Today marks the 40th anniversary of the release of Crosby, Stills & Nash‘s Daylight Again, the famed folk-rock trio’s third studio album.
Daylight Again featured two hit singles, “Wasted on the Way” and “Southern Cross,” which peaked at #9 and #18, respectively, on the Billboard Hot 100, while the album reached #8 on the Billboard 200.
The project began as duo collaboration between Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, but David Crosby, who had been struggling with drug issues at the time, was eventually brought in to make it a full-fledged CSN album.
“David was going through…a difficult time in his life, but we made the best record that we could at the time, absolutely,” Nash tells ABC Audio. “And I think it’s a fine piece of music.”
In Crosby’s absence, various other singers were brought in to fill out the tracks, including Art Garfunkel and Eagles bassist Timothy B. Schmit.
Nash says a musician who made particularly important contributions to Daylight Again was keyboardist and backing singer Mike Finnigan, who died of cancer in 2021.
“Mike Finnigan was our organ player for many, many years, and he…was a fantastic musician,” Graham notes. “A lot of Daylight Again was done with Michael singing with me and Stephen, that we replaced with David’s voice when David came back to health.”
Meanwhile, Nash explains that “Wasted on the Way,” which was CSN’s second-highest-charting single ever, was written about his feeling that he and his band mates could’ve made much more music together than they did.
“I understand that CSN and CSNY did a lot of really fine music, and I’m very proud of it all,” he says, adding with a laugh, “but once you play me a great song, I want more.”
Here’s Daylight Again‘s full track list:
“Turn Your Back on Love”
“Wasted on the Way”
“Southern Cross”
“Into the Darkness”
“Delta”
“Since I Met You”
“Too Much Love to Hide”
“Song for Susan”
“You Are Alive”
“Might as Well Have a Good Time”
“Daylight Again/Find the Cost of Freedom”
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