Friends of Friends: Burritos for the Eighties, anyone..?

One group's valley is another group's mountain. And nowhere is that more true than in our ongoing (though soon ending) adventures of The Flying Burrito Brothers. Once they were flying no more, they were flying higher than ever. And while they finally climbed the mountain of charts success, for some their output is the nadir of The Flying Burrito Brothers. Those last folks would be wrong by the way. But yeah, we are now entering the phase in which the once again reconstituted Burritos would shed both the Flying from their band name - seemingly upon pressure from the record company - and also any pretension of upholding classic country traditions. Nothing on the records of the newly christened Burrito Brothers would be something a stone cold trad country guy like Gram Parsons would recognize. 

Originally The Burrito Brothers were indeed a continuation of the reborn Burritos from 1975. Gene Parsons had been replaced by old Byrds comrade Skip Battin, and several years and several misadventures too long to recount later, three of the five Burritos from 1976 were still going: Gib Guilbeau, Sneaky Pete Kleinow and Battin. The new guy in tow was, as per usual for the band, an old acquaintance: Guilbeau's old bandmate in Swampwater, John Beland. Both men immediately hit up a fruitful songwriting partnership. And from these sessions sprang the songs for the Burrito Brothers, a project that was way more commercial than anything they had issued since at least Flying Again. Too much for Skip Battin, who got quickly sidelined (with no hope at any lead vocals), and - despite being on the cover of the first album - quit the band during the making of their first album. Afterwards, the band continued on as a trio for a bit (while picking up bassists and drummers as needed), but then decisions loomed. 

True to their new sound, Guilbeau & Beland wanted to move to Nashville, while Sneaky Pete - a Los Angelito for almost twenty years now - wanted to continue his dual career as an animator, thus letting the other two leave with the Burritos name in tow. Quick trivia time: What do The Empire Strikes Back, The Right Stuff, The Terminator and Gremlins have in common? Sneaky Pete worked on their special visual effects, even if he wasn't always credited! Yay, Sneaky!

But Kleinow was now gone from the group he founded and led throughout its first revival phase, though admittedly in Beland & Guilbeau's new, slicker country sound there wasn't much space for his attention-heavy pedal steel style. With Kleinow gone, the two Burrito Brothers decided to stay as a duo and pick up musicians whenever live shows called for them. And so they did. And as indicated in the opening paragraph, they did it very successfully. Having had a single chart entry for a single, a measly (and fluky) 95 in 1979, they racked up nine singles hits, seven of them Top 50 hits (with one other barely missing, at 53). The Flying Burrito Brothers never were a commercially successful band, the Burrito Brothers definitely were...

But is the music any good? Yes, if you can stomach a certain slickness that comes with Beland's & Guilbeau's style. It's no wonder that they finally started to sell some records, because they both could write highly commercial music with clear and big hooks, recored with an extremely professional sound. Friends Of Friends is a compilation of what to my mind is the best of the Burrito Brothers, culled from the entire period of their adventures, from first single "She's A Friend Of A Friend" to songs from their goodbye album recorded years after they stopped (Back To The Sweethearts Of The Rodeo). Some of these songs, like "I'm Drinkin' Canada Dry" have some solid country humour, others show their hand for ballads ("Burning Embers"). It might be hard to reconcile what the Burrito Brothers are doing with, say, The Gilded Palace Of Sin, but taken on their own, this is a fun listen. Spring is knocking on our doors, and this is pretty good driving music, if nothing else. But also something else. 

And with this entry we are almost at the end of the One Buck Records Burrito week. Tomorrow, as a sort of "encore", the Burrito Brothers do their final stand, at least on One Buck Records, with a live album, and then we're off to something else...

   

  

When you're right, you're right, m'am...

 

Uh oh, those Burrito Brothers are flying again...

Blame the Dutch. No, really. I mean, I blame the Dutch all the time for all kinds of things (it's genetic), but as for why The Flying Burrito Brothers couldn't just be a fond memory in the eyes of (too) few country rock fans...blame the Dutch. Already the biggest market both for country rock and for the accompanying bootlegs, the Dutch couldn't get enough of The Flying Burrito Brothers. Even after Chris Hillman and Al Perkins left for Stephen Stills' Manassas, a last lucrative tour of the Netherlands couldn't be passed up, so Rick Roberts and the last iteration of the Burritos, a tried-and-true bluegrass band ready to launch their career as Country Gazette went to the Netherlands one last time in early 1972 to wrap up any Burrito commitments. But the Dutch still couldn't get enough, so Roberts & Co. returned one year later for one last 'one last tour', this time even including Sneaky Pete, despite Country Gazette having issued their proper album, just as Rick Roberts had issued his, a highly underrated affair. 

A year later, A & M issued their retrospective double album Close Up The Honky Tonks, including some rarities (which of course made up my 'final album' Last Supper) and the Dutch chimed in with their own version, Honky Tonk Heaven. Neither of these sold particularly well, but it kept the band name going, especially in Europe (blame the...well, you get the idea). So old Byrds and Burritos manager Eddie Tickner hatched a plan for the great return of The Flying Burrito Brothers. They would indeed be flying again.  With every member of the later versions busy or uninterested, Tickner could at least get two founding members of the classic era, Chris Ethridge and Sneaky Pete to go for it. Ethridge had already recorded with Joel Scott Hill as L.A. Getaway on an album of the same name in 1972 (often credited to Hill, Ethridge & Barbata), and had been with him in a band called The Dockerhill Boys, also including ex-Byrd Gene Parsons. Those four then recruited Gib Guilbeau, with whom Parsons had worked before The Byrds came calling, and this five-piece were your new Flying Burrito Brothers. 

From the mercenary way the band was revived to the way country rock veterans, if possible with a connection to the old band or at least its contemporaries, were recruited, this would be the way of the Burrito from now on. These Flying Burrito Brothers were already the 13th iteration of the band and before the name was finally retired in 2000 another 39 (!) line-ups would follow. But these first ersatz Burritos, were they any good? As a matter of fact, they were. Flying Again was a pretty strong effort, highlighting a good batch of original songs from the likes of Hill, Parsons and Guilbeau. Besides the sequel "Hot Burrito No. 3" which reminds people that it's never a good idea to follow up classics with a distinct title, the ony issue is the abundance of covers cluttering up the latter part of side a, possibly included at the behest of the record company. The Burritos had already covered "Dim Lights" with Gram Parsons on vocals, even though at least the upbeat version here, dominated by fiddle, takes a slightly different spin, whereas George Jones' "Why Baby Why" sounds utterly pedestrian, like a barroom band on an uninspired tuesday evening. Which, in many ways, these Burritos were. 

