<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0On the eve of the September 20, 2022 release of the book <\/span>The Byrds 1964-67<\/span><\/i>, band co-founder Roger McGuinn shared his thoughts on their career on Steve Hyden\u2019s UPROXX <\/span>indie mixtape<\/span><\/i> series.\u00a0 The book is a collectable art book about the band with input from McGuinn and the other surviving members of the band, David Crosby and Chris Hillman.\u00a0 Hyden noted that the 80 year-old McGuinn, \u201cRemains a sharp and spry musician, as evidenced by how often he slipped into Byrds songs on his trademark 12-string during our Zoom call.\u201d\u00a0 They started out with Hyden coaxing out McGuinn\u2019s recollections about his career and some of the pivotal albums The Byrds released.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0McGuinn aspired to be a folk singer before he became a Byrd.\u00a0 He did a lot of studio sessions for Elektra Records including 12-string guitar for Judy Collin\u2019s third album (for which he also acted as the musical director) and on the demo version of Paul Simon\u2019s <\/span>The Sound of Silence.\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>He must have already been playing his iconic 12-string Rickenbacker electric because he notes that he asked the company’s owner, F.C. Hall why he decided to make the model in the first place. Hall replied, \u201cI did it for the folk scene.\u201d\u00a0 Roger told him, \u201cBut folk singers don\u2019t play electric guitars,\u201d while adding for Hyden, \u201cMaybe it was a prophetic thing.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When the early Byrds went in to the studio to lay down their first album, <\/span>Mr. Tambourine Man<\/span><\/i> (1965), it was recorded with the session musicians known as The Wrecking Crew and McGuinn.\u00a0 Back then, they had to have a hit single before Columbia Records would let them record an album.\u00a0 The single of <\/span>Mr. Tambourine Man<\/span><\/i> opened that door, but Roger said, \u201cWe used the Wrecking Crew for the single and the flip side because producer Terry Melcher knew we weren\u2019t a real band yet.\u00a0 I played the 12-string with them and then Gene Clarke, David Crosby, and I went in and did the vocals.\u00a0 I mean, Michael Clarke (no relation to Gene) never learned to play the drums at that point.\u00a0 These guys saved us a lot of money because studio time was expensive.\u00a0 We knocked both tracks together in three and a half hours.\u00a0 The Wrecking Crew had a bond.\u00a0 They were like fish and kind of swam around together.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t have that yet.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The first version of <\/span>Mr.Tambourine Man<\/span><\/i> had some deficiencies that needed to be taken care of before it was destined to become a hit.\u00a0 First off, Ramblin\u2019 Jack Elliot sang it with Bob Dylan on a rough demo and he was a bit intoxicated.\u00a0 Cooler heads prevailed and Dylan didn\u2019t release the track.\u00a0 When The Byrds heard it while looking for a song to record, Crosby said, \u201cI don\u2019t like it, man.\u00a0 That\u2019s 2\/4 time, that\u2019s not rock \u2018n\u2019 roll.\u00a0 It\u2019s not going to play on the radio.\u201d\u00a0 To \u2018Byrdify\u2019 the arrangement, McGuinn said, \u201cI rearranged it with a little Bach kind of stuff on the front and the back.\u00a0 It was four and a half minutes long and radio wouldn\u2019t touch it if it was longer than 2 and a half minutes, so I cut it down to one verse for time, and it was a hit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The fact that when The Byrds recorded their next album, <\/span>Turn! Turn! Turn!<\/span><\/i> themselves (1965), it took 77 takes to get the title track down on tape.\u00a0 They were a new band and still getting used to playing and recording together.\u00a0 \u201cMichael Clarke did become a really good drummer eventually,\u201d Roger recalled.\u00a0 \u201cBy the time he got to Firefall, he was a really good drummer.\u201d\u00a0 McGuinn was familiar with <\/span>Turn! Turn! Turn! <\/span><\/i>because he was a big Pete Seeger fan and had been listening to Pete\u2019s version since 1959.\u00a0 Roger also played the song with The Limelighters but they did it in a real folksy manner (calling it <\/span>Everything There\u2019s A Season<\/span><\/i>)<\/span> but, \u201cthey didn\u2019t put a beat to it.