Graham Nash remains one of the hardest working men in rock. Nash, who published his latest photo book, A Life In Focus, yesterday (November 16th), spoke to Ultimate Classic Rock and revealed he's got a total of three new albums in the works.
Nash explained, “A couple years ago, I got a band together and did (1971's) Songs For Beginners from start to finish, then took an intermission and came back and did (1974's) Wild Tales start to finish. We recorded the four shows where we did those albums, and it’s coming out as a double live album in early 2022.”
Regarding his studio follow-up to 2016's critically lauded solo set, This Path Tonight, Nash said, “I’ve been recording remotely, which is really interesting — sending my acoustic guitar and rough vocal to my guitar player, Shane Fontayne, in Los Angeles; he puts guitar and bass on them, and then he sends it to my keyboard player, Todd Caldwell, who would put keyboards on. He would send it to his brother, who is a drummer, in Lubbock, Texas; he’d put the drums on and send it back to me, and I’d mix it. It’s been very interesting — we’ve done seven tracks that way.”
Graham Nash also updated fans on his and Hollies co-founder Allan Clarke's first joint album in their nearly-75-year friendship: “I’m also eight tracks into an album with Allan Clarke. I’ve been a friend of Allan’s since we were six years old. We started the Hollies together in December of 1962, and we’ve never made a record just the two of us. People are gonna be shocked at how well Allan is singing — don’t forget, he left the Hollies because he was having trouble with his throat and couldn’t hit those high notes anymore. For 20 years, he didn’t sing. And then to work on this project and hear him singing so well and writing songs so well, I’m very happy with it so far.”
Graham Nash finally devoting all of his time to solo projects coincided with the collapse of Crosby, Stills, & Nash — a situation Nash told us is far more liberating than heartbreaking: “It's phenomenally freeing. 'Cause, y'know, when you're in a band with David (Crosby), and Stephen (Stills), and Neil (Young), y'know, a lot of decisions have to be made and somebody likes something and somebody doesn't like something, and you wanna know, 'Can I sing this song? I've got a brand new song I wanna sing — do you mind?' I don't have to ask any of those questions. I'm concentrating on me. I concentrated on Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young for 45, 50 years — and now it's different.”