These 23 Days In September / Stories / Nice Baby And The Angel / Cupid's Arrow

David Blue was born on 18th February 1941. He wasn't born David Blue, of course, but Stuart David Cohen and he came from Providence, Rhode Island. He moved to Greenwich Village in the early ‘60s and one day saw Bob Dylan writing the song that would become the great folk anthem ‘Blowin’ In The Wind’. Bob asked David to play the chords while he would create the verses. It was performed that night at Gerde’s Folk City. Once Bob Dylan made it, record companies came looking around Greenwich Village for potential artists. However, there was already a Dave Cohen performing in the village, who later joined Country Joe and the Fish.

Our Dave Cohen told folk singer Eric Andersen that he would have to change his name and Eric said, “You’ve got such blue eyes. You should be David Blue”. When Dylan heard of his new name, he started laughing and sang “It’s all over now, David Blue”. When Bob Dylan had his motorcycle accident in 1966, David Blue sent him a note “It’s been done already” – a reference to James Dean. While Bob was recovering, he was recording with the Band and David Blue can be seen on the cover of The Basement Tapes – he is sitting to the right of Mrs. Henry.

The Reprise album, These 23 Days In September was released in 1968. It was produced by Gabriel Mekler who was producing Steppenwolf. Gabriel played piano and Bob Rafkin, guitar. His first album for the newly-formed Asylum label - Stories (1972) - had a self-portrait on its cover. The album featured some magical slide guitar from Ry Cooder. The musicians on the album include Rita Coolidge, Chris Ethridge, Milt Holland and Russ Kunkel, which is pretty much an A-Team. Graham Nash, then a superstar with Crosby, Stills and Nash, produced the album Nice Baby And The Angel in 1973. Background vocals included Graham Nash, Dave Mason, Glenn Frey and Jennifer Warren.

Glenn Frey was so taken with the track ‘Outlaw Man’ that he took it to The Eagles and it was featured on their album Desperado. Cupid’s Arrow released in 1976 was produced by Barry Goldberg and featured Jesse Ed Davis and the Liverpool musician Jackie Lomax. The title track was written about protest singer Phil Ochs and it was sung at his memorial concert.