Watch any documentary about the Los Angeles music scene of the 1960s, (believe me there are plenty of them) and the significance of The Byrds quickly becomes apparent – not only in providing a Stateside response to The Beatles, but shaping rock thereafter, casting an influence filtering down through successive generations.
Coming together during the closing weeks of 1964, by June of the following year the original quintet of Jim McGuinn (12-string guitar), Gene Clark (vocals), David Crosby (guitar), Chris Hillman (bass) and Mike Clarke (drums) had achieved worldwide success with ‘Mr. Tambourine Man‘ – restructuring this Bob Dylan folk-ballad into a brilliant Beatlesque opus infused with their own soaring harmonies and distinctive jangling guitar inflections of McGuinn.
Through the following twelve months they recorded two fine albums and released a number of notable singles, whose resonance could be detected many years further on in the work of artists such as Tom Petty, Elvis Costello and The Pretenders.
But as 1966 drew to a close Clark, the most gifted songwriter of the flock, left the band as the pitfalls of such sudden and massive success took hold. For a while The Byrds continued as a quartet, recurring personality clashes not preventing the creation of some pioneering music.
By the time of their fifth album, however, they were down to a trio, as illustrated by the cover, (Crosby having been fired on being described, not for the last time in his career, as impossible to work with) which left McGuinn, Hillman and Clarke to complete work on the seminal ‘Notorious Byrd Brothers‘ set – an L.P. as important to 1968 as the ‘Mr. Tambourine Man‘ single had been to 1965.
As a replacement for Crosby they hired 21-year-old country-rock visionary Gram Parsons at whose instigation they recorded the ground-breaking, Nashville-honed ‘Sweetheart of the Rodeo.’ It proved their worst-selling album to date, although those who heard it went out and formed bands in its image, one of whom would later transition into the Eagles.
Keen to develop the possibilities of fusing country with rock, Parsons left with sudden haste, tempting Hillman and Clarke to join him as they formed The Flying Burrito Brothers. They cut a devastatingly good debut album, the upshot being that it left McGuinn (who by now had changed his name from Jim to Roger), as the only original Byrd with 1969 still a couple of months away.
For the next few years he fronted various aggregations of the band, who through to 1972 made five albums of variable quality, McGuinn displaying increased lack of interest with each successive release.
All of which, despite maintaining renown as a live act, (based on the interplay of McGuinn and the formidable talent of Clarence White, lead guitarist since 1968), affirmed their latter-day studio material while often pleasant was not the exceptional fare of earlier days – that bygone era when no matter what ‘rock‘ was prefaced with, be it ‘folk’, ‘raga‘ ‘space‘ ‘psychedelic‘ or ‘country‘ chances were The Byrds had put their flag there first.
The continuing career of each original member had been far from uneventful. Crosby struck gold in joining forces with Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, the CSN trio then extended to include Neil Young for the big-selling, era-defining ‘Deja Vu‘ set of 1970. But in being heralded as ‘spokesmen for the counter-culture‘ this ego-riven quartet were rarely on speaking terms with each other. By the middle of 1972, Crosby had most recently been heard on a duo album with Nash and the 1971 solo outing ‘If Only I Could Remember My Name‘ which deserved more acclaim than it received at the time.
After The Flying Burrito Brothers called it a day following their third album (Parsons quitting after the second to become a member of the Rolling Stones inner-circle, the songwriting axis of Mick Jagger and Keith Richard showing country nuances as a result), drummer Clarke played sessions to avoid becoming a loose end. For his part Hillman was recruited by Stephen Stills for an ensemble named Manassas, who in 1972 issued a magnificent double-set of the same name, his second-in-command status in this impressive outfit giving the repute of Hillman a timely boost.
Gene Clark meanwhile, in also being recognised as a founding-father of country-rock, had picked up plaudits aplenty for his work with a troupe named Dillard & Clark and also two fine solo albums. Nothing bearing his name, however, had come within a country mile, so to speak, of a chart position.
Through one of his many planned, yet aborted projects came the first stirrings of a reunion of the founder members, each playing on two Clark-penned tracks (‘She’s The Kind of Girl’/One in a Hundred’), that he intended to release as a single in the summer of 1971. In the event it was not released, but the sessions planted the seeds from which a more substantial realignment would evolve.
By the spring of 1972 rumours those present at the start were about to reunite became rife and when individual schedules allowed, a tentative start was made in discovering how they would sound as present-day incarnation.
Buoyed by what they heard and encouraged by a proposal from David Geffen of cutting an album for his recently founded Asylum Records, whose roster already included Jackson Browne and the Eagles, recording time was booked at the Wally Heider studios in Los Angeles through October 1972.
Keen to collaborate in a spirit of goodwill, thus avoiding personal conflicts that resulted in past tempestuous departures, egos, for the most part, were kept in check for the greater good – acquiescence going so far as allowing Crosby to take the role of producer.
