"Immigration Man" is a song recorded by David Crosby

David Crosby

David Van Cortlandt Crosby is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter. In addition to his solo career, he was a founding member of three bands: The Byrds, Crosby, Stills & Nash , and CPR...

 and Graham Nash

Graham Nash

Graham William Nash, OBE is an English singer-songwriter known for his light tenor vocals and for his songwriting contributions with the British pop group The Hollies, and with the folk-rock band Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Nash is a photography collector and a published photographer...

 as a duo, from 1972. It was released as a single and was also the closing track on Crosby and Nash's first duo album, Graham Nash David Crosby

Graham Nash David Crosby

Graham Nash/David Crosby is the first album by the partnership of David Crosby and Graham Nash, released on Atlantic Records in 1972, catalogue SD 7220. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart, and a single taken from the album, "Immigration Man," peaked at #36 on the Billboard Hot...

.

Nash wrote "Immigration Man" about an unfortunate moment he had with a U.S. Customs official when he tried to enter the country. The customs official held him up interminably, and soon people started coming up to Nash for his autograph

Autograph

An autograph is a document transcribed entirely in the handwriting of its author, as opposed to a typeset document or one written by an amanuensis or a copyist; the meaning overlaps with that of the word holograph.Autograph also refers to a person's artistic signature...

. When that happened, Nash was allowed to go through, but he remained angry with the treatment he received.

Music and lyrics

The music of "Immigration Man" is straightforward, midtempo West Coast rock

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 in the Crosby, Stills and Nash

Crosby, Stills & Nash (and Young)

Crosby, Stills & Nash is a folk rock supergroup made up of David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, also known as Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young when joined by occasional fourth member Neil Young...

 or Buffalo Springfield

Buffalo Springfield

Buffalo Springfield is a North American folk rock band renown both for its music and as a springboard for the careers of Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay and Jim Messina. Among the first wave of North American bands to become popular in the wake of the British invasion, the group combined...

 tradition. The first verse of "Immigration Man" refers to Nash going through customs

Customs

Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods including animals, transports, personal effects and hazardous items in and out of a country...

 and getting stopped by the "immigration man", who tells Nash that he's not sure if he can let him in. The second verse tells how Nash was given trouble over various documents, and the third finds him filling out a form that Nash humorously describes to be as big as a blanket. Crosby joins Nash on the next line, offering a warning to would-be global travelers: "So go where you will / As long as you think you can / You better watch out, watch out for the man / Anywhere you're going." The choruses, with harmonies from Crosby and Nash, are pleas for the immigration

Immigration

Immigration is the act of foreigners passing or coming into a country for the purpose of permanent residence...

 official to let Nash into the country, with a slight rewording at the end in which the immigration man is referred to as an "irritation man."

"I'm not against local colour," Nash explained in discussing the song, "but why should you fight me just because you speak differently than I do?" Nash also explained why he chose a picture of the earth from space for the cover of the sheet music

Sheet music

Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of music notation that uses modern musical symbols; like its analogs—books, pamphlets, etc.—the medium of sheet music typically is paper , although the access to musical notation in recent years includes also presentation on computer screens...

 for "Immigration Man". "When you look at a photograph of the earth you don't see any borders. That realization is where our hope as a planet lies."

Nash himself became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1978.

Trivia

Former Traffic

Traffic (band)

Traffic were an English rock band whose members came from the West Midlands. The group formed in April 1967 by Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi, Chris Wood and Dave Mason...

 guitarist Dave Mason

Dave Mason

David Thomas "Dave" Mason is an English singer, songwriter, and guitarist from Worcester, who first found fame with the rock band Traffic...

provided the stinging guitar solos for "Immigration Man".