When the long-awaited Buffalo Springfield box set arrived on Canadian record store shelves Tuesday, fans discovered a whole new chapter in the storied group's career.

Richie Furay -- who along with Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Dewey Martin and Bruce Palmer founded the group during L.A.'s fertile mid-'60s music scene -- told JAM! Music that even with four discs packed with three hours of music -- including 36 previously unreleased cuts -- the set doesn't capture his favourite time in the band.

"The first six weeks we were together at the Whiskey A Go-Go," Furay said wistfully when asked for his most cherished Springfield memory.

"When we were the house band at the Whiskey A Go-Go for six weeks, that was when the Springfield was the tightest. Every day, two sets a night. We were a real family then.

"When we started out at The Whiskey, there wasn't anyone who knew who we were. It was like Buffalo who? Six weeks later, they were lined up around the block. That started to speak to us that we've got something here."

Although the box set (dubbed, simply, "Box Set") mines the Springfield archives for a load of demos, alternate versions, acetates, and previously unheard alternate mixes, the group's opening stand at the legendary Sunset Strip nightspot is not represented. Presumably, no one thought to record the proceedings for posterity.

Furay is now a pastor in Boulder, CO. He spoke to JAM! via telephone from suburban Connecticut, where he was in the middle of a brief tour of churches, performing both spirituals and his secular work with Buffalo Springfield and his later, influential country-rock band Poco.

He explained that he cherishes those six weeks of shows at L.A.'s famed Whiskey because, from that moment forward, the famously fractious Springfield began to fray.

"After that (Whiskey residency), it was who's in, who's out? What is happening to Bruce? What is happening with Neil? The first six weeks at the Whiskey, everyone was there, everyone was doing their part, everyone was contributing," Furay said.

"I knew we really liked a lot of the bands happening at the time. There was a group called Love, a group called The Doors, a group called The Grass Roots. We certainly appreciated a lot of that music ... A lot of bands were just exploding and starting to experiment with their music.

"We were hot. We were tight. We didn't see anyone on the horizon that was competition."

Plenty of groups from that era sold more records, lasted longer and made a bigger initial splash in popular culture. But few groups can claim to have created such a long-lasting influence on modern music as Buffalo Springfield.

With a mere two official albums to their credit (1967's "Buffalo Springfield" and "Buffalo Springfield Again"), one major hit single (Stills' epochal "For What It's Worth"), and a posthumous third album (1968's "Last Time Around"), the group is credited by many as pioneering the fusion of modern rock and country.

Buffalo Springfield's family tree branches out to Stills' and Young's careers with CSNY and their fruitful solo careers, not to mention Furay's work with Poco and latter-day band-member Jim Messina's days in Loggins & Messina.

One could argue that Buffalo Springfield's brief moment together is the big bang that yielded a whole genre of music, and whose ripples can be spotted in the enduring popularity of The Eagles, Blue Rodeo, and the current alt-country crowd.

"Obviously, there was a lot of talent," Furay said of Buffalo Springfield's legacy.

"The Springfield really had four vocalists, and I'm not counting Dewey. I sang lead, Neil sang lead, Stephen sang leads, and Stephen and I sang in unison. That was a unique voice. I mellowed his out, and he gave mine edge. It became almost a different person.

"As you look at the career Stephen and Neil, and I have to say myself putting together Poco ... the influence they have had speaks for itself. That was all boxed up in the Buffalo Springfield. The potential was bubbling and simmering, and obviously it burst forth in the years after the Springfield was alive and well," Furay said.

"I think I speak for all of us: We weren't afraid to experiment. We weren't followers. Whatever we did was an extension of who wrote what, or this will or won't work. We did what we did."

Furay said he first heard of plans for a Buffalo Springfield retrospective about 10 years ago. Some time around 1986, the band's original lineup had gotten together for some experimental jam sessions, although Young's apparent lack of interest caused the whole thing to fall apart, Furay said.

