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| "Are we having fun yet?" |
Here's where I 'fess up. The only guitarist in the Byrds who sounded like the Byrds was Jim-Roger McGuinn. Clarence White has a rabid fan-base of old white guys, but I don't listen to the Byrds for virtuoso guitar-slingin'. I can get that from any number of fine fret-fumblers. Really. I've been trying to play the guitar for nearly sixty years now, and I'm in awe of anyone who can get through an entire song - leave alone an entire career, so Clarence "is just alright with me". But when it comes to the Byrds, I need jangle. Like I need air. And there's enough of it on the studio album to satisfy the monkey on my back. Plus some fine Jim-Roger songs salvaged from his face-palm Gene Tryp project. There are some weak moments - Welcome Back Home has seven minutes and forty-two seconds of them, and Truck Stop Girl is a missed opportunity [It's shit - Ed.].
The live album is better than anyone expected, but whether it would have stood up on its own as the Byrds' first live album is a question as dumb as it is unanswerable. Bass solo advisory.
Forty-one tracks on this "complete" version, and it's maybe time to reiterate that I didn't assemble these editions - they're the loving work of some internet anonymous with far more patience and knowledge than I gots.
First to get the reference in the picture caption gets the download.
ReplyDeleteNot particularly. That said, dear Farquhar, for some reason this is one of my fave Boids elpees. The horsey song is nice. My father came home and moved us to the panhandle of Florida. The bayou was all over the place. I could hitch to Naw Leans and back in less than 8 hours. I went to Atchafalaya with the giant Nutria rats. I mostly hung out in the alligator infested backwaters of the Gulf Coast. I think this came out when I still lived in Ohio but next thing I knew I was swimming in bomb craters at the edge of the base, the fake VC village from the John Wayne Green Beret movie. For some reason a lot of Thai girls went there to skinny dip. This is just the tip of the LINK?
ReplyDeleteThis is a swell comment, Fiveguns, worthy of working up into a scrimshaw narwhal tusk. But it ain't the link I'm looking for - and why should I make it easy for youse?. Nah - I want the connection between the caption and the album cover (other than "the caption is just below the picture DUH.")
DeleteMy answer was not particularly
DeleteNot particularly right, either.
DeleteIt does occur to me that, given the kinds of disaffection betrayed all over the album cover, the words in the caption would make a more entertaining, indeed appropriate title than the one that's (allegedly) missing.
ReplyDeleteIf downloads were given for collegiate smarts, you'd be struggling under their weight.
DeleteThis seems a little tenuous, but so what?
ReplyDeleteThe photo of the group on the cover was shot at Griffith Observatory in LA, and the person credited with originating the caption is cartoonist Bill Griffith. Is he related to the family that endowed the observatory? I don't know. And no, judging from their expressions on the cover, the band is definitely NOT having fun yet...
John weighs in with the right answer! I don't know if the cartoonist is related or not, but "Griffith" is indeed the connection between the caption and the image. Anyone commenting "what he said!" later is banned from downloading.
DeleteShould really be a Zippy link.
Yeah, and also what John said!
ReplyDelete*Instagram sadface*
DeleteThat song about a horsie was what got me into the Boids...even if I first heard it in a version from the fake-as-fuck Byrds on one of those fake comps that were out in the 90s (and didn't even have the saving grace of having some of Gene Clark's CRY stuff on it, seriously). So that goes to show that even some absolutely hacks can not destroy the majesty of a song such as Brown Female Horsie...
ReplyDeleteOh, hey, there's still a handful of curios on here I don't have like that ridiculously cut down single version of the horsie song and the hilariously overwrought and oversung version of "Just A Seson" by Mr. Doris Day Jr. (which, admittedly and fascinatingly, sounds like an entirely different song).
ReplyDeleteAnd no offense to the unknown anonymous compiler, but "Just Like A Woman" belongs on the complete Byrdmaniax...
I was going to post Terry Melcher's solo album with the card players on the cover (title erased from memory) but trashed it instead, as a public service. Does he have the worst recorded voice in history? I haven't heard everyone yet, but so far, I'd say he does. It's like listening to Cthulhu.
Delete"It's like listening to Cthulhu."
DeleteOkay, that made me laugh.
I reject the pat and all too convenient version of reality and offer the following "alternative facts" that offer your readers a much more compelling and emotionally satisfying truth to the picture riddle you pose: hats are "fun" and "fun" has three letters and there are three sunset trip "cowboys" on the cover photo who while not having fun are festooned in fun head attire. You can't argue with that logic. Do I win the boobie prize?
ReplyDeleteThis is, in fact, correct, but John's answer seemed so much more obvious I pretended it was the right one!
DeleteIt's amazing that the internet can throw together four or five guys whose brains are functioning - albeit barely - on the same wavelength!
I want opinions - if they are to be had - on the live album half of this set. Any opinions. Any at all.
ReplyDeleteOpinions on the live LP. You want 'em? You got 'em!
DeleteI've always hated that jam, which would've been more honestly called "Clarence and Jim-Roger want a cigarette break, so here's five minutes of Skip Battin goin' wild on your ass with bass-jam". The version on Live At The Albert Hall is slightly better. However, I really like McGuinn's agressiveness on "Positively 8th Street", "Lover of the Bayou" and especially "So you want to be a Rock'n'roll star" which I prefer to the studio version.
I think the live half of the original album is a little disappointing. The harmonies are mixed way too low. I saw them live six times from 1970 to 1972
ReplyDeleteand there harmonies were amazingly strong and accurate. The two key ingredients in the best Byrds' recordings are jangle AND harmonies. They aren't well represented here.
Having said that, the live version of "Ballad Of Easy Rider" included here is my favourite version...
