The Clarkophile

Lost Dillard & Clark Song, “The World is Open Wide”

2025-03-12T17:14:00.016-04:00

John Delgatto (Sierra Records) and I are following leads in an effort to track down “The World is Open Wide,” a song written by Lalo Schifrin and Alan and Marilyn Bergman, and performed by Dillard & Clark. The track was slated to be the main song in the Steve McQueen film The Reivers. According to Byron Berline’s A Fiddler’s Diary, the recording session took place on August 13, 1969 at CBS Studio Center — not A&M, as one might have expected.

Lalo Schifrin composed the film score, but it was ultimately rejected by Director Mark Rydell, who then brought in John Williams.

Schifrin’s rejected score has never surfaced.

Below is a fascinating press release from A&M’s Bob Garcia, who discusses D&C’s involvement in the film (obviously prior to Schifrin’s firing). Notice also his claim that the band recorded “dozens of completed tracks.” This could very well be standard PR hyperbole—but it’s still interesting to think about, even though the tapes were probably destroyed in the Universal fire.

If you have any information on “The World is Open Wide,” please contact me at clarkophile@gmail.com.

Above: Dillard & Clark, 1969
Seated: Gene Clark, Doug Dillard
Standing: Donna Washburn, Byron Berline,
Jon Corneal, and David Jackson

Back Street Mirror Revisited

2024-06-30T21:19:00.004-04:00

Coming July 19 from Liberation Hall,

BACK STREET MIRROR REVISITED,

A digital-only update of the Record Store Day EP from 2018, now augmented by further rarities from 1964-1970 and updated notes from The Clarkophile.

Track list:

1. Back Street Mirror (1967)

2. Don’t Let It Fall Through (1967)

3. Yesterday, Am I Right (1967)

4. If I Hang Around (1966)

5. She Told Me (1966)

6. That’s What You Want (1965)

Bonus tracks:

7. Why Can’t I Have Her Back Again (1964)

8. One in a Hundred (1970)

9. 1975 (1970)

10. She’s the Kind of Girl (1970)

11. The Virgin (1970)

The first single from Back Street Mirror Revisited is the Hugh Masekela-produced, baroque-pop version of “Yesterday, Am I Right,” from August 1967.

Stream it here.

Clarkophile interviewed by Houston Press for The Lost Studio Sessions

2024-04-25T21:51:00.004-04:00

I was delighted to chat with Houston Press writer Bob Ruggiero about the rerelease of The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982 for Record Store Day.

You can read the full article here:

Country Rock Thrives with Gene Clark and Flying Burrito Brothers for Record Store Day

Record Store Day, April 20: Gene Clark - The Lost Studio Sessions 1964 - 1982

2024-02-15T15:06:00.036-05:00

I’m delighted to report that Liberation Hall, a Massachusetts-based label, has just announced the rerelease of GENE CLARK - THE LOST STUDIO SESSIONS 1964-1982, which I’m sure many of you will remember was first released on Sierra Records in 2016.

Both LP and CD include a multi-page booklet with rare photos, production and recording information, and extensive liner notes by compilation producer John Delgatto and Clark experts Johnny Rogan, John Einarson, and Domenic Priore.

The first single is Gene with Chris, Michael, Herb Pedersen and Al Perkins, covering Rodney Crowell’s “No Memories Hangin’ Round”:

TRACKLIST:

BREAKDOWN OF THE SESSIONS (1964, 1967, 1970, 1972, 1982)

1964 SESSIONS

The Way I Am | I’d Feel Better | That Girl | A Worried Heart | If There’s No Love

These Jim Dickson-produced tracks reveal a sensitive, 19-year-old acoustic balladeer honing his burgeoning songwriting craft. Already apparent are the unexpected chord changes, the soaring tenor, and preoccupation with heartache that would characterize Gene’s later, more well-known, work both with the Byrds and as a solo artist.

1967 Single Session

Back Street Mirror | Don’t Let It Fall Through

In January 1967, Jim Dickson brought Gene into the studio to record the planned A- and B-sides of a single. Featuring members of the famed Wrecking Crew, and an arrangement by Leon Russell, “Back Street Mirror” recalls the rich baroque stylings of “Echoes.” When the single failed to materialize, the song was given to actor David Hemmings, who – singing over Gene’s thought-to-be wiped vocal – used it to kick off his Happens LP later that year.

The quirky, spirited “Don’t Let It Fall Through” shows Gene was no slouch when it came to swinging, R&B-based rock.

1970 SOLO ACOUSTIC SESSIONS

An astonishing discovery, these previously undocumented songs from the pre-White Light period are a testament to Clark’s extraordinary growth as a songwriter. Relieving the pressures of life in LA for pastoral sanctuary in Northern California, the newlywed Clark found – if only for a short time – inner peacefulness and uncommon grace, palpably felt in a clutch of songs imbued with philosophy, ecology, and spirituality.

1970 SESSION WITH THE FLYING BURRITO BROTHERS

She Darked the Sun

This rollicking track was purportedly recorded in the spring of 1970, just prior to Gram Parsons’ firing from the Flying Burrito Brothers. Gene revives – and drastically reinterprets – a song first released on Dillard & Clark’s wonderful 1968 debut (and also recorded by Linda Ronstadt). The rearrangement shows how effortlessly Gene returned to playing alongside his erstwhile bandmates, Chris Hillman and Michael Clarke.

1972 SESSIONS

Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms | She Don’t Care About Time | Don’t That Road Look Rough and Rocky | These Bars Have Made a Prisoner Out of Me

Similar to the situation with the 1967 tracks, two of these recordings later saw release on Terry Melcher’s self-titled album from 1974 (Gene’s vocals having been wiped and, for decades, presumed lost). Jim Dickson always maintained that “these were the best Gene ever sounded.” One would be hard-pressed to argue otherwise.

