Jim Messina (born December 5, 1947) is an American musician, songwriter, singer, guitarist, recording engineer, and record producer. He was a member of folk rock group Buffalo Springfield, a founding member of country rock pioneer Poco, and half of the soft rock duo Loggins and Messina with Kenny Loggins. (More from Wikipedia)
Buffalo Springfield started with a chance meeting of Stephen Stills and Neil Young; later, Stills and his friend Richie Furay were driving along Sunset Boulevard in L.A. and spotted a hearse. Stills was sure that it was Young’s, and sure enough, it was. Neil Young had another Canadian in the hearse as a passenger: Bruce Palmer. These four formed the band with drummer Dewey Martin.
By the time that their final album, Last Time Around was released – back when bands announced that sort of thing – Jim Messina was part of the line-up.
When Last Time Around was being wound up, Stephen Stills and Neil Young had already exited Buffalo Springfield; and Richie Furay (guitar and vocals) and Jim Messina (bass guitar) were about the only ones left. For the final track laid down by Buffalo Springfield, Furay and Messina were joined by Rusty Young (pedal steel guitar); he was a rarity in that time period in being one of the few steel guitarists who felt comfortable playing rock music. The three stuck together; at Young’s suggestion, they added Randy Meisner (bass guitar and vocals), who had been in a band called the Poor, and George Grantham (drums and vocals), who had been in a psychedelic folk/rock band called Boenzee Cryque with Rusty Young.
The band first began calling themselves Pogo, but Walt Kelly, the creator of the popular comic strip Pogo objected, so they switched to Poco. Poco became one of the earliest and most long-lived country-rock bands. Several record companies were interested in signing the new act, but they hit a road block: Richie Furay and Jim Messina were still signed to Atlantic Records as part of Buffalo Springfield. Meanwhile, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young were having the same problem getting signed. David Geffen, then a young talent scout, arranged for the recording contracts for Stephen Stills and Neil Young to be swapped for those of Richie Furay and Jim Messina, so that CSNY could be signed to Atlantic Records, and Poco could be signed to Epic Records.
After leaving Poco, Randy Meisner played with Rick Nelson for a while and then joined another country-rock outfit that eventually dubbed themselves the Eagles. Jim Messina left not long after that and started a fruitful collaboration with Kenny Loggins as Loggins and Messina.
(April 2014)
