peaks of Colorado don't come close to Johnny's Garden, the gentle ballad
Stills adds a wah-wah to the funk of The Love Gangster, which really takes off thanks to a Bill Wyman bass line (Wyman was willing to quit the Rolling Stones if asked to join Manassas, or so the story goes).
What to Do is anthemic, Seventies stadium rock that segues back to Still's acoustic guitar and gruff voice. Somehow, it makes a fiddle break before the final chorus feel wholly organic.
The hard-driving Right Now has a fierce Latin groove made for 20-minute concert jams. It wouldn't take much tinkering to extend Treasure (Take One) into a sprawling jam - every member gets their due in this 8-minute epic.
Despite all those instrumental excursions, Manassas winds down quietly, with Stills and a guitar on Blues Man.
That's the real genius of Manassas. I don't like to throw "genius" around, but the Manassas lineup and the songwriting mesh seamlessly.
What could have turned into a clash of egos becomes rock gold for the ages.
Got memories of your own from this hidden gem? Share them in the comments section below ...
What great album this is!
It is one for any season, but I always think of summer when I play it.
This album has no bad songs on it, seriously.
"Johnny's Garden" is one my favorites and one that always made me wonder "what the hell is he talking about?", really! ... John Lennon's garden? ... perhaps?
Also, "(Both Of Us) Bound to Lose" and "Song Of Love" are cream-of-the-crop Stills....
My favorite is the last song on side 4....that is if you have the vinyl... which is "Blues Man".
It is a perfect end to a great collection of songwriting genius and band-collaborative jamming I don't think Stills has ever equaled, exceeded, or duplicated since...
Another must have golden chestnut collection in the encyclopedia of any serious music lover.
Posted by: David S. Owen | January 11, 2009 at 06:20 PM
Undeniably one of Still's best works and one of most unrated albums of the 70's. I saw Manassas live in South Bend in 1973. At the time I didn't appreciate the talent on stage that night. It did motivate me to buy a guitar and ultimately play in a band many moons later. That's when I learned to appreciate the talent on this album. I saw Stills with CSN a couple of times, but he never exceeded the energy and versatility of Manassas.
Posted by: Lew Little | April 29, 2009 at 06:57 PM