1982 NYTEFLYTE SESSIONS

One Hundred Years From Now | The Letter | Still Feeling Blue | No Memories Hangin’ Round | I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better

Gene was reunited with his ex-Byrd brothers Chris Hillman and Michael Clarke — augmented by stalwarts Herb Pedersen and Al Perkins — for what was a laudable attempt by Jim Dickson and Eddie Tickner to launch the group (dubbed Nyteflyte) in Nashville. Gene’s reading of Rodney Crowell’s “No Memories Hangin’ Round'' stands as a moving reminder of his uncanny ability to make someone else’s song entirely his own. Sadly, this would be the last time the three ex-Byrds would record together.

Plagiarism of my work in the notes of BGO’s White Light / Roadmaster reissue

2023-07-23T22:47:00.011-04:00

At first, I was excited to hear about UK-based BGO’s new 2-on-1 CD reissue of Gene’s White Light and Roadmaster. While I’m sure a lot of longtime fans would’ve preferred another archival release along the lines of The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982 or Gene Clark Sings for You, it’s also important to maintain the availability of Gene’s core catalogue. And even though I own these titles several times over, I still bought a copy, if only to support the larger efforts of #teamGene.

I was also interested to see who had been tapped to write the liner notes.

Turns out the new notes are credited to a fellow named John O’Regan. The essay offers a rather stilted, pedestrian recounting of Gene’s life and career. It reads like a series of unrelated bullet points, lacking in both nuance and insight (it later occurred to me that O’Regan might have enlisted help from ChatGPT). Eventually, it begins to resemble a Wikipedia entry written by someone with absolutely no interest in their subject. Familiar facts are dutifully trotted out in a stiff, choppy manner; each sentence assumes the same, tedious cadence, often beginning with Gene’s name (“Clark did this. Clark did that…”).

But towards the end, I started to feel a strange sense of déjà vu. For a few moments I sat there completely flummoxed; I couldn’t quite figure it out. But then when I saw the bibliography, it became clear.

I was reading my own writing.

Listed in O’Regan’s bare-bones bibliography is this bio, which I contributed to Gene-Clark.com. O’Regan not only used my piece to inform himself, he actually lifted entire paragraphs of my writing and inserted them into his essay (see below). To anyone reading the piece, the writing would appear to be his – which I believe was the intent. And while he deigned to include the Gene-Clark.com web address in his bibliography, my name is not mentioned at all.

In case you’re wondering, BGO shrugged and referred me to O’Regan. O’Regan wrote a condescending, self-pitying letter of apology that stopped well short of admitting he knowingly stole my work.

But he and I both know the truth – don’t we, John?

Citing the sources of one’s information and directly quoting them are two different things. O’Regan made no attempt to use quotation marks for my words, yet he had no problem playing by the rules for other works quoted in his essay. So O’Regan obviously knows it’s a writer’s responsibility to indicate direct quotations of someone else’s work – he simply chose to ignore them when it came to mine.

It’s the sheer volume of the thievery that blows me away. Paragraphs of my work! Over 350 words! And this clown was surely paid for his efforts. I am thoroughly disgusted by that.

Apart from knowing how to string together a sentence, tell a good story, and meet your deadlines, there aren’t that many rules to being a writer. You don’t punch a clock, you don’t have a boss looking over your shoulder, and heck, if you want, you can write while drunk, stoned, hungover or even sitting around drinking coffee in your underwear. The only real, sacred rule of being a writer is YOU DON’T STEAL SOMEONE ELSE’S SHIT - EVER.

Oh, one more thing…perhaps unsurprisingly, someone on Twitter recently suggested that other parts of O’Regan’s notes were lifted from the late Johnny Rogan’s work.

Fuck you, John O’Regan.

Review: Gene Clark Collected

2021-12-18T18:48:00.012-05:00

Gene Clark Collected

Tipton, MO’s finest son receives a second, career-spanning compilation,

this time with a vinyl option…so what’s not to like?

Well, how do I say this politely?

Gene Clark - Collected

Music on Vinyl/Music on CD

Available as:

Ltd. Ed. 3-LP Edition: Music on Vinyl (42 songs; becomes a 2-LP set after 3-LP version is sold out)
3-CD Edition: Music on CD (60 songs)

It’s been a long, slow slog, but I think even the most cynical, battle-weary Gene Clark fan would be forced to admit that Harold Eugene is more popular now, 30 years after his death, than at any time in his post-Byrds career. There are several reasons for this, of course—John Einarson’s biography, Johnny Rogan’s Byrds tomes, and Four Suns’ The Byrd Who Flew Alone documentary, among them—but in my opinion, the pivotal moment, the thing that really kickstarted the whole Clark renaissance, was the 1998 release of the career-spanning 2-CD compilation, Flying High.

Flying High legitimized Gene Clark’s music. Heck, it legitimized Gene Clark, both as an important contributor to the Byrds’ broad legacy, and a visionary artist and songwriter in his own right.

Let’s remember that Gene never scored a hit record as a solo artist, so for him to receive a classy, career-spanning 2-disc retrospective—one that warranted a thoughtful search through the archives for high-quality outtakes and rarities, as opposed to gratuitous add-ons—was the moment the Clark Curse™️ was cast out for good. This was tantamount to a belated public validation of Gene’s work…even if it was something the rest of us had been shouting from the rooftops for many years. Flying High catapulted Gene to an entirely new level.