But they had good, even excellent stuff on here, otherwise the One Buck Guy would't bother. The new Burritos covered two Dan Penn songs, with their take on "You Left The Water Runnng" a fair approximation of Gram Parsons' old Cosmic American Music, which really was only country soul. But the real highlight here is their take on Penn's "Buildig Fires", arguably one of the finest country rock offerings of the period. It was issued as a single, albeit without success, as usual. Gene Parsons brings his usual humble persona and warm vocals to his own "Desert Childhood", a beautiful reminiscence, Gib Guilbeau's "Bon Soir Blues" recalls his Louisiana roots, and "River Road" is just a really good country rock tune, which maybe should've been the closer instead of the well-meant but..uh...not as well executed "Hot Burito #3".

So, Flying Again might not be up to the heights of the classic era, but it kicked off the 'up for grabs' era of the Burritos in style and is probably the best studio record any Flying Burrito Brothers outfit cut after the heydays of the band. It is also the band's highest charting release, though that is of course only a relative feat. It might be the Burritos' best seller, but still only reached a measly 138 on the charts. Soon, more changes were afoot for those Burrito Boys, but for now they were flying again, and relatively high in the sky. Not soaring, mind you, but a flight well worth joining nonetheless...

P.S.: What certainly didn't help the record was the abysmal cover art. I left the record untouched but provided a better alternative to the grisly original. I mean seriously, what were they thinking? I wouldn't want to buy a record that has freaky butterfly monster girl on the cover. Would you? 

          Hi! I'm freaky butterfly monster girl! Please buy this record! Or I'll murder you!

 

A Burrito or more for your last supper?

If the dismissal of Gram Parsons and the disappointing showing of The Flying Burrito Bros. weren't enough to do the band in, Stephen Stills was. Since the last time we've seen them, founding member "Sneaky" Pete had left the band to concentrate - like Chris Ethridge before him - on better paying studio session work. The pedal steel was now manned by Al Perkins. Bernie Leadon was the next to go (replaced by old Hillman comrade Kenny Wertz), leaving the band to back up Linda Ronstadt, where he ran into a couple of other musicians struggling to make their mark (Glenn Frey, Don Henley & Randy Meisner) and nothing was ever heard of these four guys again. Nope, nothing. Like, ever. 

Hillman - realizing that he had a band capable of paying his first love, bluegrass, right under his nose - asked veteran fiddle player Byron Berline to join, finally adding Kenny Bush on bass, so Hillman could concentrate on playing mandolin. In mid-1972 Stills invited the core Burritos Hillman, Roberts, Perkins and Berline down to Florida to jam with him, then issued official invites to Hillman, Perkins and Berline. The latter declined, but Hillman and Perkins agreed, bringing the Flying Burrito Brothers to a temporary end.

In order to wrap up their contract with A &M Records, the Burritos still owed them a final album, and it was the classic 'live album as contract filler' situation. The Last Of The Red Hot Burritos was an okay album and a pretty good reflection of the bluegrass-heavy stage show at the time, but as a final statement of the band it was...relatively underwhelming. This got the One Buck Guy thinking: What if, instead of bringing out a live album, A & M had insisted on bringing out a studio platter as the final Burrito record? This is what Last Supper is, an album compiled from leftovers to fulfill their contract. 

The band had cut a number of songs before and after The Flying Burrito Bros., about two thirds of an album. In order to fill up the album, why not go back to the archives and the Gram Parsons era, adding three tracks from the loose cover material sessions they did right before or after Burrito Deluxe (there's conflicting information concerning the time line here). In this way, Last Supper would also pay homage to the band's entire era, not just the late-era Hillman-Roberts version of the band. 

Last Supper opens with the familiar fuzz of Sneaky Pete's steel, so "Did You See" must've come from right before The Flying Burrito Bros. From this reminder of the Burrito sound we delve right into their C&W standard war chest, with Parsons' take on "Dim Lights", before highlighting Roberts ("In My Own Small Way", later issued on Roberts' solo album) and Sneaky Pete ("Beat The Heat"), sandwiched around Hillman's take on Jesse Winchester's "Payday", before digging out the Gene Clark-led outtake "Here Tonight" to close out what would habe been side a.

Side b would then open with a fuzzy version of the Stones' "Hony Tonk Women", courtesy of Parsons, of course, before adding another cover sung by Hillman (Harlan Howard's "Pick me Up On Your Way Down"), a cameo by Bernie Leadon to sing lead on John Fogerty's "Lodi", Parsons' excellent take on "To Love Somebody" and Roberts' "Feel Good Music", closing with a reminder of the heartfelt beauty Parsons could bring to the band, on a fragment of Dylan's "I Shall Be Released". 

So, Last Supper as conceived gives you a great, democratic overview of The Flying Burrito Brothers as they were from 1969 to 1972. It could and would have been a fine way to say goodbye. But either way the goodbye was only temporary, as we will see in our next chapter of the ongoing Burritos saga here at One Buck Records Burrito Week...

Burrito week continues: Chapter two: The Burritos transform into...Eagles (?!?)

Blame The Cult Of Parsons, again. When people talk about The Flying Burrito Brothers, they basically only talk about the band when Gram Parsons was in it. To a certain type of music critic (and music fan), the band seems to stop existing the moment Parsons was fired for showing up a mess one too many times. Everything that you read about the Burritos is basically all about Parsons, so until I picked up Hot Burritos! The Flying Burrito Brothers Anthology 1969-1972 back when it came out I didn't even know that the original band had recorded a third album. Not lumped in with the new and revived Burritos starting a couple of years later and that some would dismiss as a total travesty, yet not attached to The Cult Of Parsons, it exists in a weird shadow zone of its own. One out of which One Buck Records is trying to lift it now. 

First of all, The Flying Burrito Bros (a.k.a. the "blue album") is a very fine album. It also sounds nothing like The Gilded Palace Of Sin. By 1971 the band was completely overhauled. Bernie Leadon and Michael Clarke had already joined for Burrito Deluxe, the extremely disappointing second album (and last of Parsons' tenure). I already talked in detail about country rock's problem of following up a classic album when presenting Manassas' reworked second album Do You Remember The Americans? back in December. Burrito Deluxe is a disjointed mess, the result of creative juices stopping to flow while drugs and alcohol really started flowing, especially for Parsons. Recording sessions were haphazard, inspired songwriting at a minimum. The laziness of Parsons especially is exemplified by opening the album with, you guessed it, "Lazy Days", a song written in 1967 and already cut (and not used) by The Byrds. 

After the disppointment of Burrito Deluxe and the departure of Parsons the band needed to rebound in a big way, and did. Hillman, the best second banana in music, had drafted in another guy to share lead vocal and front man status with. The job had gone to virtually unknown Rick Roberts, who acquitted himself quite nicely. He gets credited on all seven of the album's original songs, co-writing four with Hillman and getting three solo songs including "Colorado", which became an instant standard of their live show. The sound became softer, very heavy on harmonies and shared leads. If it didn't sound like the Burritos of old, it certainly sounds a lot like the softer tracks of what the Eagles would do very soon. 

