Leave us be charitable with the wisdom of hindsight. Kathleen's Song, Pale Blue and Trust are gorgeous songs. Glory Glory might have made a reasonable B-side. Green Apple Quickstep is just swell, Jamaica Say You Will is just acceptable. But this 22-track "complete" has no unused songs that could have replaced the wretched Battin/Fowley garbage that sunk the album far more effectively than the production. Half an album is better than none? It has to be, because that's all we got.
EDIT: The unprecedented upsurge of support [2 Guys] prompted me to reassess
Absolute Happiness. While I'm not convinced it sounds like the Byrds, it is a pretty song and so should be included on the Half Album.
(crickets)
ReplyDeleteI come in search of the Missing Link. I also think that Absolute Happiness is the one Battin-Fowley composition that deserves its place on a Byrds album. 22 tracks eh? I'm hoping for a few quadraphonic mixes in there...
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, disappointed at the disappearanceof the Bad Lieutenant soundtrack. I suspect Five Guns was referring to the FILM being available - not the soundtrack...
Yeah, film's up on Sling right now. I thought it may have nudged the Farqmeister in that direction but apparently it's the Zeitgeist. Agree on Absolute Happiness. Sling has the "if you don't die in a week" special on but most stuff is free for the duration.
DeleteI have/had no idea what Sling was/is. The movie often gets shown at the FFMFI© Drive-In, of course.
Delete(Thank you, 5GW)
free tv https://watch.sling.com/browse/my-tv?cjevent=%7BeventId%7D
DeleteWhat happened to the Bad Lieutenant Soundtrack...??? I fer shore hope no boids made off wiff it.
ReplyDeleteIt's up, with Added Foam Value.
DeleteLinks after I go back to sleep and wake up again ...
ReplyDeleteI borrowed Byrdmaniax off someone when I was 20 years old and I was underwhelmed, except for just one track . . . an ok performance, just about; a flat, disinterested production; something average. And yet, it nagged away at me - there was a song within that promised more.
ReplyDeleteIt was of course "Jamaica Say you Will" written by a bloke called Jackson Browne.
Time passed and some while later I was browsing in Durrants record shop in Shrewsbury during my lunch hour and came across the debut album by that same bloke from Byrdmaniax. Interesting cover, interesting credits, so I bought it.
Well, what a thing - I subsequently bought all the following JB albums on the day of release from then till now and all because of an average track on a poor album.
Cheers, Peanuts Molloy.
ReplyDeleteThis guy was an early JB advocate. Major Tom (SWIDT?) re-up in the comments.
ReplyDeleteFor mad men only.
Ah, Byrdmaniax. Youse guys already said pretty much everything there's to say...including all the keepers. Sadly, "Farther Along" is also only half a decent/good album. So I'm toying with the idea of making a mash up of those two to create a somewhat decent Byrds album.
ReplyDeletePS: I third "Absolute Happiness". It's a gorgeous song. Sure, it doesn't sound particularly Byrds-ian, but none of the non-McGuinn numbers on "Byrdmaniax" do, and even those only very faintly...
So, Battin/Fowley songs are really getting a bad rep here, huh? I've already gone to bat for "America's Great National Pastime", and I think both "You All Look Alike" and "Well Come Back Home" on (Untitled) were not that bad "Hungry Planet" sucks, with or without McGuinn's Moog noodlings). And I'd say that "Precious Kate" off Farther Along also isn't horrible. Which leaves really the two tracks here as the absolute dregs of Battin/Fowley. At least "Citizen Kane" has that cool chorus with the Rickenbacher behind it. But "Tunnel Of Love", which sounds like a solo track, is a Fats Domino 'homage'/rip off and has no vestige of Byrds souns left - okay, if "Stanley's Song" isn't the worst Byrds song, then certainly this one is.
ReplyDeletewhile I'm grateful to have all of these Byrds Redux albums, I can't help thinking that our anonymous compiler dropped the ball on this one by not including the quadraphonic mix as a bonus. It was only released on vinyl in Japan and boasts significantly different (better(?)) mixes. There are a couple up on You-Tube and I've heard "Jamaica" which has extra string & woodwind flourishes. I'd include a link to it if I could figure out how...
ReplyDelete