But Flying High was only ever released on CD; was only ever available in North America as an expensive import. Alas, it disappeared quickly, but the point had already been made, the mountaintop summited.

Now, just in time for Christmas comes a new career-spanning compilation, Gene Clark Collected, from Music on CD/Music on Vinyl, based in The Netherlands. How does it stack up against Flying High? Well, put it this way: while the compilers of Collected appear to possess at least some superficial awareness of Flying High (and Gene Clark), they seem curiously detached from, or possibly even willfully ignorant of, the things that made it (and him) so special.

CD1

CD1, which covers 1965 to 1974, contains 23 songs (interestingly, the World Pacific era is skipped). While it’s nice to see things kick off with Gene’s signature track, “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better”, a sense of bewilderment quickly sets in: the entire Byrds era—the period upon which both his initial stardom and early reputation was initially built—is represented by a paltry four songs (the others being “I Knew I’d Want You” “Set You Free This Time” and “If You’re Gone”). These are all fine songs, but surely the period deserves more comprehensive coverage? Leaving aside for a moment the skipped gems from the World Pacific period, where are “She Don’t Care About Time” “Eight Miles High” “Here Without You” “It’s No Use” “She Has a Way” “You Won’t Have to Cry” “The Day Walk” and “The World Turns All Around Her”? This is akin to compiling the Beatles’ Red album (1962-1966) and omitting “She Loves You” “I Want to Hold Your Hand” “A Hard Day’s Night” “I Feel Fine” and—anyway, you get what I mean.

Next in the chronology is 1967’s Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers. Our compilers opted for the two singles, “Echoes” and “So You Say You Lost Your Baby,” plus the B-side of the former, “I Found You.” Not bad choices at all, but again: a mere 10 minutes of music from Gene’s time in the Byrds; only eight minutes from Gene’s solo debut. Let’s stop for a moment and talk about this. Compact discs hold 80 minutes of music and this is a 3-CD set, so what the hell is going on?

Things get worse. Quickly. The Dillard & Clark period is represented by seven songs, but the inclusion of two covers, “Don’t Be Cruel” and “Rocky Top,” shows a baffling degree of ignorance. Yes, the former was a single (with “Lyin’ Down the Middle”) but hardly among D&C’s most distinguished tracks. And the most prominent vocalist on “Rocky Top”—a song the liner notes inexplicably claim was “contributed” by Gene!—is freakin’ Donna Washburn (A gentle reminder, if I may, that this purports to be a collection of Gene Clark’s work, and not Doug Dillard’s then-girlfriend). To make matters worse, when discussing Gene’s contributions to Through the Morning Through the Night, the liner notes mention three songs, “Don’t Let Me Down” “Rocky Top” and “Polly” but make no mention of the fact that Gene wrote the titular song, as well as “Kansas City Southern.” And notwithstanding the undisputed brilliance of D&C’s take on the Fabs’ “Don’t Let Me Down,” we are now getting pretty far afield from establishing Gene Clark as a writer of consequence: in total, there are a whopping 16 covers in the set. Sixteen.

CD2

Carrying on, then, CD2 covers 1974 to 1987. The title track from No Other ended CD1, after which CD2 brings another three songs from the album (that’s four of the album’s eight songs—totalling over 24 minutes). It’s hard to argue with a generous selection of tracks from Gene’s acknowledged masterpiece, but some perspective, please: the entire 1965-1967 period is given 18 minutes.

And the choices only get more bizarre from there. Two Sides To Every Story is represented by four tracks, only two of which are Clark originals. So, rather than include “Past Addresses” or previously un-comped gems like “Lonely Saturday” “Sister Moon,” we get “In the Pines” and the forced, uninspired remake of “Kansas City Southern.”

Oh, lord, what fresh hell is this? Moving into the McGuinn Clark & Hillman period, it becomes abundantly clear that the compilers of this CD know nothing about Gene Clark—nor do they care. How do I know? Well, how else can you explain the inclusion of “Don’t You Write Her Off,” written by Roger McGuinn and Bob Hippard, on which McGuinn sings lead? If that wasn’t sufficiently disrespectful, well, how about “Surrender To Me,” the most egregious, preposterous song in the set. Not only was it written by Rick Vito, it was sung by bleedin’ Chris Hillman, ffs.

Honestly, though, I can tell you exactly how this happened. Somebody looked through Gene’s discography, made a list of MCH’s singles—not caring who wrote or sang them—and called it good. This is shoddy work. These people do not care about Gene’s legacy.

CD3, which purports to be a collection of rarities, is, in truth, merely a contextless dumping ground for a bunch of songs that have emerged over the years, either as bonus tracks on re-released editions of Gene’s albums, or taken from other (more distinguished) compilations—like Flying High.

While I was initially glad to see this set, I was disappointed to learn that Gene’s estate was neither consulted nor asked to participate in this release—which is a real pity. Had they done so, I’m confident that Kai Clark would have immediately set them straight with respect to the many errors that characterize this release.

But I was also bothered by something: I couldn’t understand why a company would, on one hand, invest in such a lavish, 3-CD/3-LP presentation (make a big splash on social media; go to the trouble of licensing a previously unseen Henry Diltz portrait), and on the other be so openly careless and inept with the actual content of a set they’ve gone to such great lengths to produce. I started to get the sense this was all sizzle and no steak. And it is. All of these songs are previously released. There’s nothing rare here.

Then it all made sense: Recently, I learned that far from being a unique, focused, well-researched/executed project along the lines of Flying High, Gene Clark Collected is merely one of 32 other such compilations in the company’s generic “Collected” series. This album isn’t about Gene Clark at all. It’s about product. All the thought and planning went into packaging. Who gives a shit about the songs?