All three outside tracks are great, and Roberts' delicate balladry, verging on folk at times, bring a different aspect to the band. It's certainly an album that, a year after James Taylor's breakthrough, could have and should have found a bigger audience. Instead, it sank lile a stone, beating Burrito Deluxe by actuallycreeping into the charts, but at a disappointing 176. A harsh result for a fine album, which you are hereby cordially invited to discover (or re-discover?)...

PS: If you're thinking "Oh, the One Buck Guy is just gonna lazily post a bunch of normal FBB albums", be back the day after tomorrow for an alternate album of what could have been the swansong of the "classic era" band... 

It's Burritos week here at OBG's! Chapter one: Come into the gilded palace of sin...

Where do you go when you already start at the top of the mountain? This is a luxury problem to have, for sure, considering how many bands and artist never ever climb that mountain. But it is a problem nonetheless. What do you do, if your best work is already done right after that first album? Try to top it somehow? Have more modest additions? The accompanying question for me is of course: Is there a point to a project involving a band that by general consensus only got worse during its tumultous tenure. (And that is, if we count all approximately 1.254 iterations of the group as coming from the same bloodline. The story of The Flying Burrito Bros. is a story of devolution, rather than evolution, and a story of diminishing returns. It's a story worth telling anyway, I believe, and will do my best to do so...

So, The Flying Burrito Brothers, a name that is immediately and intimately associated with Gram Parsons and - to a lesser degree - Chris Hillman, but it's also a name that then passed through the hands of dozens and dozens of country rock journeymen, sometimes with the participation of founding member "Sneaky" Pete Kleinow, sometimes without a single original Burrito. But hold! Technically, the guys we think of as The Flying Burrito Brothers - Parsons, Hillman, Kleinow and bass man Chris Ethridge weren't the original Burritos, either. They recovered the name from a loose group of musicians, half ex-members of The Remains, half ex-members of Parsons' old group The International Submarine Band. who also let dozens of musician sit in with them, when they moved back east. Maybe the name was supposed to be passed along from one group of relatively down on their luck country rockers to others to try and make something out of it. 

After all, The Gilded Palace Of Sin is an all-time classic, an album that could conceivably be included on 'greatest albums of all time'-lists, yet it barely charted and half of the copies it sold seems to have gone straight into the hands of other musicians. Technically, only three of the Burritos albums even charted, none higher than a pretty dysmal 138, and the band never had a single charts single until a live version of "White Line Fever" became a fluke charts entry in 1979, a full decade after the Burritos we all remember started.

Is there anything interesting that I can add when talking about The Gilded Palace Of Sin? Probably not. It's a fantastic record, top to bottom, one of the most consistent records to come out of the subgenre. Some folks don't like the talking-blues-style closing number "Hippie Boy", but I think it's just fine. "Hot Burrito #1" and "Hot Burrito #2" admittedly have terrible names, akin to an artist titling a piece "Untitled No. 67", but they are fantastic, and "#1", better remembered as "I'm Your Toy" has become an oft covered genre classic. The anti-draft anthem "My Uncle" and "Wheels", the unofficial thme song for the always-on-the-road Burritos have equally reached genre classic status. "Sin City" is every bit the genre classic that Nick Hornsby's protagonist Rob describes it as in High Fidelity. I mean, really, there are no weak spots. The double covers of "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man" and "Dark End of The Street" could look uninspired, but really were a matter of the heart for Parsons. 

So, we'll start on the top of the mountain and then slowly come down. But we'll also reclimb some modest peaks, and even in the valleys there are worthwhile sights and sounds. Well, sounds, mostly. 

So I'll hope you travel along with me all the way through Burrito week here at One Buck Records. Let's get going. First stop: The Gilded Palace Of Sin. 

Kate Bush and her sky of honey

Ah, Kate Bush, the elder stateswoman of art pop. How satisfying it was two years ago to see her belatedly get to number one with "Running Up That Hill", undoubtedly one of her best songs. Sure, it needed Stranger Things, but quality is quality, and considering what else is floating around in the charts these days...

Bush worked steadily, if slowly, throughout the late 70s and 80s and into the early 90s, but then - poof - she was gone. 1993's The Red Shoes, arguably her most streamlined and conservative pop effort, including guest spots for Eric Clapton and Prince, wasn't the start of her second career phase as some sort of adult contemporary pop star. A planned one year hiatus turned into twelve, allowing Bush to start a family and otherwise drop out of the public eye entirely.

And then, without warning, she was back. Aerial, in 2005. A double album, with pretentious titles, just like in the old days. Disc 1, A Sea of Honey, was fine, a collection of art pop songs in different style. But for me the real treasure was Disc 2, A Sky Of Honey. A conceptual piece, it is designed to show 24 hours passing by. It has a narrator and recurring characters. It is, in short, Kate Bush's fully fledged prog album. But its status as, essentially, a bonus disc of sorts makes me think that A Sky Of Honey is both underappreciated and simply not heard enough. Considering its structure as a song cycle, A Sky Of Honey makes no sense as individual pieces, so I decided to edit its songs into one album-long track. I kept the parts mostly untouched, shortening and tightening up some of the track transitions, but that's about it. I want the pieces (or now, the piece) to speak for itself.

There is one (well, one and a half) notable exception: Bush's witchy voice has its raison d'être, and can and does get used effectively, but I didn't need to hear it at this long end's journey into the night, so I did bring in my scissorhands right for the end. I found some of the noisy (and, uh, witchy) excesses of "Nocturn" and "Aerial" too much. Three quarters of A Sky Of Honey are pastoral and lush, so the intrusion of a noisier sound right at the end wasn't my cup of tea. It broke the spell of what came before a little bit, so those pieces got shortened. You will still get the gist of Bush's night's end, but in a slightly gentler way.

So, I need about 36 uninterupted minutes of your time to get lost in A Sky Of Honey. Its a trip well worth taking...

Meet Mike and Rick, shadow men of California pop rock

For guys who didn't really leave much of a mark in terms of their own name value, Richard and Michael Curtis sure left a mark. Who had the only non-member song on Fleetwood Mac's eponymous 1975 smash? These guys did. Who wrote the framework of the song that gave Crosby, Stills & Nash a Top Twenty hit in 1982? These guys did. Who was part of a legendary group that - like the aforementioned 'Mac - was a rhythm section looking for creators up front? These guys were. And yet, despite propping up Crazy Horse after all the big guns left, despite getting a leg up from old pal Lindsey Buckinham when he recorded their "Blue Letter", and despite being positioned to make some sort of dent in the California soft rock scene, the Curtis Brothers never really did. But their music is here, and its is well worth hearing, so here at One Buck Records, we want to celebrate the contributions of these two men,  constantly lurking in the shadows of California rock and pop, but never really attracting the spotlight themselves.  

