In a 2000 interview, Collins recalled hearing the song for the first time: “ came up to where I was singing on the west coast one night and brought his guitar to the hotel and he sang me “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” the whole song. Devastated by the thought of a breakup, Stills wrote the song in response to his feelings. But in 1969, when she appeared in the New York Shakespeare Festival production of Peer GyntShe fell in love with co-star Stacy Keach, for whom she would eventually leave Stills. Collins and Stills first met in 1967 and were in a relationship for two years.

Notably, the song’s title is a pun on “Sweet Judy Blue Eyes,” with most of the lyrics describing Still’s thoughts on Collins and their upcoming breakup. At over seven minutes, it’s also one of her longer cuts. It’s a dynamic number with catchy guitar lines and some of the group’s best vocal melodies. Mimicking the form of a classical music suite – as an ordered set of pieces – it’s one of the stills and the band’s better tracks. Dotted with classic tracks like “Marrakesh Express” and “Wooden Ships,” it opens with the folk-rock masterpiece “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” a Stephen Stills number that references his former girlfriend, Judy Collins. However, due to the heights reached by the quartet, their work is often overlooked before Neil Young joined the herd.ĬSN only released one record before Neil Young joined them, the 1969s Crosby, Stills & Nash, which, like its successor, is widely hailed as one of the best albums of the decade. Before there was Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, there was Crosby, Stills and Nash, and together the trio laid the strong foundations that would sustain one of music’s ultimate supergroups.Īs a quartet, CSNY rose to become the ultimate counterculture act with their 1970 record.

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