As a fan of Gene’s music for over 40 years, it would normally make me smile with pride to see his name listed alongside the other artists in the Collected series whose work I respect and admire (e.g. the Velvet Underground, Robert Cray, Marvin Gaye). After all, that is something I’ve wished for all my life: to see Gene accepted as one of the greats.

But if the trade-off for this is seeing Gene’s musical legacy cynically manipulated and misrepresented, and treated with callous disregard just so somebody can make some money, was it worth it?

Gene Clark deserves better than this. So do you.

Your Fire Burning: A List of Extant Versions of Gene’s Late-Period Masterpiece

2021-09-06T17:01:00.006-04:00

Your Fire Burning: A List of Extant Versions

As promised back in the days pre-COVID, I’m forging ahead with my series on Gene’s exquisite late-period masterpiece.

The purpose of this particular instalment is to compile a list of all known versions of the song. It will be updated if new information comes to light. If you have any reliable information about a version that does not appear on this list, I’d love to hear about it. Feel free to contact me at clarkophile@gmail.com.

The late Johnny Rogan once told me he was “always intrigued” by the fact that I named ‘Your Fire Burning’ as my favourite Gene Clark song. He never elaborated on that, but I’m sure he meant it in a positive way because we shared a fondness for the more poetic, idiosyncratic songs Gene wrote in the 1980s, of which it stood as the greatest of them all. (These are the songs we filed under E for “Epics,” in the strangely compartmentalized file drawers of Gene’s ‘80s oeuvre).

I suppose one of the reasons I champion the song is because, over 30 years after Gene’s death, only a handful of versions (complete or partial) have ever surfaced. The reason for this is, of course, that at the time of Gene’s death it was a relatively new song; it simply hadn’t existed long enough to accrue a variety of interpretations—live, studio, official or otherwise—unlike, say, ‘Train Leaves Here This Morning,’ a perennial warhorse, and near-constant staple of Gene’s live set. I think it’s clear that Gene was proud of it, and felt it was an important song, but it appears that his life ended before he could record a definitive studio version. Until such time as this theory is disproved, I think it’s incumbent upon us to document the extant versions, and cherish them as the rarest of jewels.

In documenting the versions, I also wanted to determine when it was written, or, failing that, establish a logical window of time during which it was likely written. Thanks to Carla Olson, I believe I’ve done that. But it was a serpentine path to get there.

Why? Well…

Enter Rogan

This is where it gets complicated…

The funny thing about Rogan was he never actually answered the question you were asking, he answered the one he wanted you to ask. He’d insinuated that he knew when ‘Your Fire Burning’ was written, but did so without actually, you know, telling me. Let’s put that another way: Johnny Rogan was ruthlessly circumspect in the sharing of his Gene Clark facts.

That said, he did enjoy sharing enticing bits of (vaguely worded) Clark minutiae with me…the most crucial elements of which he would invariably keep to himself (I’m playing this up for comedic value, of course. In truth, however, he was very helpful, and assisted me on many occasions).

The uncanny thing was, by design or accident, he would sometimes provide answers that created more questions than they answered: One step forward, two back.

I’ll give you an example. At some point, I had rather offhandedly referred to ‘Your Fire Burning’ as probably the “last” song Gene wrote. Admittedly, the comment was based on the fact that, prior to the release of Silhouetted in Light in 1992, it had not been documented. I must also confess that on some level I wanted it to be the last one, because it had taken on such great personal significance for me. I bathed in the belief that it was Gene’s grand final statement in this corporeal life. That image seemed rather beautiful to me. Comforting, even.

But during one of my back-and-forths with Rogan, he began to tell me about an altogether different song—an unreleased, undocumented/unpublished, samba-flavoured song called ‘Hole in Her Mind,’ taken from an 11-1/2-minute worktape in his possession. He said that it was “v. late GC”—then indicated that ‘Your Fire Burning’ had been written “two or three years” prior.

Johnny was, in his way, letting me know that I was mistaken about ‘Your Fire Burning’ being the last song Gene wrote.

The problem with that, however, is that I learned from Rogan—that very day, as a matter of fact—that, on the very same worktape, same session that features ‘Hole in Her Mind,’ work is being done on an incomplete ‘Your Fire Burning.’ In fact, the final chord of ‘Your Fire Burning’ is still ringing out when Gene, as though switching radio stations on a sudden impulse, launches into a comparatively choppy and upbeat (though obviously embryonic) version of ‘Hole in Her Mind’!

Unfortunately, at the time of our exchange, I was so awestruck with news of a previously unknown Clark original that I’d completely overlooked this apparent discrepancy.

So how do we reconcile what appears to be a contradiction in his contention that ‘Your Fire Burning’ was written “two or three years” before ‘Hole in Her Mind’ if unfinished renditions of both songs are on the same worktape?

Well, I suppose much would depend upon how one determines the point at which a song has been well and truly “written.” On the worktape, ‘Your Fire Burning’ is about 90% complete. Gene was grappling with the “break the chains” line (at one point he ad libs what sounds like “and be on earth” before quickly replacing it, on-the-fly, with “break the chains”). Elsewhere, he was experimenting with phrasing/cadence in the verses and chorus. But the melody, arrangement (including his beloved “Bee Gees moment!”—see Glossary) were all in place. Meanwhile, the rendition of ‘Hole in Her Mind’—which, you’ll recall, Rogan had described as “v. late G.C.”—appeared on the worktape in a rudimentary, embryonic form—a mere song sketch. So I believe Rogan was saying that ‘Hole in Her Mind,’ in its most complete form, came later on (I’m guessing late 1990/early 1991). He went on to say that he had a lot of information about the song, including a “fully realized” arrangement on a reel-to-reel recording:

“It's a dark song with a v. upbeat melody and much more fully realized later with prominent guitar and Mexicana melody and stuff…GC was doing his melancholic meditations AND stuff like this at the end.”