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>After working on a version with Judy Collins, McGuinn, \u201cPut the rock \u2018n\u2019 roll beat to it, and that made a difference.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0By the time the <\/span>Fifth Dimension<\/span><\/i> record came out in 1966, The Byrds were topping the charts and everybody was anxious to hear what they would come up with next.\u00a0 When the lead single from <\/span>Fifth Dimension <\/span><\/i>(1966) came out, some stations refused to play <\/span>Eight Miles High<\/span><\/i> because they assumed the word \u2018high\u2019 meant it was a drug reference.\u00a0 Certainly someone considered that 42,240 feet (5,280 feet per mile times 8 miles) might actually be in reference to flying in a passenger jet at that altitude\u2026but probably not.\u00a0 The radio bans simply made the single forbidden fruit which spurred massive single and album sales.\u00a0 Roger says now, \u201cPeople misinterpreted it as being psychedelic,\u00a0 They thought we were stoned, which we were, but . . . we didn\u2019t intend it to be psychedelic.\u00a0 In my opinion, it was an emulation of John Coltrane, a respected jazz musician.\u00a0 I was trying to do jazz.\u00a0 And I did, but nobody got it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The other influence that found its way onto <\/span>Fifth Dimension<\/span><\/i> was Ravi Shankar.\u00a0 McGuinn had an early Phillips cassette recorder that he used to record Ravi Shankar\u2019s music.\u00a0 Repeated listens were sure to have slipped into the songwriting process at that time.\u00a0 Roger mentioned the benefits of finding themselves Number One on the charts:\u00a0 \u201cThe Beatles wanted to meet us and we hung out with them and The Rolling Stones and went on tour with The Stones.\u00a0 And we were hanging out with Bob Dylan.\u00a0 I remember one night Bob Dylan, Phil Spector and I were at the Troubadour and we were backstage.\u00a0 And Phil Spector turned to me and said, \u2018You know what?\u00a0 You\u2019re in with the in-crowd.\u2019\u00a0 That was exactly what we were shooting for.\u00a0 We got there and held it for a couple of years.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Younger Than Yesterday <\/span><\/i>(1967) was also propelled up the charts by another quasi-jazz song.\u00a0 McGuinn and Hillman were thumbing through a pile of teen magazines and started talking about some of the bands featured:\u00a0 \u201cWe were kind of amused by the one-hit wonders.\u00a0 They\u2019d be there one week and you\u2019d never see him again,\u00a0 And we thought it would be fun to write a song about that.\u201d\u00a0 Ths guitar lick came from Millard Thomas who played for Miriam Makeba.\u00a0 McGuinn showed it to Hillman and <\/span>So You Want To Be A Rock \u2018n\u2019 Roll Star <\/span><\/i>started to come together.\u00a0 \u201cWe got Hugh Masekela to play on it,\u201d McGuinn remembered, \u201cAgain, we were doing jazz.\u201d The rumor about Crosby leaving the band because producer Melcher wouldn\u2019t put his song <\/span>Triad<\/span><\/i> on the album, McGuinn says, isn\u2019t true:\u00a0 \u201cThat was just the cover story for his attitude.\u00a0 Terry Melcher didn\u2019t like David and wouldn\u2019t put any of his songs on the album.\u00a0 Subsequent producers also had a hard time dealing with David.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When The Byrds started out, they were labeled a \u2018folk rock\u2019 band.\u00a0 Covering Bob Dylan songs might have had something to do with that, but McGuinn emphasizes they were experimenting with a lot of different types of music.\u00a0 At the Monterey Pop Festival, he saw Paul Beaver demonstrating a Moog Synthesizer so he went out and dropped $9000 for one of his own.<\/span><\/p>\n Though the early Moog was not as sophisticated as today\u2019s synthesizers, McGuinn set about to try and explore different types of music with it.\u00a0 He had the idea to do an album that represented the history of music, starting with Gregorian Chants and up to and past the present using the Moog to \u2018take it out into space\u2019.\u00a0 While this project never came to be, The Byrds next project would find them making a right turn into country music.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The <\/span>Sweetheart of the Rodeo <\/span><\/i>(1968) album resulted from a chance meeting Hillman had with Gram Parsons in a bank in Beverly Hills.\u00a0 Roger explained, \u201cGram had a trust fund and he was a rich kid.