[UPDATE — JUNE 2026]
As I mentioned in this recent post, I’m going through the archives to give substance to some neglected posts and A.J. Eaton’s feature doc, David Crosby: Remember My Name, was next on my list. There are lots of fun anecdotes that I wish to share and to acknowledge that we lost David Crosby aka Croz on January 18, 2023. I’m grateful to have spent time with a musical genius.
How it started
My friend, Hilary Barraford, and I made a series of comedy sketches in the fall of 2013. One of them included my film festival directorial debut and another was a 2-minute skewer of the government shutdown. On that one-day shoot, I met A.J. Eaton who was on set helping his friend/our director, Jennifer Ludwigsen. Just two months after meeting, he thought we may have a chance to shoot an EPK with David Crosby.
That opportunity didn’t materialize.
About a year later, we shot a proof of concept for A.J.’s kid’s show about peanut butter and jelly sandwich making. While I can’t pitch you the show, I’ll tell you this: I make my own nut butter with a food processor and it’s my secret PB&J weapon. I use almonds, cashews, pecans, walnuts, Brazil nuts, hemp seeds, chia seeds, a touch of honey, and salt. It will change your life. It’s also really time consuming, so you may prefer buying this premade version (at Costco).
Crosby and the band
After a few scheduling conflicts, things finally lined up on April 13 and 19, 2017. My first day with Crosby consisted of his band rehearsing at CenterStaging in Burbank. They sounded great and I’d like to make it known that I’ve long been a CSN/CSNY fan. “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” and “Déjà vu” are easily two of the greatest songs ever recorded. “Long Time Gone” is also a serious banger.
Even so–and I feel like a brat admitting this–I was super distracted in the presence of the two-time Rock & Roll Hall of Famer after hearing that Sir Paul McCartney and his band were down the hall perfecting their upcoming tour! Considering how close to the stage I was for McCartney’s epic set in Indio six months earlier for Desert Trip, I should’ve better appreciated hearing Crosby’s amazing voice right in front of my face.
A.J. said that McCartney came by the previous day to say hi, but he didn’t return so we could capture the two legends sharing a moment. I caught a few glances of McCartney on cigarette breaks and he waved goodbye as he drove off in his convertible.
A week later, we filmed Crosby’s concert at The Wiltern. Aside from some backstage moments with the band, I found some interesting angles throughout the venue to serve as performance B-Roll. Oddly enough, several months later, I returned to The Wiltern to film Royal Blood after joining the roster of concert camera ops for Last Call with Carson Daly and spent many subsequent nights shooting shows around town. I sincerely miss that gig.
Crosby examines his past
On October 22, 2017, A.J. and I headed up to Santa Ynez for some intimate scenes of Crosby sifting through boxes of photographs and sharing stories that the images inspired. While showing us around the ranch, I also grabbed some beautiful interactions between his wife, Jan, and her horses.
My final day on the production (two days later), was truly remarkable and that’s evident by how much of the footage ended up in the final cut of the film. A.J. and I returned to Santa Ynez at 7:30am to pick up Crosby in a large SUV. While it’s no secret that Crosby can be thorny, I was legitimately shocked when he greeted me with this hilarious disclaimer:
Several hours later, we met up with the rest of the crew at the Beverly Hills Hotel to begin the Rock & Roll tour of Los Angeles with our docent, David Crosby. Our Producer, Cameron Crowe joined us along with our second camera op, Ian Coad (who shares the movie’s cinematography credit with Edd Lukas). I could hardly believe the situation I found myself in: sitting in the middle row of an SUV with Crosby sharing rich stories about his time in Los Angeles over the decades next to me. From the Sunset Strip to Troubadour, Chateau Marmont to Laurel Canyon, we hit the major landmarks.
The tour eventually lead us to the house where Crosby, Stills, and Nash were formed in the heart of Laurel Canyon. It was extremely stressful and a little hectic considering I had never previously worked with Ian. There’s a dance that operators do and we needed to perfectly choreograph our moves and react in real-time to Crosby’s actions to capture this historic moment. Asking Crosby for a second take was never an option and we wanted him to feel free to go where he pleased.