It would be interesting to learn what information he had in his possession about “Hole in Her Mind,” but the current status of Rogan’s archives is unknown.

Narrowing the time frame

In my 2009 Shindig! cover story on Gene Clark, Carla shared the story of how she heard ‘Your Fire Burning’ for the first time:

Recently, Carla was kind enough to provide further information about the approximate date of the evening in question (whereupon I also came to learn that Gene Clark was a fastidious cook, who demanded perfection in his oil-and-lemon salad dressing):

I remember we were at Gene’s. He liked to make steaks and salads for dinner, and I remember it as really hot, so [the presentation of the song] was maybe September 1989. He played us “Your Fire Burning” and was still working a bit on the lyrics.

I don’t recall us performing it before [February 3, 1990] McCabe’s, but [I do] remember coming up with the answer lines spontaneously, maybe at rehearsal at Gene’s with Dave Provost and Duane Jarvis before the show. Gene was known for alternative lyrics on his own shows but usually we matched phrasing pretty close.

So, checking against whatever set lists I’ve seen from the period, and remembering Rogan’s comment that it was written “two or three years” before the “v. late” appearance of a more complete ‘Hole in Her Mind,’ I’m comfortable in dating the actual composition of ‘Your Fire Burning’ to late summer 1989. In spite of the minor fixes that remained, we may conclude that Gene felt ‘Your Fire Burning’ was at least ready for presentation in September of 1989. How long it took him to reach this point is unknown. An 18-song bootleg of Gene & Carla’s June 16th, 1989 appearance at McCabe’s does not include ‘Your Fire Burning,’ which would seem to indicate that it would soon be/was in the process of being written.

Studio Version?

There’s very little evidence to suggest that Gene recorded, let alone attempted, a polished studio take of the song. Since we know it was played live on February 3, 1990, I’ve often wondered why on earth it was passed over during the ill-fated 1990 sessions with John Arrias. It was clearly superior to the workmanlike material that was recorded (e.g. “Look Who’s Missing Who”; Tommy Kaye’s “Shades of Blue”). No one, to my knowledge, has ever indicated that there’s a (studio) recording of it.

No one, that is, except Gene himself.

Tantalizingly, while introducing the song at the Cinegrill, Gene says: “I’m going to sing a new song for you. Actually—well, it’s not that new. Well, it is recorded but it’s not out. Let’s put it that way.”

So you tell me, what does that mean? Is there an extant studio version?

It’s a lovely thought, isn’t it? In any event, here are the versions I’m aware of:

Known versions

1. Undated home recording 1989, The Otsego Kitchen, 14747 Otsego, Sherman Oaks, Ca (11:36)

‘Your Fire Burning’ | ‘Hole in Her Mind’

Carla Olson: Gene had a little cassette machine, almost like an old answering machine. He liked using his Microverb for the delay and recorded in his kitchen as there was a lot of tile in the floor and walls!

Oh, and clip-on lights everywhere to see the black controls.

Above: Alesia Microverb II, similar to the one

Gene used in his kitchen recordings

at his Otsego residence.

2. KNBR San Francisco, 1990 (2:16)

From the unofficial, fan-created 7-CD Gene Clark Box Set, circa 2001

There’s very little information about this version. It’s not a full performance (notice brief running time); sounds like it was possibly played as a musical outro after the interview segment heading into an advertisement (the fade is abrupt).

3. Gypsy Angel (Evangeline 2001) “The Otsego Kitchen,” 14747 Otsego, Sherman Oaks, Ca 1989 (7:51)

This fully developed version would appear to have been recorded on same equipment as mentioned in #1 above. It is the second officially released version. Some find Gene’s beloved echo a bit off-putting, but I just like to get inside, try to appreciate how he heard it, what it meant for him.

4. Silhouetted in Light/In Concert McCabe’s Guitar Shop, Santa Monica, Ca, February 3, 1990 (6:41)

Going by Carla’s recollection, this was recorded approximately five months after Gene presented it to her and Saul over dinner the previous September. I shared my personal thoughts about this version in this post, from February 2020.

Dignified, majestic, profoundly moving, it is the primary reason this blog exists.

5. The Cinegrill, Roosevelt Hotel, Hollywood, California, April 13, 1991 (8:34)

The stunning performance at the Cinegrill is the best indication as to how a full-band arrangement might have come together in the studio. If the 6:41 version on Silhouetted in Light hinted at a return to the No Other-like epic, then the Cinegrill version confirms it—and then some.

Clocking in at over eight-and-a-half minutes—not a second of it wasted—‘Your Fire Burning’’s length surpasses even “Some Misunderstanding” (8:09), and still goes by in a flash.

This is not the measured, poised, and gentlemanly Gene Clark from Mountain Stage, reacting to polite applause with a refined, sincere, “How nice.” The Cinegrill is raw and unfiltered, loose and untamed, the stuff of high drama, definitely not for the faint of heart. Gene lurches and lashes out like Lear on the stormy heath, out on the end of time. It is a passionate, gut-wrenching, soul-stirring performance. It is a man near the end of this life pleading for love in life, well into the beyond.

Above: Drummer Rick Schlosser
(Discogs.com bio).

