The Byrds - Sweetheart of the Rodeo
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Free Music Notes for Sweetheart of the Rodeo
Free Music Review: When Hippies Met Truckers
Hit: 5 Stars
"Sweetheart of the Rodeo" is one of the most influential albums in American Popular Music History.
Think of where the United States was in 1968. We were a country torn apart, where a kid with long hair walking into a redneck bar faced a very strong possibility of having his a** kicked inside out; where many rockers opposed the Vietnam War, while many Country folks were singing Merle's "Okie from Muskogee" and the "Fighting Side of Me".
And there were those like Country DJ Ralph Emery who looked askance at any possibilites of rock and country music having anything in common. Hey, wasn't that Bobby Dylan guy some Commie Pinko rad-i-cal.
Then came along Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman, Gram Parsons and Kevin Kelley - the Byrds, and they recorded something very special. Maybe not a well-developed album, but one that clearly saw the possibilities of rock and country music finding common ground.
That album was "Sweetheart of the Rodeo".
The songs - Dylan's "You Ain't Going Nowhere", "You're Still On My Mind", Hag's "Life in Prison", Gene Autry's "Blue Canadian Rockies", Gram Parsons' "Hickory Wind" and so many others sung with sincerity and from the heart. The Byrds were helped along by the very best - future Byrd Clarence White on Country Guitar, Jay Dee Maness (later a member of Hillman's Desert Rose Band) and Lloyd Green (now with Alan Jackson) on fine pedal steel, Earl Poole Ball on honky-tonk piano and John Hartford on the banjo.
Nashville hated it back then - when the Byrds played the Opry they were booed by all except for the great lady Skeeter Davis, RIP, and Lloyd Green who played onstage with them. Yes, redneck country dissed them - but only a few scant years later, Nashville had come along, through the embrace of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's "Circle" album; through Willie and Waylon and the "Outlaws", and finally through a band clearly influenced by "Sweetheart" - The Eagles.
Chris and Gram went on to form the Flying Burrito Brothers, continuing along the path started with "Sweetheart of the Rodeo". And today,Emmylou Harris, Travis Tritt, Vince Gill, Garth Brooks, even Martina McBride and Patti Loveless - and the new alt-Country artists like Jim Laudermilk, Tift Merritt, Steve Earle are reaping the benefits begun when the Byrds went country, turned American Popular Music around, and when Hippies and Truckers found common ground.
Free Music Review: In The Beginning
Hit: 5 Stars
So.
When you heard about Natalie Manes of the Dixie Chicks dissing W from the stage of a country concert, did you almost smash your CD cabinet -- with all those precious metal and speedmetal and postpunk and grunge discs -- in sheer anger at her unpatriotic impertinence?
Yes, you right-wing flag-waving rocker, you? Thank this record.
See, "Sweetheart of the Rodeo" couldn't have happened when it did. No, really. When this record came out in 1968, the U.S. was embroiled in its own civil semi-war over a controversial conflict abroad -- not too familiar? -- and here were the battle lines. If you loved rock, you were against American involvement in Vietnam. If you dug country, you not only never used "dug" in that context, you waved the flag and saw the Vietcong as Lenin's Southeast Asian subsidiary, to be crushed at all costs. Period. Music was the litmus test, simple as that. Countryphiles and rockers didn't just sound different, and look way different, they manned different barricades. Facing off against each other.
With "Sweetheart of the Rodeo," that began to change.
The Byrds had just shucked half their psychedelic-folk lineup, and taken on two wild-card members who would help them sow the seeds that would lead to -- well, just about everything good that has happened to both country and rock and roll since then. "Sweetheart" is, no mistake, a country album by a rock band. There's almost no lick of rock on it (the drums on "One Hundred Years From Now" and at the end of "Nothing Was Delivered" are just about the only exceptions, and one wishes for the percussion/pedalsteel raveup of which these cuts give only the barest titillating taste). I'm not a Nashville fan, and the type of country on this record has caused me to gag more than once. But maybe that's because rhinestones and white hats and square jowls and short hair and money can't deliver the goods like these longhairs (yes, that hair on the liner photos was long in 1968) did it. I think of this record the same way I do Miles Davis's "In A Silent Way." That record was fusion jazz - something of which I've heard too few good examples - the way it should sound; the record could have been released last week. Likewise, "Sweetheart" is forever new; feel is first, the way country (and rock) should always do it.
