{"id":118212,"date":"2025-08-04T12:46:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/118212\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T12:46:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T12:46:10","slug":"4-times-phil-collins-and-david-crosby-collaborated-on-songs-1989-1998","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/118212\/","title":{"rendered":"4 Times Phil Collins and David Crosby Collaborated on Songs (1989-1998)"},"content":{"rendered":"

A fan of David Crosby<\/a> since his days with the Byrds, Phil Collins<\/a> asked the CSN legend to sing on his fourth solo album, \u2026But Seriously, during their first meeting. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe will pick out notes from the air that nobody else would sing,\u201d said Collins<\/a> of Crosby. Collins had previously crossed paths with Graham Nash<\/a> and Stephen Stills<\/a> but never met Crosby until an Atlantic Records 40th anniversary party during the late \u201980s. <\/p>\n

\u201cI said, \u2018I\u2019ve got to meet David,\u201d added Collins. \u201cHe\u2019s a big hero of mine. So they introduced me to him, and I went backstage and [I] said \u2018Can you sing on my next album?\u2019 He said \u2018Sure.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Years later, Collins and Crosby\u2019s friendship developed into something deeper than lyrics. In 1994, shortly after being diagnosed with Hepatitis C, Crosby underwent a liver transplant surgery, which Collins paid for. \u201cPhil Collins did help me enormously,\u201d said Crosby<\/a> in 2014. \u201cI\u2019m not going to get into the specifics about how; it\u2019s nobody else\u2019s business but mine and Phil\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the late \u201980s, Crosby and Collins had already started a nearly decade-long collaborative run. Here\u2019s a look at four of their musical collaborations from 1989 through 1998.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: The \u201990s Hit Phil Collins Originally Wrote for Daughter Actress Lily Collins]<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cAnother Day in Paradise\u201d\u00a0(1989)<\/p>\n

Collins\u2019 fourth album, …But Seriously, was a departure from his previous, pop-loaded No Jacket Required. Its lead single, \u201cAnother Day in Paradise,\u201d addressed the issue of homelessness, how it is often overlooked, and was one of two tracks featuring Crosby on backing vocals. <\/p>\n

\u201cI sent him a tape of the two songs, and he loved them, came in, and he was wonderful,\u201d recalled Collins. \u201cWe sat down at the piano \u2026 he showed me his ideas, and he did exactly what I thought he\u2019d do. He came up with these ideas that nobody else would think.\u201d<\/p>\n

When released on October 23, 1989, \u201cAnother Day in Paradise\u201d topped the Billboard Hot 100, marking Collins\u2019 seventh and final No. 1, and won the Grammy for Record of the Year in 1991. Crosby also joined Collins for the live performance of \u201cAnother Day in Paradise\u201d\u00a0at the\u00a01991 Grammy Awards.<\/p>\n

She calls out to the man on the street
\u201cSir, can you help me?
It\u2019s cold and I\u2019ve nowhere to sleep
Is there somewhere you can tell me?\u201d
He walks on, doesn\u2019t look back
He pretends he can\u2019t hear her
Starts to whistle as he crosses the street
Seems embarrassed to be there<\/p>\n

Oh, think twice
\u2018Cause it\u2019s another day
For you and me in paradise
Oh, think twice
\u2018Cause it\u2019s another day for you
You and me in paradise<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s Just the Way It Is<\/strong>\u201c(1990)<\/p>\n

The second song Crosby lent his vocals to on …But Seriously was Collins\u2019 anti-war ballad, \u201cThat\u2019s Just the Way It Is,\u201d addressing the conflicts in Northern Ireland. <\/p>\n

\u201cIreland of course, it\u2019s on the doorstep [of England] but everywhere else in the world it\u2019s just another news report,\u201d said Collins, \u201cbut if you are living in England and you just sort of constantly [hear of] people getting blown to smithereens because this thing that\u2019s been going on \u2026 You see newsreels of kids throwing\u00a0petrol bombs\u00a0because their brothers throw them and then their dads throw them and their dad\u2019s dad and it\u2019s just bred, inbred, now this violence and I just thought someone somewhere, and it\u2019s got to be from both sides, has got to say \u2018Hang on, life means more than this. This has got to stop.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Released as a single in 1990, \u201cThat\u2019s Just the Way It Is\u201d peaked at No. 26 in the UK and features Collins and Crosby harmonzing on the pre-chorus: And I don\u2019t know why,\u00a0why do we keep holding on \/ I don\u2019t know why,\u00a0pretending to be, oh, so strong \/ Oh, why,\u00a0is there something I don\u2019t know? \/ Or something very wrong, with you and me, or maybe<\/p>\n

All day long, he was fighting for you
And he didn\u2019t even know your name
Young men come and young men go
But life goes on just the same<\/p>\n

And I don\u2019t know why,\u00a0why do we keep holding on
I don\u2019t know why,\u00a0pretending to be, oh, so strong
Oh, why,\u00a0is there something I don\u2019t know?
Or something very wrong, with you and me, or maybe<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the way it is
That\u2019s the way it is<\/p>\n

\u201cHero,\u201d David Crosby, featuring Phil Collins (1993)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A year before David Crosby underwent liver transplant surgery, he released his third solo album, Thousand Roads, which was his last album for 21 years before releasing\u00a0Croz\u00a021, and his final, For Free, before he died in 2023. Thousand Roads features songs written or co-penned by\u00a0Joni Mitchell<\/a>\u00a0(\u201cYvette in English\u201d),\u00a0John Hiatt<\/a>\u00a0(\u201cThrough Your Hands\u201d), and opens on \u201cHero,\u201d a song Crosby co-wrote with Collins.<\/p>\n

Produced by Collins, who also played drums, keyboards, and drum machine on the track, the song covers the complexities of life and the good versus evil within human nature.<\/p>\n

It was one of those great stories
That you can\u2019t put down at night
The hero knew what he had to do
And he wasn\u2019t afraid to fight<\/p>\n

The villain goes to jail
While the hero goes free
I wish it were that simple for me<\/p>\n

And the reason that she loved him
Was the reason I loved him, too
And he never wondered
What was right or wrong
He just knew, he just knew<\/p>\n

In 1993, Collins also released a demo version of \u201cHero\u201d with his vocals only as a\u00a0B-side\u00a0to \u201cWe Wait and We Wonder\u201d from his fifth album, Both Sides.<\/p>\n

\u201cHero,\u201d CPR, featuring Graham Nash and Phil Collins (1998)<\/p>\n

Five years after releasing Thousand Roads, Crosby delivered a live album with his jazz trio, CPR, alongside guitarist\u00a0Jeff Pevar, and Crosby\u2019s son, keyboardist James Raymond. Recorded at the Wiltern Theater in Los Angeles in November 1998, Live at the Wiltern features Crosby\u2019s CSN bandmate Graham Nash is also a special guest, joining him and Collins on a live version of \u201cHero.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo: David Crosby (l) and Phil Collins during AFI Tribute to Steven Spielberg at Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, CA. (Jeff Kravitz\/FilmMagic, Inc)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A fan of David Crosby since his days with the Byrds, Phil Collins asked the CSN legend to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":118213,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[73906,73907,171,975,73908,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-118212","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-csn","9":"tag-david-crosby","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-music","12":"tag-phil-collins","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}