Like so many other musicians closely associated with the West Coast music scene, the Curtis brothers weren't from anywhere near California. They came out of Goshen, Indiana, and music was part of the family business. These Vizitors, the band they started as teenagers included fellow brother Tom and sister Patty, their dad was a local DJ. These Vizitors recorded two singles for Capitol which both charted, but no albums or follow-ups were coming. The band had relocated to Palm Beach, Florida but when it became clear that These Vizitors had run their course, Michael and Rick moved to Southern California. 

They were hired by Billy Talbot & Ralph Molina, a rhythm section who had the right to a classic band name - Crazy Horse, obviously - but not much else. Being neither singers nor songwriters, Talbot & Molina split singing and songwriting duties between the Curtis brothers and Greg Leroy. The resulting album At Crooked Lake has its moments, but is otherwise relatively unremarkable country-influenced rock, though Rick especially brought an interesting psychedelic undercurrent to his songs. Crazy Horse became dormant after the failure of At Crooked Lake, so Michael lent his talents for one album to jazz-inspired Canadian band Truck (previously featured on All Pearls No Swine Vol. 8). 

The Curtises then reconvened in L.A. to plot their next move. Finally securing a record deal with Polydor, they became friends with a duo of musicians - a pair both professionally and in private - who had just recently recorded and released their debut album. Their names? Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. Both played and sang on a handful of demos, including a song the brothers had written, "Seven League Boots" (previously featured on All Pearls, No Swine Vol. 3). The song wasn't great, with the Curtises still getting the hang of writing (hint: it's not a rhyme if the words are the same! "If I had to go around the world / just to find your world" is a pretty awful chorus. Who are these guys, Kid Rock's ghostwriters?). But hook and melody of the song was solid, so Stephen Stills rewrote it almost a decade later, turning it into the much more coherent "Southern Cross" for Crosby, Stills & Nash's Daylight Again album.

But the Curtises were still waiting for something big to happen, and finally in 1975 things got moving. They got a record deal with Polydor and went into the studio to record their first album as The Curtis Bros. (or The Curtis Brothers Band). And who was in an adjacent recording booth, purely by accident? Old pal Lindsey Buckingham, recording with Fleetwood Mac. Liddy Buck heard the Curtises' "Blue Letter" and spontaneously decided to record it for and with the Mac. This should've given an additional boost to The Curtis Bros. , but when their album (with their own version of "Blue Letter") came out in 1976? Crickets. If the album isn't a work of genius, it's a very fine record straddling the line between pop and rock, sometimes verging on soft rock,. It probably deserved better than the absolute non-reaction it got. 

The band went back into the studio two years later for International Artists to record a follow-up, including a couple of tracks - sign of the times - that start to have a bit of a disco flavor but that album was then unceremoniously shelved, and so was for all intents and purposes the career of Mike & Rick. In Rick's case, literally, as he seemingly quit the music business after the failure of The Curtis Brothers Band. Michel went the opposite direction, hustling for jobs, becoming a touring musician with Hoyt Axton, then later Gene Clark and others. Rick Curtis dies suddenly and unexpectedly, not to mention too young, from a seizure in 1995. 

Family Affair: A Curtis Brothers Anthology compiles pretty much everything I could find from and featuring Rick & Michael Curtis, including four tracks from These Vizitors, four tracks from Crazy Horse (with the respective lead singer mentioned first in the tracks ' credits) and every tracks from The Curti Brothers Band, both their eponymous album and the shelved follow-up. I thought that Michael's work with Truck didn't jibe well with the rest, so some of that will feature on future volumes of All Pearls, No Swine but the anthology also features a handful of Michael Curtis solo tracks, including his cover of Gene Clark's "Gypsy Rider", recorded after spending years with Clark on the road, first as part of the infamous Byrds tribute that later morphed into the Django Band (as they were credited for the live rendering of "Southern Cross" featured here). Both discs (yup, I'm still compiling these as ready-to-be-burned to disc! Sue me!) end with Michael on acoustic guitar, from only a couple of years ago. At the end of disc one he laments "Man's Inhumanity To Man", while disc two ends bittersweetly with the only solo track from Rick I could find, a mid-60s recording of him doing an acoustic folk version of "Wendigo", followed by Michael's "It's Hard To Say Goodbye", his moving eulogy for his fallen brother. 

They might have mainly operated in the shadows of bigger, more important bands and artists, but Rick & Mike deserve their hour (or two) in the spotlight, which is exactly what Family Affair - A Curtis Brothers Anthology will provide you. So, towards the light and the sweet sounds of the Seventies, folks...

  

 

Saddle Up...with Beyoncé

A couple of weeks ago I wouldn't have thought I would post an album (or rather, a variation thereof) from 2024 and I would have even less thought it'd be an album by Beyoncé. I probably haven't thought about Beyoncé in fifteen years, because in 2009 "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)" was everywhere and had the potential to annoy the heck out of you. The last time I looked forward to hearing Beyonce is probably about twenty years ago (sheesh...) when "Crazy In Love" came out, which was a great single, no matter how you slice it. So color me as surprised as you are by what ended up our One Buck Record of the day. 

Beyoncé released Cowboy Carter at the end of last month as part of an ambitious multiple album project (this is seemingly 'Act II', so all i's in the songtitles are doubled. Artistic or silly, you ask? Both, I'd say!), this time venturing into country territory. And, as you all by now, you can always lure the One Buck Guy with something country-related. When I posted my little Hick Hop compilation a couple of weeks ago, I was probably unconsciously pushed to do so by having heard "Texas Hold 'Em" a couple of days before, which in turn reminded me of Bubba Sparxxx' "Deliverance" which in turn...well, you know. So rather than just letting that spark of inspiration lay where it came from, I decided to dive deeper into Beyoncé's so-called country record. And boy, is there some diving to do. Because Cowboy Carter (I'm sure the title has some gender-critical point to make that I can't care to bother with) suffers from what I called in the comment thread of my Hick Hop platter the rap album problem, namely a tendency to overstuff their albums with too many songs and a number of skits and interludes. Cowboy Carter might not be a rap album, but it suffers from that exact issue, running a rather unreasonable 78+ minutes over a whooping 27 tracks, including skits with country outlaws Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson, plus a bunch of other guests. 

Cutting through all the clatter and filler was the first issue. There is some very good, and some very interesting music on that record, but it gets bogged down by too much of everything a bit everywhere. However, the idea of saving the highlights and have a much more streamlined alternate album took root almost immediately. The idea was to keep mainly the vaguely country-related stuff and build around that. Cowboy Carter isn't strictly speaking a country album, it is rather - like hick hop - a hybrid between beats, country instrumentation and imagery, and Beyoncé's background in modern r'n'b. But the country stuff does give a through line to what is now Saddle Up, a leaner by more than half collection of some of the strongest Cowboy Carter material, including her covers of the Beatles' "Bluebird" and Dolly Parton's "Jolene", complete with new lyrics. 

