Times Square (TS): You’ve had many opportunities to work with musicians throughout your career. What do you normally look for when forming musical relationships?

Richie Furay (RF): I think one of the things you look for when putting a band together is the talent, the natural talent. I can be looked at as raw talent; talent that you don’t necessarily have to work at but is just there: you see it, you know it. Then when you start to put those groups together there has to be some sort of cohesiveness so that everyone is on the same page. As is so often the case with bands, you get together, you’ve having a great time and then someone decides, ‘gotta go’ and that makes it difficult because you have to start over.

TS: From what I understand you began writing songs for Buffalo Springfield’s second album in 1967, and I’m interested in how you feel you’ve grown and changed as a songwriter.

RF: I was writing back then from a very young perspective. I was in my twenties, and the style of the music we were writing would kind of play off of whatever was contemporary at the time. After a while I learned that I wasn’t a follower, I was someone that created a sound. After I left Buffalo Springfield and started Poco, I was one of the innovators of the California country rock sound, so my music took on that kind of perspective and it’s lived with me ever since.

TS: Being that you’ve fairly consistently been involved with the music industry since the 1960s, how do you feel the industry has changed? What are the upsides and downsides for an artist today?

RF: Back in the day when we were starting, it all depended on a record company. If a record company took an interest in you, they signed you to label and then they paid for the recording and in many cases they would help in promoting the tours. Today, I think with the Internet the way it is, it’s a whole different world in terms of how you get your music heard. That’s one of the main and most significant differences from my perspective. I don’t know whether to say it’s more difficult – when Springfield started in the late sixties, it seemed pretty easy for us. It really happened very fast without us having to do much at all; We started opening up for The Byrds and we did a couple weeks at Whiskey Au Go Go. People heard us and began recognizing the talent that was in the band, a record company signed us and we had a record deal. But today, the record company doesn’t play as important a role in, at least, the initial marketing of the music. 

TS: You’ve toured extensively throughout your career, and you’ve seen most of America several times over. How would you describe the evolution of the culture generally?

RF: Let me put it this way: when Buffalo Springfield started, our biggest record was called ‘For What It’s Worth’ and it became a national anthem for whatever protests were going on at the time. In that regard, the culture hasn’t changed at all, in that we still have protests going on all the time, and I’m sure there’s still a lot of people playing that music. My music has generally been - and I’m speaking for my music personally – a release of the pressure that people may be going through, whether they may be going through social changes, cultural changes or personal changes.  I’ve always wanted the music that I’ve been involved with to be something like a release valve, so a person could come to a concert that I’m doing, and they may be experiencing the most difficult time in their life, but at the concert there will be a place of refuge and relief, if you will, for them to be able to step outside of whatever is going on in the world at the moment. That’s what I’ve wanted for my music, particularly from the time that I started Poco, on through SHF and even my solo music, I just wanted it to be a breath of fresh air for people. 

TS: When were you inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and how do you feel about that achievement?

RF: 1997. I think it was 1997, I should check for myself [laughs]. You know, what an honour. At first, looking at it, I thought, did I ride into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on the bootstraps of Neil Young and Stephen Stills? I think after we got together, after 42 years and did our shows at the Bridge School concerts a year ago in October and then doing the spring shows out in California and Bonnaroo in Tennessee, I think I was really able to know that hey, I contributed quite a bit to the overall success of Buffalo Springfield. It was an honor to have your peers take a look at you and say you’re worthy of this recognition. I’m very proud of the fact that though there are a lot of talented people out there right now that I feel are worthy to be in the Hall of Fame, here we are, we’re in it and I’m very humbled by the fact of being nominated and selected. 

TS: What do you have in store for your audience at your upcoming show at B.B. King’s?

Well, I love playing in New York. This will be the third time we’ll be playing B.B. King’s and the first time it was definitely heart thumping because I hadn’t played in New York in a very long time. It’s really a thrill to see all the people come out to hear the band. And that’s what it’s all about today, when people are coming I want them to walk away from that show and say, “Wow, you know what? That was one of the best concerts I’ve been to.” That’s really what I want people to get out of it when they come to any of the shows that we’re doing.

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