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t know this when we met him but Chris ran into him at the bank when he was picking up his allowance.\u00a0 It was after Crosby left The Byrds and it was not working on stage because I was playing lead, Chris was playing bass, and his cousin, Kevin Kelly was playing the drums.\u00a0 We needed someone to play rhythm guitar after Crosby left so Hillman invited Gram over to the rehearsal studio to see if he could play some McCoy Tyner type piano.\u00a0 He played a little Floyd Kramer-style piano and I\u2019m like, \u2018Well he knows how to play piano.\u00a0 We can work with him.\u2019\u00a0 We had dabbled in country a little but it wasn\u2019t until Gram came along that we decided to go to Nashville and record the <\/span>Sweetheart <\/span><\/i>album.\u00a0 Gram was so in love with country music it was infectious and we just fell in love with it, too.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The session guys in Nashville didn\u2019t quite know what hit them when The Byrds came to town.\u00a0 They were used to playing the music put down in front of them so having The Byrds tell them, \u201cHey, do whatever you want, man.\u00a0 Come in when you want, stay as long as you want.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Roger says they would play poker during the day back at the Ramada Inn and then record at night:\u00a0 \u201cIt was like a party and we had these great A-list studio guys to work with.\u00a0 They loved it.\u00a0 They had never worked on sessions that were so unstructured.\u201d\u00a0 The only hitch came when they found Parsons was signed to another record label.\u00a0 To prevent a lawsuit, they had to go back and change some of the vocals he contributed.\u00a0 They were finally put back in place on their 1990 box set <\/span>The Byrds.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It seemed the newly countrified Byrds could do no wrong but they found the audience at the Grand Ole Opry a bit standoffish because they had long hair (they were booed).\u00a0 The album confused their old fans and there was much consternation among the suits at their record label.\u00a0 Their luck didn\u2019t improve when they made the decision to accept an offer to play in South Africa.\u00a0 Roger recalled touring the American South in the 1960s as a member of the Chad Mitchell Trio.\u00a0 They had Miriam Makeba touring with them and McGuinn found himself constantly apologizing for the way her band was treated.\u00a0 She was the one who said, \u201cYou ought to see my country.\u00a0 If you ever get a chance, to go South Africa.\u201d\u00a0 The Byrds had big money waved at them to do just that so they stopped to hang with The Stones in England on their way to Johannesburg.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As it turned out, Keith Richards and Parsons hit it off and became good buddies.\u00a0 When Keith told The Byrds there was a ban on musicians traveling to South Africa, Gram decided to quit the band and stay in England to chum around with Keith.\u00a0 Roger continues, \u201cWe went on without Gram and it was just horrible.\u00a0 We got death threats.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t get to play to mix audiences as we had been promised.\u00a0 I got the flu, and then we didn\u2019t get paid.\u201d\u00a0 Roger forgave Parsons for quitting The Byrds.\u00a0 Gram and Hillman would later join up to form The Flying Burrito Brothers:\u00a0 \u201cI was just blown away by all the great songs they were writing together.\u00a0 Gram and I played pool and rode motorcycles together, like a bunch of hillbillies or something.\u201d\u00a0 Five years later, Parsons would die from apparent heart failure but it has always been suspected that drugs and alcohol may also contributed to his untimely end.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Early in his career, McGuinn was offered a chance to get into the movie biz.\u00a0 He turned it down and was told, \u201cYou won\u2019t ever get to work in Hollywood after this!\u201d\u00a0 He gleefully ends this story with, \u201cAnd I never did,\u201d but that is not entirely true.\u00a0 In 1969, Peter Fonda flew to New York City to talk Bob Dylan into writing a song for his new movie.\u00a0 He screened the flick for Bob who scribbled some lyrics on a cocktail napkin before giving it back to Fonda.\u00a0 Peter got on a plane to Los Angeles where he presented the napkin to Roger saying, \u201cBob wants you to have this, man.