Highlights written by Beyoncé and her collaborators are the two singles, "Texas Hold 'Em" and "16 Carriages", the sultry "Alligator Tears", the beautiful ode to her daughter, "Protector" and "American Requiem" which is both personal and political ("Can we stand for something? / now is the time to face the wind", while interpolating Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth"). Cowboy Carter runs for more than 78 minutes, Saddle Up runs a vinyl-era appropriate 38 minutes. If it were a vinyl record, tracks 1-7 would be the a-side, and tracks 8-13 the b-side, for all you nerds (like me!) out there. 

                                                    Like a rhinestone cowgirl...

In order to get the music into a shape I like and enjoy listening to, I mercilessly cut things down to the bone, both in terms of tracks used (I think "Ya-Ya" and "II Hands II Heaven" are great songs on their own, but they didn't fit what I wanted to do with Saddle Up) and the tracks itself. "American Requiem" is entirely re-edited to eliminate some parts I didn't like, "Sweet Honey Buckin'" lost more than half of its running time (and the, uh, 'buckin' part, thus the title change), I didn't much care for the opera stylings in the second part of "Daughter", so turned it into a medley with" Flamenco" and so on and so forth. Cowboy Carter is ambitious and overstuffed, and deserves credit for the former while the latter is now being taken care of. The album's overreaching is actually to its favor, as Beyoncé reckons with country music, its history, its meaning - especially on a personal and family history level - and its makers and listeners. 

A part of the project was seemingly to counter the harsh rejection of parts of the country establishment (you can easily guess which ones) to her first country foray, "Daddy Lessons" in 2016. This is what she is referring to in "American Requiem" when she sings "Used to say I spoke 'too country' / and the rejection came and said I wasn't 'country enough' / Said I wouldn't saddle up". But saddle up she did, ain't no doubt about that. 

Cowboy Carter is one of the most talked about albums of the year, if not the last years, or if you believe Stevie Wonder (one of the cast of thousands who played on this thing), "of the 21st Century". Yet I imagine most of you probably haven't heard it, because it's not your jam. I didn't think it was mine, either, but now, as Saddle Up, maybe I can get some of you to check out what Beyoncé's ambitious, messy, complicated take on country is about...

So, folks, let's all saddle up...

The Byrds' adventures in stone cold country...

Your old pal and mine, FTIII has chimed in with some swell cover art that blows my low-budget b&w original (in which I was very disappointed) out of the water. As he would say "Should youse bums be desirous..." (and why wouldn't we be?)

Roger McGuinn knows about best laid plans of mice and men. His ambitions often outweighed the results he had to show for them. Like the musical Gene Tryp!, a hippie reworking of the Peer Gynt story, he was working on with Jaques Levy throughout most of 1969 and parts of 1970 that never came to fruitition. When Sweetheart of the Radio hit shelves in August 1968 and reintroduced the new, very different Byrds as all-out country players, this wasn't the record the ever ambitious McGuinn had planned. His big project after The Notorious Byrds Brothers closed the book firmly on the classic era of the band was to lead the Byrds into jazz and a vaguely defined "Space Music", composed on his beloved Moog. Well, Sweetheart of the Radio was...not that. As they say, plans changed. 

Plans mainly changed due to one Ingram Cecil Connor III, better known as Gram Parsons. As McGuinn half-humorously, half-horrified explained: "When I hired Gam Parsons, it was as a jazz pianist...I hired a piano player and I got George Jones in a Nudie suit!". Yup, that he did. And got way more than he bargained for. Parsons' love for country music reignited Chris Hillman's own soft spot for the genre, and while it took some convincing, soon McGuinn was on board, hatching another super-ambitious plan that, again, didn't come close to fruitition: an album presenting an all-encompassing American musical history of the 20th Century, starting with traditional old-time bluegrass, then country music, then rhythm'n'blues and rock'n'roll to finally move into - you guessed it - the music of the future, "space music". But Parsons' traditionalist country leanings soon put the kibosh on McGuinn's expansive plans and any notions of "space music". Instead it was all country, outfitted with enough rock energy to appeal to the counter-culture. 

But that, of course, wasn't the end of the story, either. Parsons more or less hijacked the group from underneath McGuinn's nose, not only dictating the musical direction, but also taking the lion's share of lead vocals, essentially refashioning the Byrds as his band and relegating McGuinn to a bit player, while simultaneously lobbying to include pedal steel player J.D. Maness as a full-time Byrd. Then fate, in the shape of a possible contract dispute with Parson's old label, Lee Hazlewood's LHI, intervened. Not being sure that Parsons had fulfilled his contractual obligations over there, CBS wanted Parsons' vocals to be wiped off the album, so McGuinn began re-recording all of Parsons' lead vocals. When the dispute got cleared up, only Parsons' sentinemental classic "Hickory Wind" hadn't been touched. To appease Parsons, two covers with his lead vocals, Merle Haggard's "Life In Prison" and 'You're Still On My Mind" were put on the album, but as Parsons himself rightfully pointed out, these pedestrian covers were recorded as warm-up numbers, not necessarily serious contenders for the album. Not to mention that a Parsons outtake such as "Lazy Days", could have been put on the album instead. In the end, this reversal of fortunes was no doubt something McGuinn was secretly happy about. His status as King Byrd had been re-established while forcing Parsons in the supporting role he was originally supposed to have. 

Sweetheart of the Rodeo remains a slightly baffling album, and for me personally, not a favorite of the band. Its importance in the band's discography and in the development and cultural acceptance of crossing the borders between country and rock'n'roll is undeniable and gives it classic status, but as an album of music it just doesn't do it for me. So this Byrds album logically is the first to get the patented OBG alternate album treatment. First order of the day: Chuck those mediocre country covers, while also re-installing some of Parsons lead vocal work. Unlike what has long been reported, not all Parsons leads were irrevokably erased (in fact, traces remain on the original album, with McGuinn and Hillman dubbed over them), so future expanded and deluxe editions wielded a number of tracks with Parsons' original lead vocals in tact. On the finished album, McGuinn had - in what became somewhat typical for him - imitated the source, aping Parsons' vocals rather than singing in his normal style, with questionable results. "The Christian Life" was an especially egregious example. The irony of Parsons - who probably knew every deadly sin's second name and favorite pet -  evoking Christian values and a life of purity was one thing, but in McGuinn's mannered ersatz vocal, the song sounded like pure parody. 

