In 1977, Crosby, Stills & Nash had already spent several years releasing hit after hit. The supergroup, which started with David Crosby, Stephen Stills, and Graham Nash, had been releasing music since 1969, with their debut Crosby, Stills & Nash record. Neil Young joined from 1969 to 1970, making it Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, returning in 1973 and 1974, before leaving again for over a decade.
Undeterred, the three remaining members continued to release music. In 1977, Crosby, Stills & Nash released “Just A Song Before I Go”. It was the debut single from CSN, their third studio album, and the song was written solely by Nash.
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“Just A Song Before I Go” became the band’s highest-charting single, peaking at No. 5. The success of the song is a bit surprising, since Nash later admits he didn’t spend much time on “Just A Song Before I Go”, writing the entire song in about 15 minutes.
The Story Behind “Just A Song Before I Go” by Crosby, Stills & Nash
“Just A Song Before I Go” says, “Just a song before I go / To whom it may concern / Travelling twice the speed of sound / It’s easy to get burned / When the shows were over / We had to get back home / And when we opened up the door / I had to be alone.”
Not only did Nash write “Just A Song Before I Go” quickly, but he also wrote it in response to a dare.
“Graham was at home in Hawaii, about to go off on tour,” Crosby recalls. ”The guy who was going to take him to the airport said, ‘We’ve got 15 minutes. I’ll bet you can’t write a song in that amount of time.’ Well, you don’t smart off to Nash like that. He’ll do it. This is the result.”
According to Nash, the guy taking him to the airport bet him $500.
“I was at the home of a friend of mine, Spider was his name,” Nash remembers. “And as I got up to leave, he said, ‘You know what? You’re supposed to be a big-shot songwriter … I bet you can’t write a song before you go home.’ I said, ‘Really? You bet? How much do you bet?’ He said, ‘$500 you can’t write a song just before you leave.’”
Later, Nash said he still held onto the money he won in the bet.
“I still have his $500 because it was written on a bet, really,” Nash reveals. “It was the biggest single hit that CSN ever had, I believe. Like my friend Joe Wall says, ‘If I’d have known it was going to be such a big hit, I’d have written a better song.’”
Photo by Ed Perlstein/Redferns/Getty Images
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