Graham Nash – Now (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 38:40 minutes | 673 MB | Genre: Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BMG Rights Management (US) LLC

Long known as the steady diplomat who kept together the oft on-the-brink alliances of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young—until he couldn’t—Graham Nash sounds, at 81, feisty on his seventh solo album. There’s an edgy urgency to the music and his famous high tenor on the vibrant “Right Now.” “Now that I realize just how I am/ When all is said and done/ What a life I’ve lived … Here I am/ Still living my life/ Right now/ Right now!” he declares. And his life is not one of easy chairs. “Golden Idol” takes on the politicians who turned the other cheek in the Capitol insurrection of January 6, 2021. “I know they’re lying/ ‘Cause their lips are moving,” Nash sings. “They’re trying to rewrite recent history/ When the MAGA tourists took the hill/ They will not stand up/ ‘Cause they’re bought and paid for.” “Stars and Stripes” is jangling folk with excellent harmonies that finds Nash poking at the root of American divisiveness: “Sometimes I wonder why the world is like it is/ Frozen by the fear of change/ If we keep believing all the lies meant to divide us/ There’s no one else that we can blame.” And while he aims to keep moving forward, he’s not exactly looking to reinvent himself. “A Better Life” is imbued with that easy Laurel Canyon familiarity on which he made his bones in America. It almost feels like a follow-up to “Teach Your Children” told from the other side, with Nash singing, “We’re going to make it a better life/ Leave it for the kids … one we can be proud of/ So at the end of the day, we can laugh and say that we left them a better life.” Sweet and simple, “It Feels Like Home” is like an echo of “Our House.” It’s one of several songs written for his new wife of only a few years, along with “Love of Mine,” a bit of a heartbreaker with high and lonesome harmonica accompanying an apology for hurt feelings. Sharply bowed strings lead the way for “I Watched It All Come Down,” as the singer recalls, “I watched it all come down/ To a rock and roll parade … I watched it all come down/ To a paperweight at the business end of town/ Loaded up and loaded down/ It’s a mess.” Nash has said that the song is about the thrill of making music with David Crosby, Stephen Still, and Neil Young, but also sadness that they let emotions (and, let’s be honest, substances) get in the way of them making more. And looking fondly back on another part of his history is “Buddy’s Back,” a sweet tribute both to Buddy Holly—complete with a “Peggy Sue”-inspired riff—and his old pal in the Hollies, Allan Clarke. – Shelly Ridenour

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