During our time in the canyon, we visited one of its greatest treasures: Canyon Country Store. After walking around the market and grabbing some snacks, Crosby sat down for an impromptu interview. Similar to most of my work on this film, we relied on natural lighting to capture our vérité moments. I believe there’s a lot of luck involved with getting nice images on documentaries, and we were pretty blessed on this project. I absolutely love the frame of Crosby below.
An unexpected collaboration
I either blocked it out, or missed it, but according to Crowe, Crosby didn’t appreciate this particular destination and gave him “fucking hardcore shit about taking him to Laurel Canyon.” Unlike my previous days on the doc, Cameron Crowe spearheaded the interviews and his preparation and organization were next level. He arrived with a gigantic notebook, which makes sense considering his journalist roots. Watching him guide the interviews was really special and the fact that their relationship goes back so many decades is a unique thing to witness.
Ten hours in a GMC Suburban is rarely anyone’s idea of a good time. This day was the exception. It ranks among my fondest filmmaking experiences.
I’m particularly grateful to have collaborated with the genius behind Almost Famous, which is one of my favorite films. There were two scenes that I watched on repeat countless times back in the day thanks to a new technology, DVDs: ‘My Awesome Mix Tape #6’ scene from Boogie Nights (1997) and Stillwater’s performance of ‘Fever Dog’ in Almost Famous (2000).
Almost Famous arrived a month before I started film school and that scene perfectly captures the joy of cinema, music, and the concert experience. It also depicts the joy of seeing your heroes do what they do best from a special vantage point. While I don’t share William’s youthful exuberance from that scene, there are times in one’s career where you might get to watch your favorite band backstage. That actually happened to me in 2007 while shooting a doc for Rock the Bells. I watched the crowd from Zack de la Rocha’s point of view as one of my favorite bands, Rage Against The Machine, put on another unforgettable live show. Rage didn’t allow us to film them and I didn’t want to get into trouble, so I snuck this awful photo with the terrible camera on my Palm TREO 650!
The reception
David Crosby: Remember My Name premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival where it was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize. It subsequently played numerous festivals and won Best Music Documentary at The 15th Annual Boulder International Film Festival (BIFF). Aside from screening in A.J.’s hometown for the 8th Annual Sun Valley Film Festival, it’s played Santa Barbara, Seattle, Mendocino, and Revelation Perth. It was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Music Film in 2020 and in several categories at the 2019 Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards. The film is currently Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with a 92% tomatometer.
Soon after the Sundance premiere, Sony Pictures Classics acquired the rights to A.J. Eaton’s first feature documentary. The LA Times featured this lengthy article ahead of our theatrical release. You can now rent or purchase the film on Fandango or Amazon Prime.
The Aftermath
I’ll leave you with one final story related to this film. I received a phone call in 2021 while rock climbing at Hollywood Boulders. I probably should’ve let the unknown number go to voicemail as I had just experienced not one, but two extremely painful “flappers” on my hands. In my bewildered mental state, I distinctly heard, “Cameron Crowe recommended you.”
I didn’t realize that I made such an impression from our short time together. What’s more, it was from Cameron’s long time friend and collaborator, Neal Preston. I was too out of it in the moment to realize that I was also familiar with his legendary work. He recorded a great episode of WTF with Marc Maron in 2017 and as a result of that appearance, I bought his excellent coffee table book, Neal Preston: Exhilarated and Exhausted. It features stellar photos of Led Zeppelin, Queen, and Bruce Springsteen (which proudly hangs on my wall). Neal also shot the amazing cover to the record that I spun the most growing up: Springsteen’s “Live 1975-85.”
So I guess the moral of the story is that a silly sketch with friends may lead you to sharing a set with film, photography, and music deities. What’s your favorite David Crosby song?