"Ohio" Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young | CME Full Band Fridays

This Full Band Friday, the CME House Band plays one for our fellow third coasters, “Ohio,” written by Neil Young and released as a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young single in the spring of 1970.

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About the song:
"Ohio" is a protest song and counterculture anthem written and composed by Neil Young in reaction to the Kent State shootings of May 4, 1970, and performed by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. It was released as a single, backed with Stephen Stills's "Find the Cost of Freedom", peaking at number 14 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number 16 in Canada. Although a live version of "Ohio" was included on the group's 1971 double album 4 Way Street, the studio versions of both songs did not appear on an LP until the group's compilation So Far was released in 1974. The song also appeared on the Neil Young compilation albums Decade, released in 1977, and Greatest Hits, released in 2004.

Young wrote the lyrics to "Ohio" after seeing the photos of the incident in Life Magazine. On the evening that the group entered Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles, the song had already been rehearsed, and the quartet—with their new rhythm section of Calvin Samuels and Johnny Barbata—recorded it live in just a few takes. During the same session, they recorded the single's equally direct b-side, Stephen Stills's ode to the war's dead, "Find the Cost of Freedom."

The record was mastered with the participation of the four principals, rush-released by Atlantic and heard on the radio with only a few weeks' delay (this was despite the group already having their hit song "Teach Your Children" on the charts at the time). In his liner notes for the song on the Decade retrospective, Young termed the Kent State incident as 'probably the biggest lesson ever learned at an American place of learning' and reported that "David Crosby cried when we finished this take." In the fade, Crosby's voice—with a tone evocative of keening—can be heard with the words "Four!", "Why?" and "How many more?". According to the liner notes in Greatest Hits, it was recorded by Bill Halverson on May 21, 1970, at Record Plant Studio 3 in Hollywood.

After the single's release, it was banned from some AM radio stations including in the state of Ohio, because of the challenge to the Nixon Administration but received airplay on underground FM stations in larger cities and college towns. Today, the song receives regular airplay on classic rock stations. The song was selected as the 395th Greatest Song of All Time by Rolling Stone in 2010. In 2009, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

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Gear Used:
Epiphone Rivoli Bass Sunburst 1966 - https://bit.ly/3BisHOy
Ludwig Classic Maple Drum Kit Vintage Blue Oyster: https://bit.ly/3in4JL5
Epiphone Casino Sunburst 1962 - https://bit.ly/3Dne4M0
Fender Tonemaster Deluxe Reverb Combo: https://bit.ly/3EYOwWa
1973 Gretsch 7595 White Falcon Stereo: https://bit.ly/3Dez3AE
Gibson GA-30RVS Goldtone 1999 - https://bit.ly/3Dl1ih6

Featuring:
Sam Porter
Nathaniel Murphy
Joseph Soldati
John Paul Moser

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Lyrics:
Tin soldiers and Nixon's coming
We're finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio
Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?
Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?
Tin soldiers and Nixon's coming
We're finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio
Four dead in Ohio (four dead)
Four dead in Ohio (four)
Four dead in Ohio
Four dead in Ohio (how many more?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (oh)
Four dead in Ohio (oh)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio (why?)
Four dead in Ohio