Rockphiles Blog: STEPHEN STILLS - Sheffield City Hall, October 18

Rockphiles' roving reporter Paul Neve recently attended Stephen Stills' concert in Sheffield. Stephen is on the tag end of a series of European dates. He turned in the following review.

"I was disappointed to see that the upper balcony was completely empty and that the lower balcony was only half full. The audience, which I estimated at no more that 1400, largely comprised the expected mix of 50-somethings, one sporting the obligatory Hawaiian shirt, several promoting vintage CSNY wear, but first prize must surely go to the guy in the plain white tee with the words Barack’n (roll) written neatly in black!

At 7:45pm Stephen and his band took to the stage. The guitar tech brought out his white and gold Gretsch Country Gentleman double cutaway and they launched into Helplessly Hoping. Stephen’s vocals were weak on this as I mentally compared it to his much younger Youtube version I had watched only a few hours earlier at home, so I felt extremely anxious that this was going to be a disaster. As it turned out, my fears proved groundless and for the rest of the evening his voice was faultless.

The other band members then left the stage, together with the Gretsch, to leave Stephen alone on stage, attired formally in a dark suit and polo shirt singing a range of acoustic songs played on at least three different Martin guitars. Boy, can he make those guitars sing! The tonal quality of this masterpiece has to be seen and heard live to be believed.

He wasn’t particularly effusive with the audience and tended to rattle off his acoustic set numbers one after the other. He introduced Treetop Flyer, clearly one of his favourites, as “Friends of David Crosby and runners of weed across the border from Mexico before Americans had learned how to grow it themselves! “ Dylan’s North Country Girl was performed with real feeling after which he remarked that he had done “something nasty” to his finger nail. He then wryly commented that he had considered retitling 4 + 20 to 3 + 60, to reflect his age, and he had “great difficulty singing this song, these days, with a straight face!”

Before playing Johnny’s Garden, we learned that he had lived in southern England for 5 years in a house with a big garden (actually Ringo Starr’s former 14-bedroom country house in Surrey). As the lyrics suggest, he noted these were the “happiest times of his life.”

After introducing Suite Judy Blue Eyes as a “step into the abyss,” he launched into a blistering Latin arrangement before being joined on stage by the rest of the band for the final chorus. His “See you in 20 minutes and we’ll do some rock ‘n roll, “ended the first set at about 8:30pm. He was a little subdued when he left. Perhaps his finger hurt, or maybe he was just disappointed that the house was smaller than anticipated.

True to his word, he returned with the rest of the band, this time dressed casually in jeans and a suede jacket and armed with the first of his two Strats. Isn’t it About Time was a bit too loud and heavy on the tremelo but at least it set the mood for the all-electric second set. The Buffalo Springfield’s Rock ‘n Roll Woman was outstanding and my personal favourite track of this set. His take on Tom Petty’s The Wrong Thing To Do was good also.

Wounded World, a songwriting collaboration with Graham Nash, to memorialize children leaving home to go to college, morphed into a version of Rocky Mountain Way that Joe Walsh would have been proud of!

At this point, off came Stephen’s jacket and he launched into Latin-flavored Make Love To You which featured a keyboard solo from Todd Caldwell. This was followed by Buffalo Springfield classics Bluebird, and protest anthem For What It’s Worth, the final song in the set, and the song for which Stephen Stills will likely be best-remembered. Both were blistering renditions and the audience gave the band a well-deserved standing ovation.

Before commencing the anticipated encore of Love The One You're With, he introduced the band – long-time sidekick Joe Vitale on drums and percussion (an effortless octopus all evening who made it look so easy!), as well as Todd Caldwell on keyboards and Kenny Passarelli on bass.

As other reviewers have noted, there seemed to be something missing, but I’m glad I went. Stephen has a melancholic air, but perhaps he always did. He can still sing and play well but, though he longs to be free and probably hates his legacy as the guitarist with CSN (and his Springfield compatriot Y), to me and many others, that’s who he is. I know this was the Stephen Stills Show but I missed the trademark vocal and guitar harmonies from other band members. I think it’s another case of the whole group being more important than the sum of its parts. Commercial success and artistic preference do not always go hand in hand so if CSN (and Y) ever re-assembles anywhere, any time, (and provided I win the lottery!) I’ll be on the next plane!"

[Editor’s note: For what it’s worth, I’m hoping for the Springfield reunion – they’re all still with us. Stephen was part of that before he was part of CSN. Probably as likely to happen as a Hollies reunion, or a Byrds reunion.]

Acoustic Set List

Helplessly Hoping; Treetop Flyer; North Country Gir;l Change Partners;4 + 20;The Blind Fiddler; Johnny’s Garden; Daylight Again/Find The Cost Of Freedom; Suite Judy Blue Eyes

Electric Set List

Isn’t It About Time; Rock And Roll Woman; The Wrong Thing To Do; Wounded World/Rocky Mountain Way; Want To Make Love To You; Bluebird; For What It’s Worth

Encore:

Love The One You’re With

More info here at Stephen's official site.