With Parsons' lead vocals on "You Don"t Miss Your Water" and "The Christian Life" restored, I now wanted to rebalance the album, so McGuinn's slightly psychedelic take on the folk standard "Pretty Polly" gets reinstated here. I split the difference between Parsons' own take on "One Hundred Years From Now" and the excellent album version that features co-leads by Hillman and McGuinn, so both get the nod, one as the opener, the other as the closer. Given its presence, it naturally becomes the new title song (I never liked Sweetheart of the Rodeo as a title much either). And there is some small amount of justice for Kevin Kelley, who got the short end of the stick when the band drafted in Clarence White who in turn asked for old bandmate Gene Parsons to join, so Chris Hillman had to tell his cousin that his services were no longer required. For years, Kelley's lead vocals on "All I Have Is Memories" were considered lost, but have now also been recovered, so Kelley at long last gets a highlight spot on the only Byrds album he played on. 

So, One Hundred Years From Now it is, an album that I think genuinely runs better than the original Sweetheart, while also giving a pretty democratic view on the Byrds as a country group with balanced contributions by everyone. 

So, let's revisit those country roads with them country Byrds once more, shall we...?!

My original, very not awesome cover art...

The Byrds At Twilight - A Love Story In Reverse

It happens to all of us. We come to an artist at what is seemingly the wrong time in their career. We are either too early, or too late, or we fall in love with what is - according to public opinion - the wrong album. I came to the Byrds early, then late, then in the 'wrong' order. And I don't much care. The twilight Byrds - the band that was, at least according to a bunch of critics in long, steady decline ever since Roger McGuinn became head Byrd and, for all intents and purposes, only Byrd, plus a bunch of hired guns. Snobs still kind of dismiss this era, basically closing the chapter on the Byrds once Crosby left. Most still agree that The Notorious Byrds Brothers is a masterpiece - and it is - but everything afterwards splits opinions, not least because of the Byrds' hard turn into country music. The hiring of Gram Parsons and the Byrds full-fledged country rock adventure Sweetheart Of The Rodeo usually still escapes unscathed, mostly due to 'The Cult Of Gram', but everything after, starting with the often-maligned Dr. Byrds and Mr. Hyde is often considered minor work. People who dismiss this era of course totally miss out on the biggest weapon of the twilight Byrds - guitar slinger (or rather: guitar bender) Clarence White, one of the most talented guitar players of his, or any, era. The songwriting might have been wobbly sometimes - especially once Skip Battin and partner in crime Kim Fowley entered the picture - but the music often was still magnificent, in no small part to White's inimitable guitar playing. 

My first exposure to The Byrds was the 'right Byrds' - "Mr. Tambourine Man" and "Mr. Spaceman", both featured on one of the first CDs my dad ever bought, a compilation called California Sounds Of The 60s. That album was probably the single biggest influence of my future love for music from that era, a foundation for my love for both The Beach Boys and The Byrds. But The Byrds then disppeared for a long time - my entire adolescence - from my music hearing habits, only to come back in the weirdest avatar possible. Starting my studies, I stumbled in one of the bookstores adjacent to campus onto a huge bin with CDs for a buck - the One Buck Guy was born! But so was a newly rekindled love for The Byrds - via the worst means, a CD featuring completely fake songs by a couple of chaps of dubious intentions, ex-Animals bassist Danny McCullough together with producer Gerry Chapman. Their original songs were god-awful, and so were their Byrds covers. But you can't keep a great song down, no matter how hard you try. The moment I heard "Chestnut Mare", even in this ridiculously bad version, I knew it was a great song. The very next day I went to the record store and bought The Very Best of The Byrds, the U.K. compilation that was at the time the best and most complete Byrds compilation out there. And the rest is history.

Or almost. Because just as I rekindled my love for the Byrds, the band's re-issue program had reached the end of the Columbia era. So the first Byrds albums I possessed were Farther Along and (Untitled). And while (Untitled) rightfully is considered as the highlight of the twilight Byrds and has their last indisuputedly great song in the aforementioned "Chestnut Mare", Farther Along is considered to be pretty bad, or at least mediocre. But I love that album despite its massive flaws, from its sepia cover art to most of its songs. It's, by all objective measures, the 'wrong album' to fall in love with the Byrds, since it has almost nothing to do with the greatness of their classic era, but you love what you love. I continued to (re-) discover The Byrds in reverse, the last Columbia album from them that I bought was their much-heralded debut album Mr. Tambourine Man. And of course my fondness for the Byrds' twilight years has carried over to today and One Buck Records. 

This very long-winded introduction is the intro to the long-awaited arrival of the Byrds on this blog. I have featured some Byrds-related artists (Gene Clark, Manassas), but nothing from the band itself. I was blocked for months by ambitious plans for cover art on the first of what will be a series of alternate albums of the Byrds' twilight years. Well, all those plans fell through as I'm simply not very gifted in the visual arts department. So, with a resigned sigh I settled for something that had little to do with my ambitious plans, and decided to launch the project anyways. 

So, this will be your weekend double-header: Today's long-ish introduction to the Byrds project, and tomorrow the launch of the first of The Byrds' alternate albums, One Hundred Years From Now. But since some of you hopefully read all the way through my trip down memory lane, you deserve a little something for your trouble, so I compiled an album that covers the Byrds' twilight years, mainly through outtakes, alternative or live versions and single mixes, so as to have not too much overlap with the albums to follow. 

So, enjoy a first stroll down Byrds boulevard, then be back tomorrow to see the boys really saddle up...

 

One Album Wonders: The legend of Lakota

It seems that in the 1970s, every third band dabbling in country rock was named after a Native American tribe, a Native American chief or something other Native American-related. Some of these bands were more improbable than others. Such as one of the handful of bands named Lakota, this one being built around the songwriting, playing and singing of J.W. Grimm (not related to the famous Grimm brothers, as far as I know). These guys were called Lakota, using Native American imagery and came from the dusty plains and rocky canyons of...Long Branch, New Jersey. Lakota was essentially a two-person band: Grimm on lead guitar and lead vocals and J.T. Callahan on drums, percussion and harmony vocals. For their one and only album in 1979 they picked up help from William Sleight on Bass and Chris Norden on rhythm guitar. Published on JBS Records, only a few hundred copies of this crept out at the time. 1979 was of course a time by which country rock was entiely passé, so a straggler like this didn't have a chance. But how wrong people were! 

Unknown or little known country rock records are a dime a dozen and most of them probably deserve to await in attics or one dollar bins. But sometimes you can pull a diamond in the rough from out of that pile of obscure bands with country leanings and Lakota's self-titled album is such a case. It's an excellent listen all the way through, something that a lot of his peers in the genre didn't manage. Grimm was a really solid songwriter and performer. He also liked to play some loud rock guitar, as Lakota definitely come down more on the rock side of the country rock equation. So, if you're not that big on pedal steel and such, but like crunchy guitar and Southern Rock, you should definitely check this out as well. 

