Posted on 10/15/2010 5:02:02 PM PDT by Reaganite Republican
The Byrds were an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1964. This pioneering group underwent numerous personnel changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn (aka Jim McGuinn) remaining the sole consistent member until the group disbanded in 1973, while also featuring David Crosby for three seperate stints.
Although they only managed to attain the commercial success on the scale of contemporary greats like The Beatles, The Beach Boys, and The Rolling Stones for a fairly brief period (1965–66), time has treated their work well... as The Byrds are today considered to be one of the most influential bands of the 60s.
Initially, they pioneered the musical genre of folk rock, melding the influence of The Beatles and other British Invasion bands with contemporary and traditional folk music. As the 1960s progressed, the band were also influential in originating psychedelic rock, raga rock, and country rock.
The Byrds' signature blend of clear harmony singing and McGuinn's jangly twelve-string Rickenbacker guitar has continued to be influential on popular music up to the present day. The Byrds were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked The Byrds #45 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time
Among the band's most enduring songs are their electric-cover versions of folk greats Bob Dylan's Mr. Tambourine Man and Pete Seeger's Turn! Turn! Turn!, along with the self-penned originals, I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better, Eight Miles High, So You Want to Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star, Ballad of Easy Rider and Chestnut Mare.
They covered quite a number of Dylan tunes in electric actually, bringing a lot to the material with variations of their own signature sound... like my own lifelong favorite, lip-synched here on the Ed Sullivan Show...
More/video at Reaganite Republican
Or Chris Hillman?
Worse yet, how could they pile them in with the beach boys?
Funniest mop top was Steve Marriot in Small Faces lol
Supurb... I’ve got a couple scratched ones, save them for the record sleeve I guess lol
Yes! Very controversial album back then— fans expected something psychedelic but they sang country instead. At the time it didn’t please rock or country fans.
Right out of the Bible!
1965 was a great year in music. I just today picked up a nice mono copy of Kinda Kinks from ‘65. Listening to it at the moment.
As for The Byrds, I have most of their albums on vinyl and cd, as well as solo McGuinn projects. Great stuff!
And Roxy Music, too.
Nice article (from 2008) with pics about Chris Hillman these days:
http://www.mandolincafe.com/news/publish/mandolins_00909.shtml
When folks like that are covering your music, you know you have a winner.
1965 was a very, very good year
And it’s not sentimental for me... I was three, and I surely don’t remember it going down lol
Enjoy some nice mandolin mp3s here. http://www.mandolincafe.com/
To my ears, no song better captures the spirit of 60s than Eight Miles High. One of my favorite covers of it is by Leo Kottke.
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