And while the Firebyrds and 20th Anniversary of the Byrds bands amounted to a bunch of guys going through the motions, the band Gene assembled at the Cinegrill was his best yet, anchored by the incisive, propulsive playing of drummer Rick Schlosser (Van Morrison, Art Garfunkel, Rod Stewart) and keyboardist Stewart Elster (Donna Summer, Melissa Manchester, Rickie Lee Jones, Chaka Khan, Nicolette Larson, Glen Campbell). In YFB, Schlosser gives a masterclass in sympathetic backing, anticipating changes with dramatic, powerful fills and meaningful accents that somehow keep everything rooted and orderly, even as he’s pushing the song forward.

For his part, Elster’s uncommonly elegant performance recalls Nicky Hopkins’ playing on the Rolling Stones’ “Angie,” echoing and accentuating the desperate pleas within Gene’s tortured vocal lines (“Listen, little darlin’…”). Both performances share the same effortless grace and beauty.

Above: Undated photo of Stewart Elster,
from EntireProductions.com.

6. Kai Clark, with Carla Olson - Silver Raven (2020)

If Gene’s Cinegrill performance was akin to a high-wire act without a net, then Kai’s resembled an upstart magician pulling a rabbit out of his hat. Before this, I would not believed anyone could have done justice to YFB. With all due respect to the Bee Gees, this was Gene Clark’s moment. There are some songs you just can’t cover because they are synonymous with the writer and his/her original performance.

But Kai (with Carla’s comforting presence) pulled off the ultimate magic trick. Not only did he acquit himself nicely, he honoured his father in a way that moves me very deeply.

So that’s it. This is all we have. Again, if you have reliable information about another version, I invite you to contact me at clarkophile@gmail.com.

How I’d create a Deluxe Edition of Roadmaster

2021-08-27T13:42:00.015-04:00

Roadmaster 2-CD DELUXE EDITION*

*An unofficial fantasy release

Above: Cover design contributed
by Court Hansen from Trapped in the Crates
BACKGROUND: Problem-ridden, misunderstood, stateless, shuttled from one guardian to another, Roadmaster is the unwanted foreign-born stepchild of Gene Clark’s catalogue.

The album was originally conceived as a Terry Melcher-produced work, but health problems, ongoing paranoia about the Manson Family, and substance abuse issues forced him to pass off production duties to his 26-year-old assistant, Chris Hinshaw. Hinshaw, up until then a capable engineer with an impressive resume (that includes Sly & the Family Stone’s There’s a Riot Goin’ On and Taj Mahal’s Giant Step/De Ole Folks at Home) had also recently worked with Melcher on two Byrds albums, Untitled and Byrdmaniax. (Note: For more information on the original 1972 Roadmaster sessions, see Roadmaster: The Hinshaw Mix FAQ ).

With Hinshaw now at the helm, Gene’s work began afresh, with support from a dream team of L.A. country-rock session players: Clarence White (guitar); “Sneaky” Pete Kleinow (pedal steel); Chris Ethridge (bass) and Byron Berline (fiddle), plus Gene’s closest Byrds buddy, Michael Clarke (drums). Eight songs were completed before the project took a fatal blow when, in Gene’s absence, Hinshaw made a huge unforced error. After Sly Stone and others descended upon the studio for purposes of staging an extended lavish party, vast costs were charged to Gene’s account. A&M soon pulled the plug on Roadmaster before it could be finished. It appears that although Gene was not directly responsible for the breakdown, he was the one who shouldered the blame.

Enter former Byrds manager Jim Dickson—who had unsuccessfully attempted to kickstart Gene’s solo career two years before with a planned 45 involving all five original Byrds—who saw an opportunity to salvage both projects, Roadmaster and the 1970 single. And then, augmented by what most fans (incorrectly) assumed to have been a single stray track cut with the Flying Burrito Brothers in 1970—Dickson created the 11-track Roadmaster we’ve come to know and love.

But if Roadmaster’s conception was akin to a dark Victorian novel—rife with sordid affairs centred around an abused, unwanted stepchild—its birth would add a few chapters of its own.

Whereas A&M had seen fit to release Gene’s most recent album, 1971’s White Light, on three continents—North America (US), Europe (UK) and Australia—Roadmaster’s birth was a comparatively quieter, more sequestered affair. Like some Victorian maiden sent away under mysterious circumstances to give birth to her illegitimate child in a foreign land, Roadmaster was relegated to a rather muted, humble release facilitated through Ariola Records, a subsidiary of A&M’s Dutch operation.

Its next noteworthy release came in 1986 via Edsel, a UK label—which is how I first acquired it as an import, sitting forlornly in the “Reduced Imports” dump bin, marked down to a mere $8.00. Astonishingly, although recorded in America, by American musicians, and bearing the name of an artist born and bred in Missouri, Gene Clark’s third solo album did not earn a release on an American label until Sundazed reintroduced it in 2011.

So to recap, the original Roadmaster LP was cobbled together from three discrete sources:

Eight completed songs from the aborted 1972 sessions, the production duties for which were initially undertaken by Terry Melcher, and then handed off to his assistant Chris Hinshaw;
Sessions for a projected solo single, produced by Jim Dickson, with contributions from Roger McGuinn, David Crosby, Chris Hillman and Michael Clarke, and an uncredited Bernie Leadon;
A 1970 session with The Flying Burrito Brothers.

Despite its complicated pedigree, Roadmaster holds up remarkably well as an album. In spite of everything, it maintains its own unique flow, establishes its own personality, and ultimately, makes its own album-like statement. Its birth may not have been planned, but Gene’s fans have, over time, come to accept it as a bona fide, cohesive album; a worthy followup to White Light.