Speaking of Southern Rock, Grimm gets a little indulgent on "J.W. Crier", an almost seven minute extended rock jam, but unlike a lot of peers, he actually has the chops to pull it off. I personally am not a huge fan of jams, but I can groove with J.W. to J.W. Whether it's a beautiful country ballad like "Walking In The Rain" or a mid-tempo round-up like "Simple Wave", Lakota offers a constantly good listen. Actually, most songs are kept mid-tempo, giving the album a friendly, almost folk-rock-ish sound at times, as exemplified by the fantastic "If I Wanted To". 

'Nuff said, as they used to say at Marvel. Get this album and play it, it is definitely worth checking out and becoming part of your rotation. New Jersey Injuns rockin' your (virtual) turntable! Who'd have thought?   

Big Macs? That depends on who's cooking them...

Tribute albums by various artists are notoriously difficult to get right. Seeing how every artist is more or less left to their own devices, there is no unifying concept other than the songs itself. Maybe the sound and style of the original artist, but that wields its own set of problems, namely : if you ape that sound or style too closely, what is even the point ? Many a tribute compilation has slid into second-rate karaoke like that. And then there is the problem of variety. Deviating from the original’s template can bring variety and true re-imaginings of the originals, but is a buying audience even willing to have that in spades ? After all, we buy the tribute album to get songs that we know and love, preferably in versions we can recognize as being those beloved songs. So, subtle tweaks and variations are probably a good idea, but be too radical in your reworking and the exercise – at least to a lot of listeners – loses its purpose. Be too close to the orginals, when you can easily have those instead, and it leads to a different kind of pointlessness.

Only a few compilations have gotten this right, and those paying tribute to Fleetwood Mac aren’t among them. Legacy – A Tribute To Fleetwood Mac's Rumours is a case of artists being too reverential to the originals and slipping into second-rate karaoke. It doesn’t help that the roster is a murderer’s row of middle of the road mainstream artists, bordering on adult contemporary mainstays, that more or less exemplify mainstream pop rock radio in the mid-90s. Put unimaginative karaoke in the hands of these folks, and it’s a total snoozefest. A second compilation, from which my version borrows its title and most of its tracks has a much higher hit rate, probably due to it coming out about fifteen years later and being done by a more diverse roster of artists, including a who's who of hip indie artists, from Antony and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy to St. Vincent and Tame Impala. It does get very heavy on electronics at times, and some songs from the original comp went too heavy into re-make/re-model-territory for my personal taste, but the keepers really are keepers. Just Tell Me That You Want Me also had – as a nod to tradition, maybe? - some inclusions of old warhorses on the artist roster that left me baffled (Billy Gibbons?), but I kept Marianne Faithful's version of “Angel” and the Lee Ranaldo/J.Mascis collaboration on “Albatross”.

                                When none of the band or artist pictures talk to you...

So, all in all, I retained about two thirds of the original Just Tell Me That You Want Me : A Tribute To Fleetwood Mac comp, added a mere two tracks from the aforementioned Legacy (“Second Hand News” from the now all-but-forgotten Tonic and Jewel's “You Make Loving Fun”) and then added two other Mac covers I had lying around. One is the excellent version of "Dreams" by Whiskeytown, circa Stranger's Almanac. Plus a rowdy punk version of "Go Your Own Way" by Seaweed to close out proceedings. This leaves us with an album whose more electronic-based numbers give it a fresher edge, while being more balanced and a little more kick ass with the contributions from the 1990s roster.

Say what you will (ha!) about the Mac after Buckingham and Nicks joined, but they sure as hell had the songs with which you can't argue. This One Buck records version of Just Tell Me That You Want Me : A Tribute To Fleetwood Mac will remind you of what was great about that run, in a number of different voices and styles.

So, go and tell me that you want 'em....

The Berry Project Part 2: Wayne Berry's got them Beachwood Blues...

It's time for part two of the tryptich of Wayne Berry albums that sadly never were but could have and should have been. Last we saw Berry on these pages, he tried (in our kayfabe version of history) to become a pop star by putting a bunch of could-have-been-contenders on ...just a matter of time. Album two, Beachwood Blues actually does have a single song that was released at the time. It's the title song, coming out as his lone single for A&M in 1973, and as usual for Berry, doing nothing charts-wise. 

Beachwood Blues' organizing principle is that it's a very loose concept album about finding and losing love in L.A. in the early 1970s. It starts with one of his most interesting outtakes from the era, because "Stray" sounds like he had taken an early, immediate liking to Bruce Springsteen. It even has some saxophone in it, and a muscular rock sound that sounds a bit like The Boss and his E-Street Band, a direction Berry wouldn't pursue afterwards. It also has some clear aurobiographical elements, which had me put it on the 'aural biography' Country Boy, City Dreams (the upcoming conclusion of the trilogy), but I needed a kick-ass rock song as an album opener. The ballads here, especially "It's Hard Living Without You", are top notch and Berry works his patented mid-tempo magic in the title song. But the more interesting numbers are the ones that show him stretching out a bit. We already talked about "Strays" but there is also "For Your Love", a rockabilly number that has Berry trying out his best Elvis Presley imitation. And if you have picked up the handy Berry compendium Berry's Cherries back in November, then you're already familiar with "The Wrong Man", a really catchy number that's one of his best outtakes from the period. Period. 

So, there really isn't much to add. It's another winner from Berry, which I hope you will agree on. Even his outtakes beat the established work of some charting artists, again. So, have a lovely weekend with some more Wayne Berry, a man who knows about making having the blues sound great...

PS: For the cover, I found a vintage picture of Beachwood Drive which I think works splendidly..

And now for something completely different: Who's up for some hick hop?

Many of you will have realized my penchant for country rock and Americana, but fewer if any will have realized that I have a love for hip hop music, mainly because One Buck Records hasn't featured any hip hop yet. But that'll change. I might be wrong, but I guess a lot of One Buck Records readers are fine with having little to none hip hop in their lives (prove me wrong, people!). But to get a leg into the genre we'll start with hip hop that only has one leg in the genre - and the other firmly planted on a country road.

Country rap, or as I prefer it being called, hick hop has been a genre for about twenty years now. Some would point to Kid Rock and "Cowboy" but other than singing about Rock's wish to be that, it doesn't have particularly firm roots in the genre, though Kid would soon afterwards unironically embrace country music after trying to be Bob Seger for a couple of years. I'm not counting the ever popular duet option of either a country singer with a guest rapper or vice versa. Do it entirely, or don't do it at all. 

