"Everyone has a job to do in this band," David Crosby explained to the audience on Monday night.

"(Stephen) Stills takes care of the great hard rock, (Graham) Nash writes the anthems and I do the weird stuff."

That's a succinct description of the output of the world's greatest supergroup. Formed out of The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield and The Hollies respectively, and joined occasionally by the mercurial Neil Young, the trio's hard rock, anthems and weirdness has inspired a generation.

But the Brighton Centre is a long way from Woodstock and the question was, could those extraordinary voices, which combined to such stunning effect all those years ago, still soar?

The answer was yes, remarkably well, given the abuse heaped on them. Both Crosby and Nash's voices sounded surprisingly youthful as they took us through such classics as Wooden Ships, Southern Cross and Marrakesh Express.

The same was not true for Stills, who struggled to hit the high harmonies. Instead, he used his rougher-edged voice to superb effect on some rowdy blues numbers and his signature tune Love The One You're With, during which he beckoned the enthusiastic audience to leave their seats and come to the footof the stage. They didn't need asking twice.

His roaring version of Booker T Jones's Old Man Trouble threatened to raise the roof off the venue and he has lost none of his virtuosity when it comes to the guitar.

Man Alive, Stills's latest album, has been ten years in the making and he took the opportunity to perform several new tracks from it.

As an outfit, CSN may not be exactly prolific but when you take in the various permutations, CSN&Y, Crosby and Nash, The Stills Young Band, Manassas, CPR and various solo projects, you wonder if they ever stop touring long enough to write a song.

In fact, this was Crosby and Nash's second trip to Brighton this year, although Crosby couldn't recall how many trips he's had here.

"We might have been here before," he wondered, ruefully.

"I might have even had a good time but how would I know?"

As a unit, the venerable CSN are greater than the sum of their parts and showed that they still have plenty of mileage, plenty to say and plenty of people who want to hear it.