The Deluxe Edition that was never made

It’s astonishing to me that a “Deluxe Edition” of Roadmaster failed to materialize during the DE’s mid-to-late-2000s reign—you know, when seemingly anyone who ever made an album got the DE treatment. I think Roadmaster was as worthy as some I’ve seen. Because of its built-in duality—it exists as both a patchwork creation and standalone album—I think it’s an ideal candidate for augmentation. A DE could help flesh out its complicated history, provide aural colour and detail, answering any lingering questions (the Hinshaw mixes, the full story of Gene and the Burritos, etc).

Personally speaking, ever since the release of Flying High in 1998 (with those unexpected alt mixes of “She’s the Kind of Girl”/“One in a Hundred”) I’ve been creating my own Extended/Bonus Tracks-editions of the album, and updating whenever new tracks came to light. I remember when I learned of the existence of the much-vaunted Hinshaw mix, it opened up the possibility for a 2-CD set, if only in my own mind.

So that’s what I’m sharing here today. What you see below is my own version of the Roadmaster Deluxe Edition, with notations about sources, although out of respect for the Estate and others, I will not share links to any downloads of the unreleased material.

So record companies, listen up, this is what you should do.

Oh, and 🤙?

Above: A list of ingredients to bake
your own Roadmaster DE.

CD1 Roadmaster (Tracks 1-11 Original LP, released 1973)

1. She’s the Kind of Girl
2. One in a Hundred
3. Here Tonight
4. Full Circle Tonight
5. In a Misty Morning
6. Rough and Rocky
7. Roadmaster
8. I Really Don’t Want to Know
9. I Remember the Railroad
10. She Don’t Care About Time
11. Shooting Star

Bonus tracks (Green type indicates officially released track)
12. She’s the Kind of Girl (acoustic demo) The Lost Studio Sessions Bonus Acoustic CD EP
13. One in a Hundred (acoustic demo) The Lost Studio Sessions Bonus Acoustic CD EP
14. She’s the Kind of Girl (early run-through, Take 14) Roadmaster, Japanese SHM-CD UICY-75898
15. One in a Hundred (early run-through) Roadmaster, Japanese SHM-CD UICY-75898
16. She Darked the Sun (1970 recording with The Flying Burrito Brothers) The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982

Total time: 55:00

The Alternate Roadmaster

CD2

1. She’s the Kind of Girl (Produced by Jim Dickson, alt mix) Flying High

2. One in a Hundred (Produced by Jim Dickson, alt mix) Flying High

3. Here Tonight (acoustic demo) Here Tonight: The White Light Demos

The Chris Hinshaw Mixes

4. Full Circle Song American Dreamer: 1964-1974

5. In a Misty Morning (Sierra Records 2017 Sampler

6. Rough and Rocky unreleased

7. Roadmaster unreleased

8. I Really Don’t Want to Know unreleased

9. I Remember the Railroad unreleased

10. She Don’t Care About Time unreleased

11. Falling Star (Shooting Star) unreleased

Produced by Terry Melcher

12. Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982

13. She Don’t Care About Time The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982

14. Don’t That Road Look Rough and Rocky The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982

16. In a Misty Morning (Impromptu studio demo) unreleased (Producer unknown)

Total time: 59:00

Gene in the 1980s, Part 3: This far, and no farther

2021-08-24T09:29:00.027-04:00

A collage of images of Gene’s work and activities from 1979 to 1991
Top row: Promo pic of Gene Clark & Carla Olson, around the time of So Rebellious a Lover;
Middle row: McGuinn Clark & Hillman LP, 1979;
the ill-fated City, 1980; Firebyrd, 1984; So Rebellious a Lover, 1987;
Bottom row: 1983: Gene on Sun Country, Canadian TV; CRY, late 1980s;
Gene and mulletted John York on TV’s Solid Gold, introduced as “The Byrds”;
the 5 original Byrds at the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, January 16, 1991.

Previous posts in this series:
1. Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991)
2. Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

This far, and no farther

In this, the final part of my series on Gene in the 1980s, I’ll examine the unfortunate stigma surrounding Gene’s work: it’s likely causes, the ways in which it was disseminated, and how it came to be accepted as fact.

Late last year I had a text conversation with an online friend who is, without a doubt, one of the most knowledgeable 1960s-music fans I’ve ever encountered. He has assisted with, and provided source material for, various reissue projects, and amassed a formidable collection of rare official releases and ultra-rare, unreleased recordings—the kind of stuff that's only shared between hardcore collectors.

We were chatting about Johnny Rogan’s Requiem for The Timeless, Vol 2, which he hadn’t read. He then added, rather casually, that his interest in Gene’s career fades after 1974 or so. Normally, I wouldn’t be surprised or offended by a simple statement of taste, but I must admit I felt a momentary twinge of annoyance. As it was a text-only conversation (oftentimes the breeding ground of miscommunication) I wasn’t sure whether he simply wanted to humbly acknowledge a gap in his knowledge, or whether he was blithely dismissing a large portion of Gene’s post-No Other work—otherwise known as the original inspiration for this blog.

Now, as those who know me will attest, I am possibly a tad hypersensitive where Gene is concerned. Ehh, fair cop. But at the same time, I do understand that music fans often impose personal lines of demarcation, as if to say "I will go this far, and no farther" (an in-joke for fans of Columbo). Some Led Zeppelin fans cherish the first six LPs, but were left cold by Presence, and felt In Through the Out Door veered too closely towards mainstream pop (“All My Love”). Some (horribly misguided) Pink Floyd fans will argue the band became great only after Syd Barrett’s departure, and will summarily dismiss his contributions as puerile. So why then should it surprise me that Gene’s fans would draw similar lines in the sand?

