"Marrakesh Express" was released in the spring of 1969 on Crosby, Stills & Nash's eponymous first album. It spawned two Top 40 hit singles, "Marrakesh Express" and "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes," which peaked respectively at #28 the week of August 23, 1969, and at #21 the week of December 6, 1969, on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. The album itself peaked at #6 on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart. It was certified four times platinum by the RIAA for sales of over 4,200,000.

Crosby, Stills & Nash is such a great album, and I'm working on my Wes Anderson Criterion Blu-ray collection (lack only "The Darjeeling Limited" and "Fantastic Mr. Fox"..and my favorite of his films, "Budapest Hotel" (his latest) which hasn't yet received the treatment)....so since I didn't have anything else ready, I made this very quickie mashup. I hope you enjoy it. PS....buy the movie on Criterion Blu-ray if you haven't yet and are as big as I am. [ Ссылка ] The video is my first encoded in 4K UDH (though the source material is not 4K...i'm just experimenting with the format).

The album was a very strong debut for the band, instantly lifting them to stardom. Along with the Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo and The Band's Music from Big Pink of the previous year, it helped initiate a sea change in popular music away from the ruling late sixties aesthetic of bands playing blues-based rock music on loud guitars. Crosby, Stills & Nash presented a new wrinkle in building upon rock's roots, utilizing folk, blues, and even jazz without specifically sounding like mere duplication. Not only blending voices, the three meshed their differing strengths, David Crosby for social commentary and atmospheric mood pieces, Stephen Stills for his diverse musical skills and for folding folk and country elements subtly into complex rock structures, and Graham Nash for his radio-friendly pop melodies, to create an amalgam of broad appeal. The album features some of their best known songs: "Helplessly Hoping", "Long Time Gone" (a response to the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy), "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" (composed for Judy Collins) and "Wooden Ships" (co-written with Paul Kantner of Jefferson Airplane).

This album proved very influential on many levels to the dominant popular music scene in America for much of the 1970s. The success of the album generated gravitas for the group within the industry, and galvanized interest in signing like acts, many of whom came under management and representation by the CSN team of Elliot Roberts and David Geffen. Strong sales, combined with the group's emphasis on personal confession in its writing, paved the way for the success of the singer-songwriter movement of the early seventies.

In a contemporary review, Rolling Stone critic Barry Franklin called Crosby, Stills & Nash "an eminently playable record" and "especially satisfying work", finding the songwriting and vocal harmonies particularly exceptional. Robert Christgau was less enthusiastic in The Village Voice: "I have written elsewhere that this album is perfect, but that is not necessarily a compliment. Only Crosby's vocal on 'Long Time Gone' saves it from a special castrati award." In a retrospective review, Jason Akeny of AllMusic believed some of the songs' themes "haven't dated well" but "the harmonies are absolutely timeless, and the best material remains rock-solid". In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Crosby, Stills & Nash number 259 on their list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Jefferson Airplane guitarist Paul Kantner was finally credited as co-composer of "Wooden Ships" on the expanded edition reissue, something long acknowledged on his group's version of the song from their Volunteers album, released the same year.

[Lyrics]
Looking at the world
Through the sunset in your eyes
Trying to make the train
Through clear Moroccan skies
Ducks and pigs and chickens call
Animal carpet wall to wall
American ladies five foot tall in blue.
Sweeping cobwebs from the edges of my mind
Had to get away to see what we could find
Hope the days that lie ahead
Bring us back to where they've led
Listen not to what's been said to you
Would you know we're riding
On the Marrakesh Express
Would you know we're riding
On the Marrakesh Express
All on board that train
I've been saving all my money just to take you there
I smell the garden in your hair
Take the train from Casablanca going south
Blowing smoke rings from the corners of my my, my, my, my mouth
Colored cottons hang in air
Charming cobras in the square
Striped Djellebas we can wear at home
Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express
Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express
They're taking me to Marrakesh Express
Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express
Don't you know we're riding on the Marrakesh Express
They're taking me to Marrakesh
All on board that train
All on board that train

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