So, the first real hick hop artist that really broke through was Bubba Sparxxx. I'm not a huge fan of his debut album (including the hit "Ugly"), but lead single "Deliverance" from the follow-up of the same name is a fantastic piece of business. Timbaland's beats were state of the art then and are still beautiful twenty years later. It's just a beautifully constructed track. Sparxxx himself ain't no slouch himself, coming up with some rhymes that always make me smile: "You took your wealth and knowledge and gave it to the poor / only to find that your savior's manure". And the chorus casts him as a modern day Huckleberry Finn: "I've been travellin' for some time / with my fishing pole and my bottle of shine". Hick Hoppers The Lacs followed in his foot steps a couple of years later, channeling a certain John Denver classic here in "Country Road". 

Sparxxx' work might have been the spark that lit a dozen country rap artists, but Brooklyn producer Rench pushed things further with his Gangstagrass project, which mixed rap and bluegrass to often astounding effect. Half of the album of the day are Gangstagrass cuts, you will probably at least familiar with "Long Hard Times To Come", used as the theme music for the great Justified. 

And then there's of course the third option, country or Americana acts covering rap songs, with two prime examples on this album: Thai-American Hugo's bluegrass version of Jay-Z's "99 Problems" and one of my first exposure's to the sub-genre, The Gourds' hilarious take on Snoop Dogg's "Gin And Juice", complete with the most redneck-y vocals you can imagine. Fun stuff.  

So, ready for some Hick Hop y'all?! Then let's get the hip hop hoedown started...

Gene Clark's No Other? Oh, sure there's another, Geno!

I didn't know I'd need or want another No Other for the longest time. For the longest time, it was already difficult to even have the original No Other. Gene Clark's maverick outing was conspicously out of print and never issued on CD for almost two decades, no doubt amplifying the album's reputation as a lost materpiece in absentia. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, or so I've heard. But I remember how difficult it could be to get your hands on Gene Clark albums in the late 90s and early 2000s before the great Clark renaissance, spurred by a whole bunch of cool indie artists espousing his genius and especially the genius of No Other. 

It's interesting how that album's reception changed in these lost decades. Nowadays, every music journalist will explain that the album is some sort of masterpiece, even with reservations. But for a long time throughout the 90s the album was considered more of a misshapen curiosity. Allmusic, of course also changed its tune. Now, you've got your in depth five star review pronouncing the misunderstood genius of the album, but the original write-up (for the book version!) was a decidedly different affair, awarding a mere three stars. "These arrangements are just over the top", opines Matthew Greenwald, "and Clark's songs and vocals are clearly weak under the weight." Despite mentioning "some fine songs" Greenwald (not the worst of Allmusic's writers at the time) concludes "Overall though, it's indulgent and the sound of the record say more about the '70s than the songs do. You can almost taste the cocaine."

Thomas Jefferson Kaye's production decisions have been at the heart of the discussions about No Other ever since the album came out. Supported by deep pockets at Asylum Records, Kaye really did indulge, adding overdubs over overdubs on the performances that already included playing from some of L.A.'s best session men. So, do these songs really need orchestral arrangements and luscious backing choirs? The choise is now mine, yours and everyone else's, due to the rennaissance of Clark as an inspiring musician for other musician's that finally led to a re-issue program worthy of its name. No Other had finally been issued as a no-frills edition on CD by Collector's Choice in the late 90s in the U.S. (and EastWest Recordings in Japan), but the rerelase in 2003, complete with liner notes and bonus tracks really got the ball rolling. In these bonus tracks it was also possible for the first time to listen to Clark's songs without the ton of overdubs Kaye imposed on them. 

Interesting as that was, it didn't really push me to even consider trying an alternate album version of No Other. For one thing, the songs seemed to be so intricately tethered to the very sound of the album that I considered the alternate, comparatively stripped-down versions as interesting asides, not the essence of the music. This attitude changed with the appearance of the No Other box set in 2018 by 4AD, not incidentally the home of many of those aforementioned cool indie artists stanning for Gene Clark and No Other. Here you really had a plethora of bonus tracks to skim through, truly being able to see how some songs got knocked in shape, and some roads not taken (you might remember Clark's funk version of "Silver Raven" that I put on All Pearls, No Swine Vol. 3 back in October). Going through some of these tracks two years ago, I finally decided to give a decidedly different No Other a try. 

Well, next time you have an unusual album to promote by a guy notorious for not helping out with said promotion, maybe go easy on the drag queen look...?!

All tracks here are without the massive overdubs of the released version. To really show the difference in approach, I decided to start things off with the title song, presented here in an uncluttered, more percussive version that has an almost agressive edge to it, not to mention that you can really hear a latin music sound influence in it which is difficult to hear in the official version. "Some Misunderstanding" sounds a whole lot more country now, with the pedal steel being elevated to lead instrument in the mix, whereas in "From A Silver Phial" you can now hear old comrade Chris Hillman's mandolin playing much clearer. The biggest change involved "Strength of Strings", which is now only half its original running time. I never was a fan of the 'banshee vocal' interludes, so I cut the opening and closing ones. I originally wanted to retain the one in the middle of the track, but - in what is clearly a run through/demo - Clark, enjoying himself and the music, introduces the bridge with a "here we go", so both the exclamation and the last banshee interlude are gone. What remains is now a surprisingly muscular, sinewy rock song. I wanted to finish with the most ethereal songs as a double climax, so "Silver Raven" and "Lady Of The North" in versions where you can really hear the instruments like Richard Greene's electriic violin, barely audible in the released version. 

An Other No Other is a much more relaxed listen than the original, where Kaye's aural delusions of grandeur have something oppressive and even manic about them, recalling Greenwald's comment about almost tasting the cocaine involved. In this version, we're much closer to Clark's usual stomping grounds between folk and country rock. Interestingly, my alternate albums of Clark zig where the originals zagged. Roadmaster was mixed to be as traditionally country rock as possible, whereas I reworked it into Shooting Star as way trippier and more psych, pointing out even clearer the way to No Other. And now An Other No Other goes the inverse route, toning the album's trippier sound way down, bringing its sound closer to the White Light/Mendocino Dream era. 

I'm not about to claim that An Other No Other is better than No Other, because I - like pretty much everyone - am not a hundred percent sure where I finally stand on No Other's production. I think there's some truth in all points of view. The relatively straight forward country rocker "Life's Greatest Fool" for example did profit from those dramatic gospel choirs that seemed to give it more urgency. It's not a weak song per se, but rather a so-so one that does profit from more production, whereas I think numbers like "Strength of Strings" can feel like they're toppling over under the layers of production. So yeah, No Other stays a conundrum wrapped in an enigma, no matter the configuration. But I think it's worthwhile to check out what a more relaxed, homily No Other would sound like, and that's what An Other No Other does, for whatever it's worth. 

PS.: This concludes for the time being my explorations of alternate albums of Gene Clark, though I might at some point have a look at the Silveradoes/Two Sides To Every Story era. But fear not, Clark fans, there's still a ton of Clark and Clark-related material I want to post here, so, as usual, stay tuned...