Manassas is the 1972 debut double album by Manassas, a blues rock group led by American musician Stephen Stills, released April 1972. It was a critical comeback for Stills and continued his commercial success by being certified Gold only a month after being released and peaking at number 4 on the US charts.
Recording The album was recorded at Criteria Studio B late 1971, where Stills used his clout to keep the studio and engineers Ron and Howard Albert available around the clock. The band all stayed in a rented house about 30 minutes away from the studio, in Coconut Grove. This allowed Stills to record the album around the clock, waking up band members in the early hours of the morning when an idea struck. Stills would also record in mammoth sessions often going on for days, until Chris Hillman and Stills got into a fight, after which they started to record at regular hours. Al Perkins and Dallas Taylor had a rule where they would not perform any more than seven takes for a single track, so often Stills would stay in the studio editing after having released the band at 4 or 5 am. The band then flew to Stills' house in London in January 1972 to finish recording and mixing the album and to rehearse for an upcoming tour starting in March 1972. It was here that Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones played bass on and co-authored "The Love Gangster" and is reported to have said that he would have left the Stones to join Manassas. At one point Stills put in an unbroken 106 hour stint in the studio, and engineer Ron Albert said he had just got to bed after a marathon session lasting 84 hours when the phone rang with Stills summoning him back to the studio with the words: "I know you're tired, but there's this idea I've got for this song that I want to get on tape before I forget it..." Another time, working to Stills' manic schedule, the band cut eight tracks in two days with no sleep.
Songs The album was split into four thematic sides. Side 1, The Raven, is a composite of rock and Latin sounds that the group would often perform in full live exactly as presented on the album, including the segues that connected several of the songs. Side 2, The Wilderness, mainly centers on country and bluegrass, and features Chris Hillman on mandolin and fiddler Byron Berline. Side 3, Consider, presents a mix of musical styles, including "Johnny's Garden" (reportedly written for the caretaker at Stills' English manor house bought from Ringo Starr), and Stills using a Moog synthesizer on "Move Around". Side 4, Rock & Roll Is Here to Stay, features rock and blues songs, including "The Treasure", a mainstay of Manassas' live sets, and Stills' acoustic solo piece "Blues Man".
Several of the songs on the album are inspired by Stills' romantic relationship with Rita Coolidge, and Coolidge's leaving Stills for his CSNY bandmate Graham Nash. In particular, "Raven" was Stills' nickname for Coolidge,As also referenced in Stills' 1970 song "Sit Yourself Down" and David Crosby's 1971 song "Cowboy Movie". while "What to Do" and "Right Now" were written about CSNY's subsequent breakup and Stills' relationship with Nash.
Artwork and packaging The artwork was taken after Stills, a Civil War buff, had the band flown over to Manassas station in Manassas, Virginia, where the Confederacy had claimed its first major victory at the Battle of Bull Run. The photo they liked was the band standing on the platform under a Manassas sign, and so the band was named. Included with the album were fold-out posters with named pictures of all the members and hand-written lyrics on the back, including a message urging people to 'Use The Power, Register and Vote'.
Chart performance The album debuted on the Billboard Top LP's chart for the week ending April 29, 1972 and eventually peaked at No. 4 in June, during a 30-week run. Stills' album shared the top 5 with an album by David Crosby and Graham Nash (Graham Nash David Crosby) and an album by Neil Young (Harvest), all collectively members of the quartet Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. "It Doesn't Matter" was released as a single and peaked at No. 61, during a chart run of 7 weeks. "Rock & Roll Crazies" was released as the second single and peaked at No. 92 during a 3-week run. By 1974, it had sold an estimated 400,000 copies in the US, which is the equivalent of 800,000 as the album is a double.
Reception
Manassas marked a critical comeback for Stills, with AllMusic calling it a "sprawling masterpiece" and Rolling Stone saying it was "reassuring to know that Stills has some good music still inside him. Most of it has a substantial, honest sound found on too few records these days. All the sounds you hear come from the seven group members". Chris Hillman was singled out as an "importance in the success of Manassas and in the comeback of Stills, he can't be over-stressed [...] He's a masterful musician whether he's playing bass, guitar, or mandolin, and his boyishly pure, uncolored voice can carry a lot of emotional weight.". However, Robert Christgau rated the album C+ and in a mixed review stated "Yes, Steve has gotten it together a little, even deigning to cooperate with real musicians in a real band, and yes, some of this four-sided set echoes in your head after you play it a lot. The only problem is you're never sure where the echoes come from". In positive reviews, Record World called it "music of the highest order", Cash Box said it will "convince you of Stills' worth", and Billboard said it "offers loads of class material". In a June 1972 review for The San Diego Door, Cameron Crowe said "Manassas always remains admirable if not exciting. The musicianship is generally excellent with the only pitfall being that the droning Stills' vocal pervades all but one of the LP's sixteen cuts". He also stated the "lyrics represent a low-point in Stills' lyricist career". Chris Welch for Melody Maker said "The blues, soul, rock and country music are all the influences. They play them like the Grateful Dead, with a sincerity and ability that one does not always detect in the work of those exclusively involved in the original idiom".
Andrew Weiner for Creem said "Stills, perhaps the most maligned superstar in recent rock history, has finally - and against all the odds - got it on. And Stills has written too many good songs here even to try count them".