In the event some creative tension would not have gone amiss as ‘BYRDS‘ (March 1973) is a disjointed affair, far removed from the innovative work that made this line-up such an enthralling proposition.
With hindsight the enterprise feels more a stop-gap affair between what else the cast had going on at the time rather than concerted effort to present themselves as a fully committed band. McGuinn and Hillman both later admitted they had superior songs in stock (in truth not hard to believe), than the pair each submitted – this material subsequently appearing on solo releases further down the line.
While Gene Clark displayed commitment to the cause with two fine songs, (even then one had been in circulation for 12 months), the album was diminished through not including more of his material, especially in light of two bland Neil Young covers. The pervading input of Crosby extended to a couple of unremarkable compositions of his own and an uninspired version of Joni Mitchell’s ‘For Free.’
Indeed, for a group responsible for so much pioneering music, ‘Byrds‘ is an album defined by what is absent rather than its content – no truly great tracks, not a Dylan offering among the covers and barely any trademark 12-string guitar passages from McGuinn.
In fairness, the album begins in positive fashion, the group producing a sprightly run through of ‘Full Circle‘. This engaging Clark song is taken at a slightly faster lick than the version he cut while recording a solo album the previous year, which true to form where he was concerned, failed in coming to fruition. (The tracks, along with various other unreleased recordings, appeared on his the 1973 ‘Roadmaster‘ compilation).
An enjoyable slice of early ’70s L.A. soft-rock, while the melody and harmonies are reminiscent of ‘Take it Easy‘ which 12 months earlier had given the Eagles their breakthrough hit, the country inflections here provided by Hillman on mandolin.
The lyrics reflect on how life can be cyclical in nature, the notion reinforced by the rear sleeve where the five members are pictured sitting in the Troubadour club in Los Angeles, the place where McGuinn, Clark and Crosby came together as a trio in 1964 on their way to forming the Byrds.
With a wistful vocal the writer contemplates the highs and lows that occur in life, the allusion to how circumstances change but still feel familiar inadvertently pertinent in the context of a reforming ’60s rock outfit:
‘Funny how the circle turns around/First you’re up and then you’re down again/Though the circle takes what it may give/Each time around it makes it live again.’
If the opening track confirms Clark as the writer of superior country-rock pieces, his legacy beginning in 1964 with ‘Feel A Whole Lot Better‘ a song of such majesty it showed The Byrds had capability to out-Beatle The Beatles, then ‘Sweet Mary‘ reveals the folk-singer origins of McGuinn – this downbeat acoustic ballad nicely arranged and performed, if not particularly substantial.
To the accompaniment of ringing guitars and mournful mandolin, the protagonist takes a fatalistic view of a relationship reaching an end:
‘Oh, it’s nothing you said or invited/And it’s nothing you did that was wrong/And our loving together was Heaven/And I’ve promised myself to be strong/Sweet Mary I’ve got to be leavin’/Oh, I can’t let you into my life.’
Things then take a brighter turn, in every sense, the second Clark offering, ‘Changing Heart‘ breezing in to the sound of cheery harmonica and guitars of 6 and 12-string variety.
Lyrically the writer is again found in reflective mood, giving consideration to the fine margins between success and failure, (‘One wheel spinning and one on the ground‘), Clark certain of nothing but the uncertainty of how long glory may last:
‘So many people gather round/A thousand voices lift their praise/For you have reached the top/And so they give you all they’ve got/But when you’re singing from the soul/They fail to see your final goal/They only tell you that you have a long ways left to go.’
The mood goes back down a couple of gears as Crosby leads a brooding take of ‘For Free‘ Joni Mitchell having first aired the song on her captivating ‘Ladies of the Canyon‘ set from 1970.
Despite the vivid imagery of the lyrics, evoking differences between the lives of the writer and a busker seen across a city street, the track while competently performed and passable in its execution lacks the necessary spark to make it memorable – which is a shame as Crosby delivers a committed vocal worthy of more invigorated support.
Of the two Crosby-penned tracks, with ‘Laughing‘ he chose to revisit a song previously featured on his solo L.P. although its history could be traced back even further. It was recorded but not considered, for ‘The Notorious Byrd Brothers‘ an eventuality, among others, precipitating his departure from the group in late 1967 – the composer perhaps affording himself a laugh up his sleeve at its eventual inclusion on a Byrds record.
Two years before Crosby, on his own album, had given the piece a more languid reading and while McGuinn make his presence felt with some characteristic 12-string flourishes, there is often a sense the group are plodding through to the end. At almost six minutes the longest track of the eleven becomes guilty of overstaying its welcome, the abstract nature of lyric while no doubt grandly opaque (‘I thought I met a man who said that he knew a man/Who knew what was going on‘), in 1967 somewhat grandiose six years later.