\u201d\u00a0 McGuinn got out his guitar and finished <\/span>The Ballad of Easy Rider.\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>\u201cWe finished it and it did really well.\u00a0 A few weeks later, Bob called me up and said, \u2018Take my name off the credit.\u2019\u00a0 He didn\u2019t want a credit on it.\u00a0 The album was a hit.\u00a0 It sold a lot of copies and generated some income, but the band was, at that point, doing kind of watered down material.\u00a0 The rest of the record didn\u2019t really have any Byrds hits.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The Byrds would fly again in 1973 when Crosby talked David Geffen into financing a reunion album.\u00a0 Roger says, \u201cThe album wasn\u2019t bad.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t great.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t bad but it wasn\u2019t a reason to continue with the name of The Byrds.\u00a0 It was more of a party than a recording session.\u201d\u00a0 By mutual agreement, The Byrds were grounded.\u00a0 As a solo artist, McGuin put out six albums over the next twenty years.\u00a0 The strongest, <\/span>Cardiff Rose <\/span><\/i>(1976) and <\/span>Back From Rio<\/span><\/i> (1991) kept him on tour and the latter record reached #44 on the charts.\u00a0 After several decades on the road, Roger decided to do something he always wanted to do.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He broached the subject with his wife Camile who told him, \u201cCall your agent and have him book some dates.\u201d\u00a0 What McGuinn told her he wanted was to, \u201cToss his guitar in the back of the car and go on the road as a solo act.\u201d\u00a0 My wife and I got to see this version of Roger McGuinn at the Calumet Theater some years back and it seems he is perfectly happy with his decision.\u00a0 He guests on other\u2019s albums and will occasionally show up on one of those PBS Rockin\u2019 Oldies fundraising shows to sing a couple of Byrds\u2019 hits, but being on the road with his guitar and wife has been his life in the new millennium (not to mention is now ever present wide brimmed hat).<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As for The Byrds, Roger McGuinn summed up the career circle he has traveled:\u00a0 \u201cI regard The Byrds as a nine-year detour from my dream of being a folk singer like Pete Seeger.\u00a0 We wanted to be like The Beatles, and we got that.\u201d\u00a0 When all is said and done, he really has realized his original dream to be like his idol Pete, so that can\u2019t be a bad way to wrap up his story.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0During his performance at the Calumet Theater, some glitch took place with the equipment off stage.\u00a0 After a couple of god-awful squelching sounds blurted from the house PA, Roger stood up and stalked off behind the left stage curtain.\u00a0 A few minutes later, he strode back to center stage.\u00a0 Whatever adjustments he had to make fixed the problem and he finished without even mentioning the incident.\u00a0 There are alot of pampered rock stars who would have exploded over something like this, but not this old folkie.\u00a0 If McGuinn managed to work with the mercurial David Crosby and not punch his lights out, why would he lose his cool over a small technical problem?\u00a0 Seems like Roger is doing his thing and enjoying the ride.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Top Piece Video:\u00a0 Why can’t\u00a08 Miles High<\/em> be about flying in an airliner?\u00a0 Roger claims that is exactly what it was about!\u00a0 This is alter version of the band circa 1970 when they got a little more ‘jammy’.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0On the eve of the September 20, 2022 release of the book The Byrds 1964-67, band co-founder Roger McGuinn shared his thoughts on their career on Steve Hyden\u2019s UPROXX indie mixtape series.\u00a0 The book is a collectable art book about the band with input from McGuinn and the other surviving members of the band, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11,8,6,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bands-musicians","category-education","category-from-the-vaults","category-new-music","category-woas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2688"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2691,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2688\/revisions\/2691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}