The album was certified Gold on May 30, 1972, just over a month after being released. Stills has stated the album did not receive the recognition it deserved due to Atlantic Records and Ahmet Ertegun (head of Atlantic Records) wanting him back in the "goldmine" that was Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Stills said that as soon as the album shipped gold, Ertegun pulled it, and people could not find it in stores.
The album was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.
It was voted number 735 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums 3rd Edition (2000).
Retrospectively, in 2022 the album was called a roots rock "landmark".
Track listing
Personnel Manassas Stephen Stills - vocals, guitar, bottleneck guitar, piano, organ, electric piano, clavinet, Moog synthesizer Chris Hillman - vocals, guitar, mandolin Al Perkins - pedal steel guitar, guitar, vocals Paul Harris - organ, tack piano, piano, electric piano, clavinet Dallas Taylor - drums Calvin "Fuzzy" Samuel - bass Joe Lala - congas, timbales/percussion, vocals Additional players Sydney George - harmonica (on "The Raven" and "The Wilderness") Jerry Aiello (on "The Raven" and "The Wilderness") - piano, organ, electric piano, clavinet Bill Wyman - bass (on "The Love Gangster" and "Rock & Roll Crazies") Roger Bush - acoustic bass (on "The Raven" and "The Wilderness") Byron Berline - fiddle Malcolm Cecil - Expanded Series III Moog synthesizer programming Technical The Albert Brothers - engineers Stephen Stills, Ira H. Wexler - cover design Ira H. Wexler - photography
Special thanks to Bruce Berry & Guillermo Giachetti, Daniel J. Campbell, Michael John Bowen, Michael O'Hara Garcia, Buddy P. Zoloth, Edward Astrin & Ahmet Ertegun
Charts
+Chart performance for ManassasChart (1972)Peak positionUS Billboard Top LPs4UK Album Charts30Canadian RPM 100 Albums9Dutch MegaCharts Albums1West German Media Control Albums34Norwegian VG-lista Albums6Australian Go-Set Top 20 Albums17Swedish Kvällstoppen Chart8US Cash Box Top 100 Albums6US Record World Album Chart4Chart (2013)Peak positionJapan Oricon Albums Charts292
+Sales chart performance for singles from ManassasYearSingleChartPosition1972"It Doesn't Matter"US Billboard Hot 10061Canada Top Singles (RPM) 48US Top Singles (Cash Box) 49US Top Singles (Record World) 46"Rock & Roll Crazies Medley"US Billboard Hot 10092US Top Singles (Cash Box) 111US Top Singles (Record World) 86 Year-end album charts Chart (1972)PositionUS Billboard Pop Albums53US Cash Box64Dutch MegaCharts Albums10
Certifications
Tour Manassas toured across the world in 1972, this being Stills biggest solo tour date, playing arenas in the Americas, and headlining festivals in Australia. After the initial Manassas tour from 9 April to 20 May. Manassas then completed five tours in six months, from July 14 to July 30 they toured the West Coast, the second tour from 11 to 28 August toured the East Coast, they then toured Europe and Scandinavia from September 13 to October 9. The fourth tour was a tour of Midwestern American Colleges, and finally the fifth tour was conducted in the South from December 1–19. During this tour Manassas had a charter plane and toured manically, but Stills was losing money on these tours as he was paying the band very generously. DateCityCountryVenueAttendance/NotesEurope Tour21 March 1972BremenGermanyBeat Club (German TV)22 March 1972AmsterdamNetherlandsConcertgebouw23 March 1972FrankfurtGermanyJahrhunderthalle25 March 1972LondonEnglandBig Beat Club26 March 1972ParisFranceL'OlympiaAustralia31 March 1972AlburyAustraliaRock Isle (Mulwala) FestivalHeadlined both nights1 April 19722 April 1972Rock Isle (Mulwala) FestivalDue to headline (Cancelled due to weather)US Tour9 April 1972HonoluluUnited StatesHIC Arena14 April 1972AuburnAuburn Memorial Coliseum15 April 1972JacksonMississippi Coliseum17 April 1972New OrleansMunicipal Auditorium19 April 1972Baton RougeAssembly Center21 April 1972GainesvilleFieldhouse22 April 1972DaniaPirates WorldSold Out23 April 1972TampaTampa Jai Alai FrontonProfessionally Recorded26 April 1972OxfordMississippi Colisseum28 April 1972St LouisKiel Auditorium29 April 1972PeoriaFieldhouse30 April 1972ChicagoArie Crown Theatre1 May 19722 May 1972New York CityCarnegie Hall4 May 19725 May 1972BostonBoston Garden7 May 1972UniondaleNassau Colisseum9 May 1972BuffaloBuffalo Memorial Auditorium12 May 1972PhiladelphiaThe Spectrum Theatre6,41013 May 1972WilliamsburgKaplan Arena15 May 1972AtlantaAlexander Memorial Coliseum18 May 1972San AntonioSan Antonio Municipal Auditorium19 May 1972HoustonHofheinz Pavilion20 May 1972DallasDallas Memorial AuditoriumWest Coast Tour8 July 1972MiamiUnited StatesMiami Jai-Alai FrontonDolphin Benefit, concert recorded John Sebastian, Fred Neil guest14 July 1972FresnoSelland Arena15 July 1972Las VegasLas Vegas Stadium16 July 1972Los AngelesHollywood BowlBryon Berline guests17 July 1972Santa BarbaraSanta Barbara County Bowl20 July 1972SacramentoSacramento Memorial Auditorium21 July 1972BerkeleyBerkeley Community TheatreSold Out Roger McGuinn, Neil Young