About 40 years back, making music on Geffen Records, I got sued by that company. The reason I was sued was because i was making records that were different from what they wanted. ‘Unrepresentative and uncharacteristic’ was the phrase they used in the suit. I wished I was still on Reprise.
I had just made ‘TRANS’- original vocoder driven songs, inspired by my son Ben and those like him who were non-verbal, in September and October of 1981, and was sitting on it. I was digesting what I had done and how to present it.
Then I recorded ‘ISLAND IN THE SUN’ in Hawaii during May of 1982. Hearing it, Geffen Records insisted I add more rock songs. I still regret adding original Trans vocoder driven songs to Island in the Sun and calling that TRANS. TRANS should have remained untouched. It was the first time a record company had screwed with my creative process and it pissed me off. i never should have acquiesced. Reprise never did that to me and never has in the forty years since I came back to them.
I then went on to record during early 1983 at House of David Studios in Nashville and then Broken Arrow Ranch studio. That was the beginning of recording OLD WAYS, which I was then sitting on, incomplete.
In April and May of 83 I recorded EVERYBODY’S ROCKIN’ at Broken Arrow Ranch. That album was released in July of 1983 on Geffen Records.
In August 1983 I recorded the original ‘I Got a Problem’, later to appear with overdubs on LANDING ON WATER. Shortly after that, in NYC, I was ready to record ‘Don’t Take Your Love Away From Me’, a blues influenced ballad I had recently written. Surprisingly, Geffen Records cancelled the session that I had booked for that song. I had never had a session cancelled on me in my life. It was the right moment to record. I was ready for the song, had the right band, when Geffen Records turned on me, cancelling the session. That was a first.
Shortly following that, on Dec 1 1983, I was sued by Geffen Records for not sounding like ‘Neil Young’. The suit charged me with recording “uncharacteristic and unrepresentative” albums.
At the beginning of 1984, back at Broken Arrow Ranch, I began recording HARD LUCK STORIES, an album made on synthesizer and Computer drum, with me singing all the parts. That became an unreleased record with four songs, Razer love, Your love, Hard Luck Stories and If You Got Love, although some of those songs would later appear in other records.
In February, Crazy Horse played live at the Catalyst, which became a funky live video called TOUCH THE NIGHT, audio released in NYA Volume 3 as CD 9b, film released in Volume 3 Blu Ray disc 3a, titled CRAZY HORSE AT THE CATALYST.
Mid 1984 I continued at the ranch with the Harvesters trying to finish OLD WAYS, recording in the Harvest Barn unsuccessfully. I continued playing on the road with the International Harvesters at Austin City Limits, where we captured ‘California Sunset’ for OLD WAYS and then ‘Gilley’s’ a few days later, a complete recording which is now available on the NYA timeline.
In January 1985, I was back at Broken Arrow with David Briggs and we recorded Daughters, a kind of country folk rock song, the kind many people associate with me.
Then the Harvesters went on the road in Australia playing a lot of country. We came back in April 1985 to record in Nashville at The Castle in Franklin, to finish OLD WAYS. We recorded seven more songs to complete OLD WAYS, released on Geffen records in August of 1985.
The other songs I recorded at The Castle during that time comprise an unreleased album I now call ‘TENNESSEE’ - a great record of Country music, made with studio players from Nashville and produced by David Briggs and Ben Keith. It also includes Daughters, from the ranch, and ’Interstate’ recorded live at the Knight Center in Miami. I hope that album, with its many unreleased tracks will be released this year.
At the end of 85 and beginning of 1986, I was in LA recording LANDING ON WATER, my last Geffen Records release. And then I was free.
Returning to Reprise Records, I soon began recording with the BueNotes, a great band which I loved. Uncharacteristic?