Stephen Stills and Manassas

Manassas - Pieces

When I saw this was coming out I was worried that it might be just a cash-in best-of masquerading as something special. Well, it is something special. Pieces is a collection of all the little bits of Manassas that somehow never made it onto the two records they did release in their short, legendary career. Riding high on Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's incredible success and the platinum sales of his first two solo albums, Stephen Stills was looking for a less pressurized outlet for his prodigious talent. He found it in former Byrd/Burrito Brother Chris Hillman who acted as a non-threatening yang to his fiery yin. Forging a sound that would be predictor of all country-rock to follow, they beautifully melded Country, Rock, Latin and Soul into great vehicles for Stills' vocals and songwriting. There are songs that were left off their groundbreaking first album, "Witching Hour" and "Like A Fox" (with a vocal by Bonnie Raitt), a bunch of songs left off their second album (which might have changed the way it was received), some loose studio jamming (the instrumental "Tan Sola Y Triste" or Stills' fun "Sugar Babe",) a few gorgeous Stills solo rarities ("My Love Is A Gentle Thing," "Word Game" and "I Am My Brother,") and most significantly a session from the birth of Manassas, when Burrito Brothers including fiddle master Byron Berline run through a series of classic bluegrass songs that totally shows off another side of Stills. To hear them barnstorming their way through tunes like "Uncle Pen" and "Dim Lights, Thick Smoke (and loud loud music)" is really an eye-opening joy. This is sort of the Holy Grail of great 70’s rock. It may not be as amazing as their debut, but there is lots of very substantive stuff to dig into here.
Paul Epstein

On September 22, 2009, Stephen Stills, singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist will release "Manassas - Pieces", a 15-song collection of outtakes and rarities.

"The bits and pieces we were silly enough to leave off", Stills writes in the liner notes. Manassas, the country rock band he formed in 1971 with Chris Hillman of the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers, released two albums: a self-titled two-disc set in 1972 and "Down the Road" in 1973.

"Pieces" includes alternate versions of two "Down the Road" songs, "Do You Remember the Americans" and "Lies", the latter featuring Joe Walsh on guitar. It also features Manassas versions of "Word Game" and "Sugar Babe", which first appeared on "Stephen Stills 2" in 1971, as well as "Like a Fox", which features a then-fledgling Bonnie Raitt on backing vocals.

In the "Pieces" liner notes, Stills writes fondly of Manassas as "the first steel-guitar-driven country/rock band that any of us can remember...Whatever else has been said about this time of immense creativity, what Manassas turned out was a collection of material that remains the precursor of virtually all of the Nashville country rock productions that followed during the next decade. The energy is unrepentant, the creativity irrepressible, and the value of these recordings irrefutable.""

MANASSAS "PIECES"

(*previously unreleased)

"Witching Hour"*
"Sugar Babe"*
"Lies" * (with Joe Walsh)
"My Love Is A Gentle Thing"
"Like a Fox"*
"Word Game"*
"Tan Sola Y Triste"*
"Fit To Be Tied"*
"Love and Satisfy"*
"High & Dry"*
"Panhandle Rag"*
"Uncle Pen"*
"Do You Remember the Americans"*
"Dim Lights, Thick Smoke (and Loud, Loud Music)"*
"I Am My Brother"*

 http://twistedspork.blogspot.com/2009/09/manassas-pieces.html