David Crosby - Royal Theatre 2016 ~Photo Mel Z
Source: Mel Z / Rogers

The Royal Theatre was the set for a wonderful session of storytelling last night, with the legendary David Crosby. A nearly sold-out Royal Theatre was the setting for the 74-year old folk-rocker to not only sing and play those “scrumptious” guitars (his words), but to spin a yarn or two. Between the songs, Crosby captivated the audience with delicious stories of his days as a member of The Byrds, making jokes about what it was like to work with Scorpios Neil Young and Joni Mitchell in his career, to parenting, politics and psychedelics

The music of course, is Crosby’s main mode of storytelling — while the songs were mostly unfamiliar, the intimate unplugged sound was crystal clear. His vocal range was dynamic but not perfect but as Dave said himself, the songs come out differently every night — because he doesn’t remember how did it the night before. Crosby’s ultimate form of storytelling — the songs — were genuine. I was nearly reduced to an ugly-cry during the song Carry Me, which was about his mother dying. Apparently so was he, Crosby remarked after the song that sometimes it’s hard to sing that one.

You could hear a pin drop in the room, or a camera-shutter snap. The audience were well-behaved but for a few bouts of shouting out to Crosby on the stage now and then, and a steady-stream of visitors to the bathroom…because that’s kind of crowd we were…yes, I’ll include myself in that.

David Crosby unplugged was not only a crowd-pleasing show, but it felt like you’d had the opportunity to sit down with a music legend and hear his musings, philosophies and tales…and you didn’t want it to end.

Check out a great pre-show interview with David Crosby from Monday Magazine, and my buddy Mike Devlin’s review on the show in the Times Colonist.

Mel Z – Midday Show 10am – 2pm & Rocktographer Ocean 98.5