"Then about three years ago, Neil Young called and said come out to the ranch (outside San Francisco). He was putting some things together and he wanted some input. I thought that was pretty cool. It wasn't a courtesy call."

Although the set credits production of the box to the full group, Furay said it was evident Young was the driving force behind the project.

"He did all the work, as far as I was concerned. I don't know what Steve did. Neil did all the work," he said, adding that talk of reuniting the Springfield to record new material to coincide with the box set never got beyond the early talking stage.

Furay endorsed Young's early approach to the set, although he said in hindsight he regrets not having voiced concern over the set's under-representation of "Last Time Around." Young and Stills participated little in the album's creation and have for years voiced their dissatisfaction with the results.

"I know (Young) looks at 'Last Time Around' as a stepchild. You know what? Quite frankly and truthfully, only the first record was the full band. Even the second one ('Buffalo Springfield Again'), there were a lot of outside influences that came in to work on that record. There were some songs on 'Again' where a lot of us didn't have anything to do with Neil's contributions."

Perhaps more controversial than the short shrift given to "Last Time Around" is the box set's fourth disc, which re-presents the entire contents of the first two Buffalo Springfield records -- even though virtually every song from those records is scattered through the rest of the box-set's chronological presentation of the band's music. And remastered versions of both "Buffalo Springfield" and "Buffalo Springfield Again" are available separately in record stores.

Instead of duplicating those songs twice on the box set, collectors know of a handful of rare or unofficially-released songs that could have been included, but Furay says he can see the logic to the repetition.

"That was totally Neil's decision. The one thing it does for me, and I am not opposed to it, is: Here you have it all," Furay explained.

"This is all the studio (sessions), whatever we tried, attempted and came through with. You have all of this on the first couple of CDs, all of it raw, some of it bits and pieces. Some of the struggles or some of the songs were trying to come alive. It is all pieced together on the first couple of CDs.You can hear the struggles, and then you can hear how it all fell together (on the fourth disc).

"It was Neil's decision. He took the time, put the money out and all of the effort was his decision. I guess that is the way it goes."

As well, some concert and rehearsal tapes of the band are known to exist, but none were included in the box set, despite the band's stellar reputation as a live act.

"I haven't personally heard any (live tapes). If there is some that either Stephen or Neil have, for whatever reason, they decide not to put it on. Whether there was a conscious decision, whether quality couldn't be worked with, I don't know," Furay said.

"I'm sure whatever was there live was not recorded properly, and it would have been something a little less than what the memory is. I would rather have the memory of what it is and what we were than have something that falls short of what we were."

As for his current work, Furay has written a full album of new material, and has been talking about joining with his former Poco bandmates Rusty Young, Paul Cotton and George Grantham.

"I don't know if I would call it a Poco reunion," Furay explained.

"It is options. I am certainly not talking about, at 57, going off and starting another career of music. But you know what? My life is blessed. I can come out and play to people who have come out to see me, yet my life is still far-removed. I can get recharged and go out and do it. I don't discredit the fact that I will go out and play. I want to go out and play. But it is not my total focus."

Meanwhile, at his recent church shows, interest in his past work has been escalating. Before audiences of perhaps 100 people crowded into church basements or sprawled on lawns, Furay has been obliging with a few selections from his secular repertoire.

"Last night we did 'Go And Say Goodbye,' 'For What Its Worth,' 'On The Way Home.' I have done 'A Child's Claim To Fame,' 'Sad Memory' and I have done 'Kind Woman.' In this little club we were at last Monday night, I had to ask someone to hold up the lyrics to 'For What It's Worth.' Everybody there knew the words, but I didn't know 'em," he laughed.

"It's like riding a bicycle. I am very thankful. Any of the songs, whatever group I am involved with, whether it is Buffalo Springfield or Poco, I don't feel like I couldn't sing because I am a Christian now. It is really easy for me to do that."