That's interesting about the harmonies. They're not really exploited to best effect on the studio half, or Dr. Byrds and Easy Rider, either. Terry Melcher has a lot to answer for. Listening to Truck Stop Girl - it sounds like a deliberate denial of harmony. If they were capable of "sounding like the Byrds" live - and I take your word for it absolutely - why not on record? It's the aural equivalent of dumping that logo. Yes - jangle and harmonies. Both boxes need to be checked.
DeleteAt least the harmonies are prominent on Dr.Byrds which makes it the most Byrds sounding album of the last five. "Truck Stop Girl" in concert had harmonies AND jangle and was all the better for it. I LOVE the way Clarence integrates his country licks into the verse of Tambourine Man on Untitled.
ReplyDeleteI think McGuinn's ego had a lot to do with the curtailment of the harmonies.John York's high harmony on "Tulsa County" is mixed ridiculously low. The harmonies on the Live At The Albert Hall CD are also way too low. I was at that show and they were much more prominent on the night...
Agreed with John about the harmonies on some live boots being much more prominent.
ReplyDelete"Tulsa County" is another story entirely. According to John York, Melcher insisted on York giving him the publishing rights to "Fido" and when York refused his original version of "Tulsa County" the alternative version with York's lead vocal was nixed and then taken over by McGuinn as York was told by Melcher that "Roger sounds more like a cowboy" (whatever the hell that means). And to top off the pettiness I imagine they mixed John's harmonies way too low.
I feel that for some reasons until "Farther Along" songs with Clarence White leads were particularly bad served by production and/or arrangement choices. The shorter and much punchier "Oil in my Lamp" should've been included instead of the version on the album, where White sings in that weird faux-Appalachian nasal whine and the very simple song gets repetitive mighty quick.
"Truck Stop Girl" has again that weird nasal whine which goes so far as to sound almost parodic and makes some of the lyrics almost unintelligible. I mean I love that song and Clarence did much better versions of it in concert, but on the record the song comes off as weirdly unfinished and unrefined.
We'll discuss the production choices on Byrdmaniax when that album comes along but to have a beautiful, well-produced lead vocal by White you have to wait until "Farther Along".
Speaking of the high harmonies by York that I , like John, adore and makes that short-lived version my favorite of the post-original band: Everyone here knows of and has a version of the concert known as the Boston Tea Party, right?!
ReplyDelete(I wanted to post that under the Ballad album, where it's more appropriate, but the speed at the House Of Foam passed me by.)
https://www.guitars101.com/forums/f145/byrds-1969-02-22-boston-ma-sbd-flac-166689-2.html
(it's flac but I'm sure that can be transformed)
A must hear boot from them Boids especially if you like John York. Tons of rarely played or exclusive songs on that set, plus York gets five lead vocals and his harmony singing is almost a co-lead at times. A top five Boids boot in my opinion.
I've always enjoyed the McGuinn penned songs, but the rest of the album, apart from Yesterday's Train and the Dylan cover, doesn't do anything for me. The 16 minute jam is worse than tedious. Never even listened to it on the expanded CD.
ReplyDeleteI had thought of uploading the Melcher album from which the version of Just a Season comes, but having listened to 30 seconds of it I decided against it. What is contained in the link below is his version of Tulsa County Blue, which for some reason he changed the title, from the card players' album, which, Mr T, is called Royal Flush. Also a version of Yesterday's Train from the Clarence White compilation CD, White Lightning.
https://pixeldrain.com/u/h7RGG7mM
And if anyone has never heard the original version of Hungry Planet it can be found here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0prx7tMmXVw
I can understand McGuinn deciding to take a back seat as far as lead guitar work when teamed with Clarence White, but that does not explain his going on to hire other, far inferior, guitarists, viz Bowden, Vito, Sambataro, during the 70s.
Finally (Gott sei Dank) having coveted John York's hat on Dr Byrds, I took a shine (pun probably intended) to Clarence's shoes here. Found a pair somewhat similar and after wearing them twice decided it was a mistake and never wore them again. Ho hum.
sambgodot,
Deletecould you possibly upload the interesting stuff you're posting on something other than pixeldrain? My antivirus program redirects me, claiming it is a malware-spreading site...
As for "Hungry Planet"...jeez, I thought the Byrds version was bad, but it could have been much worse. Also goes to show how much control our control freak Jim-Roger ceded in the last years of the Byrds. At the time of (Untitled) he would still nix the boogie-woogie novelty songs that Battin/Fowley were writing, but we were not so lucky on the next two albums. And I say that as someone who's actually defending "America's Great National Pastime"...
https://workupload.com/file/bztc8cW9ZxW One Buck Guy try this, the same that Mr T uses.
DeleteThaks,sambgodot, that worked. I don't know why Pixeldrain makes my antivirus program go nuts but it is very adamant I don't go there...
DeleteChrist, after listening to that Melcher song I can see why Fraq trashed the idea of posting this stuff. Chtulhu goes to Mexico! *shudder*
DeleteSambgodot, isn't this version of "Yesterday's Train" the same as the one on "Unissued"?
That's interesting, yes, they do seem to be the same, which means that the liner notes on the White CD (2009) were wrong in claiming the version therein was previously unreleased, which is the reason I put it up there. That'll teach me to listen more carefully in future, presuming there is a one, a future, that is. Hey ho. So it goes.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAwesome as always....though I'm fonder of the Clarence White era than perhaps thyself. There are maybe four guitarists in history that I drop whatever it is I'm doing to listen to, and two of them are on this record. (the other two are Richard Thompson and John McGeoch, not that anyone cared). So thanks for these!
ReplyDeleteSo howzabout Byrdmaniax....Naked?