Gram Parsons, a fully intentional leader of the rock/country revolution, starts his legendary and agonizingly brief contribution to American music, and rock in general, with this record. From the Rolling Stones and the Beatles to Faith Hill and Mary Chapin Carpenter, Gram has left lasting tracks. His deep exposure to every facet of Southern music leads the way on this record. And capable players call on the country in them -- as it's put in the liner notes by David Fricke, rock and roll at its very core is country music, and the best country music always rocks -- to follow Gram into what had always been no-mans land before, and would never be again.
Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead, Phish, the Allman Brothers, Steve Earle, R.E.M....the list of people owing at least part of their sound and success to "Sweetheart" is a very long one. It's Nashville the way someone would have had to do it eventually. It didn't happen a year too soon.
Free Music Review: Just okay straight up country
Hit: 3 Stars
I bought this album a year or so back because I am a fan of roots country bands like BR549 and The Derailers and I thought I could get another fun and tuneful album to add to my collection.
Although the album is OKAY, I can't give it an enthusiastic recommendation as a top-tier roots country or country-rock album. It's just has no emotional punch to it. As you can see by the accompanying reviews, however, it has its fans. So just to make sure I wasn't crazy, I went to my three favorite music review sites to see what they had to say:
My first stop didn't support my views... The All-Music Guide gave it 5 stars out of 5 and held it up as maybe the Byrds' best album. Here are a couple of quotes: "..no major band had gone so deep into the sound and feeling of classic country (without parody or condescension).." "..few albums in the style are as beautiful and emotionally affecting as this."
My reaction: I guess Hickory Wind is a pretty good song. BR549 did a cover on their first album and I like it there too.
Next site: Wilson and Alroy give it 2 ? stars of 5. "for Byrds fans, it's so countrified that hardly a smidgen of the Byrds' original sound remains." "And some of it's sincere to the point of being nauseating" (The review was by Alroy)
My reaction: That last comment rings true for me.
George Starostin on his website "Only Solitaire" gives it a rating of 6 out of 10. "the album as a whole is dang uninteresting." "the arrival of Gram Parsons on the scene proved to be crucial and, in the long run, disastrous for the Byrds" "This isn't even country-rock - it's just pure country, with pedal steel guitar as the only prominent instrument in existence. The result is that it gets boring. And boy, does it get boring..." "...ten dull, gloomy, ploddering numbers that resemble each other like two drops of water and make the record sound horrendously dated and pointless."
My reaction: 1) Ploddering is not a word, but it does seem to apply here. 2) George is a big fan of the Byrds, so you'd think he'd be kinder. Still, he gives it the same rating I did, meaning he can't deny it's at least OKAY.
To recap; I just can't get as excited as some others. I guess I'm looking for music that can get my foot stomping or with a great melodic hook or lyrics that make me smile. I get none of that on this album. This album just kind of ambles and leaves no memorable. A couple of the songs sound like fair to middlin' Grateful Dead songs. One even makes me recall the Mama's and Papa's (which is not good for me, but maybe you'll like it). In the end then, I'm glad I have had a chance to hear where country rock got started and kudos to the Byrds for getting the ball rolling, I'm just as glad though, that some others took the genre to much higher levels.
Free Music Review: Quintessential country rock
Hit: 5 Stars
Without a doubt THE most influential example of country rockever to be produced on this planet. This is the one that
started it all! The Burrito Brothers,Commander Cody, Poco,
The Eagles-they all would have sounded different if it were'nt
for this piece. If you are even remotely interested in the
country rock genre this album has got to be the cornerstone
of any collection.
Free Music Review: good, but second best, actually...
Hit: 4 Stars
yes, this is a sterling album, one that has held up over the years. great songs, great harmonies, a wonderfully positive concept (listen to "the christian life"). surely, it will never be "old" to my 56 year old ears, but...the byrds did a better album after parsons left the band, then the planet...it was titled..."untitled." i'd give "sweethearts" 4.4 stars and "untitled" 4.5.