Rock Survivor

By By Andrea Sachs

No one could accuse David Crosby of having led a boring life. A founding member of the Byrds and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, the veteran musician has made even more headlines for his turbulent personal life. Crosby, who appeared at Woodstock, has gone to prison for possession of a firearm and drugs, been in a serious motorcycle crash, gone broke, taken heroin, had a liver transplant and fathered six children, two of them as a sperm donor. He recounts his colorful story in his new book, Since Then: How I Survived Everything and Lived to Tell About It (Putnam), which will be published in November. TIME'S Andrea Sachs spoke with Crosby:

You just finished a concert tour. How did that go?

Wonderfully. We had new songs that Neil [Young] had written. They were very political and very strong. A large part of our job is to make you boogie and make you feel good, but part of our job is to be the town crier or the troubadour who says it's 11 o' clock and all's well. Or it's 12:30, and we have a chimpanzee in the White House and things are a little bit problematic.

How do you view the 1960s now?

I think we were right about everything except the drugs. We were right about civil rights; we were right about human rights; we were right about peace being better than war. Most of the causes we espoused then were correct. But I think we didn't know our butt from a hole in the ground about drugs, and that bit us pretty hard.

In 1985 you went to jail for possession of drugs and a firearm. What was that experience like?

It was very tough. It was a Texas prison. It is a very straight-up, hard, full-out high-security prison. It was not fun at all, but it was a good lesson, and it allowed me time to wake up from being a junkie, which I think is a worse prison than being in prison because you carry it around with you.

Your 1994 liver transplant was controversial. At the time, there were some people who said you got special treatment because you are a celebrity.

Nobody gets special treatment. It's the most severely regulated thing you can imagine. Nobody can jump the line at all in any way. I waited. I was in the hospital for 71 days, and I came within a week of dying before they matched my liver.

What made you decide to be a sperm donor for singer Melissa Etheridge and her former partner Julie Cypher?

Actually I didn't decide. My wife did. They were wanting to have a child, and it was proving very difficult for them, as I think it has been for a number of lesbians. She volunteered me, and I thought about it for a minute. They had been in love for a long time and were doing very well, and I thought, you know, I don't really care about the plumbing of the people. I care about the love and if there's love there, and there was. I guess the proof is in the pudding. The kids turned out wonderfully.

Which young musicians who are popular now do you like?

I'm very fond of Jack Johnson. I think he came up with his own new style, and he writes really well. I really like a group called Nickel Creek. I think they're brilliant. I'm very fond of this little pop girl, Pink, because she wrote this song, Dear Mr. President. Holy s___, what a song! Whoa. The girl has real talent.

You turned 65 in August. What's that been like?

Oh, man, it's creepy. When you're really sure that you're getting old, you just shoot yourself. No, I'm kidding. It's O.K. I have a lot of things wrong with me, and so there are a lot of medical problems and stuff. That makes it harder, but you don't know that when you're playing. As soon as you start playing, all that goes away.