Altogether more convincing is ‘Long Live the King‘, where Crosby also takes opportunity to ruminate on the falsehoods attached to fame. The ‘wooh Humpty Dumpty now the king is falling down‘ may be stretching an allegory to its limit, but the busy, bristling manner in which the track is performed makes it a valid track, McGuinn once more heard in fine, if understated form as Crosby asserts:
‘They lead you astray, you could be up there all alone/A star they say a million miles away from home/An empty space is that the place you wanted.’
Sadly, neither of the two songs contributed by Hillman are noteworthy, side two opener ‘Things Will Be Better‘ (co-written by Manassas drummer Dallas Taylor), while snappy and energetic is not well served by a blustering lyric. Later on the second side, Hillman comes to the fore again with ‘Borrowing Time‘ – Manassas percussionist Joe Lala receiving a co-write credit – which is the better of his compositions, the ringing mandolin and rich harmony vocals planting this jaunty number firmly in the country-rock field.
The couplet ‘Borrowing time/You know it just ain’t right/It’s so hard to believe/All that’s passed behind‘, connects to the loose, overriding theme of time waiting for nobody. It is safe to say Stills would not have considered either for the next Manassas album, despite ‘Down the Road‘ when it appeared in April 1973 being a mediocre follow-up to its sparkling double-album predecessor.
Upon ‘Byrds‘ being released, when asked about the absence of a number by Dylan, with whose songs they had once been synonymous, Crosby replied that Neil Young was his ’70s equivalent – hence the decision to offer up versions of ‘Cowgirl in the Sand‘ and ‘(See the Sky) About to Rain‘ that was sequenced as the closing track.
The key difference, however, was that back in the day when they performed Dylan material it was done with such verve, their renditions of ‘Mr. Tambourine Man‘, ‘Chimes of Freedom‘ and ‘My Back Pages‘ (to name just three), became authentic Byrd-songs due to the originality involved. But while there is little to truly dislike about each Young cover neither is there much to be enthralled by, ‘Cowgirl in the Sand‘ condensed from his edgy, seven minute original to three minutes of safe country-rock.
At this stage Young had not formally released the latter – it would turn up on his formidable ‘On the Beach‘ set of the following year – and while it would be wrong to say The Byrds fail in doing it justice, there is nothing to suggest others now ploughing the same furrow, be they Poco, America or the Eagles could not have covered it, either song in fact, equally well.
If both fall into the ordinary rather than objectionable category, then McGuinn’s side one closer ‘Born to Rock ‘n’ Roll‘ goes directly into the second bracket. This lumpen, mid-tempo creation while passable enough in the verses, is pole-axed by a cringe worthy chorus, whose ’50s-pastiche background vocals turn it into a nauseating novelty track.
Having cut a version with the ongoing Byrds that was omitted from their 1972 ‘Farther Along‘ record, the reunion album aberration might not even be the worst version in circulation. For that dubious distinction it vies with an equally lamentable take included on the 1975 ‘Roger McGuinn and Band‘ set – the artist himself later acknowledging what an ill-advised move it had been resurrecting the song.
That such a below par piece could make the final cut reflected badly on whoever had responsibility for quality control, not least because a far better McGuinn song, ‘My New Woman‘ was deemed surplus. The composer, wisely in this instance, subsequently allowed this polished, jazz-infused cut to see the light of day on his self-titled debut album later in the year.
The confounding ‘Born to Rock ‘n’ Roll‘/’My New Woman‘ issue became a microcosm of the negative reviews ‘Byrds‘ would receive on release. Writing in Rolling Stone, Jon Landau described it as ‘One of the dullest albums of the year‘ while New York rock scribe Robert Christgau bestowed a C grade from his A-D rating system, dismissing the record as ‘A bunch of stars fabricating a paper reconciliation.’
There proved sufficient intrigue in a Byrds reunification for the album to reach number 20 in the U.S. charts and 31 on U.K. listings, but in the wake of such a pedestrian showing interest turned out to be fleeting and in moving on with their careers, McGuinn, Hillman and Clark were soon distancing themselves from the project.
Indeed, before 1973 was out, McGuinn fulfilled his commitments to the final Byrds line-up he had been fronting prior to the reunion sessions and on winding up that ensemble put out a generally impressive solo album. Gene Clark, the only member to emerge from ‘Byrds’ with his reputation not tarnished, was retained by Asylum for whom he cut the creatively fantastic but commercial flop ‘No Other‘ that appeared in September 1974.
But in the great scheme of things a flawed album was by no means the worst Byrds-related story of the period as 1973 would claim Clarence White (killed by a drunk driver) and Gram Parsons (drug overdose) – the end of their relatively young lives at 29 and 26 respectively, serving to make ‘Byrds‘ a token gesture rather than tragedy.
THE BYRDS – BYRDS (Released 7 March 1973):
Full Circle/Sweet Mary/Changing Heart/For Free/Born to Rock ‘n’ Roll/Things Will Be Better/Cowgirl in the Sand/Long Live the King/Borrowing Time/Laughing/(See the Sky) About to Rain;
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