But the exchange did make me wonder why his interest wanes after No Other. Why is Gene's '80s period a no-fly zone for Byrds fans? What is preventing hipsters who discovered No Other in 2019 from checking out So Rebellious a Lover or Two Sides To Every Story? At the risk of encouraging smartass replies, why is it that, for the vast majority of reissue labels and fans, both casual and hardcore, interest in Gene Clark’s career begins with Mr. Tambourine Man (1965) and tapers off sharply after 1974’s No Other (1977’s Two Sides to Every Story at the latest)?

Above: Gene Clark, circa 1986

Oh, there are pockets of fans who, like me, would love to hear Gene’s pre-fame recordings, like “Blue Ribbons.” Some, particularly European fans, remember McGuinn Clark & Hillman; saw the ‘77 show in London with the KC Southern Band. Others picked up Firebyrd and So Rebellious a Lover in one of their innumerable incarnations. But the sad, rather depressing, truth is that fewer still know or care about the smattering of posthumously released ‘80s gems that lay scattered across various now-OOP releases. This is yet another reason I miss Rogan, since he was the most well-known, high-profile champion of Gene’s ‘80s period. With his passing, hardcore Gene Clark fans have lost their loudest representative voice. For those who long to see the official release of tracks like “Communication” “Crazy Ladies” and many more, it is a bitter blow.

To be perfectly blunt: barring a miracle, I don’t foresee any label taking a gamble on Gene’s ‘80s period. Ain’t gonna happen, notwithstanding the critical/commercial success of 4AD’s massive No Other box in 2019.

How do I know?

Well, when was the last time there was a major Byrds reissue? In the early 2000s, Sundazed did an admirable job, but that particular wellspring seems to have dried up for good. We never did get that rarities set devoted to The Notorious Byrd Brothers, did we? And Sony/Legacy seem to have given up on the Byrds around the same time; the second box set, There is a Season, was released in 2006. But apart from righting Roger’s notorious wrongs vis-à-vis the first box set (more on that later), There is a Season offered little in the way of rarities to entice hardcore fans. Since then, there’s been nothing of note, except The Complete Columbia Albums Collection, which was essentially one-stop shopping for the entire reissue program (1996-2000). So, if the Byrds aren’t contenders for archival releases, what chance does Gene have? I mean, who is left that would take on such a risky project?

That’s why Sierra Records’ ill-fated The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982 (2016) was such a heartbreaker. As social media coordinator on this project, I’m still ashamed of my failure to generate more sales for Sierra. I am both astonished by the widespread indifference that greeted this magnificent set, and annoyed with those fans who clamoured for Clark rarities, but who didn’t get behind it, then had the audacity to criticize it when problems arose.

The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982 is by far the bravest, most thorough and respectful Gene Clark-related archival release of my lifetime. I tell myself that the vast majority of Clark fans had no conception of the riches it contains. Where past releases like Echoes, This Byrd Has Flown, and Flying High had offered a few tantalizing dribbles of previously unreleased tracks, this was the real fucking deal, the proverbial opening of the floodgates: a surfeit of legendary outtakes, much-bootlegged demos, oddities, experiments, and lost works.

In the world of Gene Clark releases, it was unprecedented: an entire project that was built upon, and devoted to, a vast cache of previously unreleased, chronologically arranged material (a whopping 30 songs in all!) that was, at its core, the hardcore Clark-fan’s version of an alternate Flying High. It embraced a huge swath of Gene’s career and included many legendary tracks, many of which were either presumed lost, or came as a complete surprise. And it failed.

You can’t say we never tried. But ask yourself this: in light of the fate that befell TLSS, what chance would an '80s-only collection have, after recordings sourced predominantly from the hipster-approved 1965-1974 period had failed to catch on? Gypsy Angel (2001), an album comprised of acoustic demos, was superior to UTSM but incurred the wrath of many because of the coarseness of the recordings. Others were turned off by the perceived deterioration of Gene’s voice, specifically the dental issues that added a lispy whistle to his voice. Personally, I think it added character and depth, and believe (as did Rogan) that it was a revelatory release. But yeah, the cover sucked.

Above: Gypsy Angel, 2001.

Above: Screengrabs of Gene Clark
on Canadian television, 1984.

Conclusions

Based on my research, it seems obvious that an unfortunate stigma clings to Gene’s post-1980 work like skunk-spray on a dog. How this stigma developed, took hold, and came to be accepted as fact is the result of many factors—some of which are attributable to Gene’s choices (no argument there). Some are not.

In my opinion, a deeper understanding of the stigma’s origins may help to dispel it, so that we may at least see another side to the decade. Yes, it was indeed the time of the 20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds—but Gene also wrote “Your Fire Burning” “Pledge to You,” and many others during that decade.

Simply put, there are two sides to Gene’s story in the 1980s.

1980-1991 Seeds of Stigma

Psychodrama CITY

What a difference a year makes: 1979’s McGuinn Clark & Hillman LP; 1980’s City, which both demonstrates the extent of Gene’s demotion in the billing (and corresponding lack of contributions), and also provides incontrovertible evidence to support the theory that, at the dawn of the 1980s, business types had eschewed use of telephones in favour of walkie-talkies.

In 1978-79, Gene Clark was clean-shaven, looking good, and was apparently good-to-go: a home-run king back in the big leagues again, following a brief stint in the minors.

But at the same time, this was ground zero; the precise moment at which everything soured...

McGuinn Clark & Hillman never attained the supergroup status of, say, CSN (upon whom they were clearly modelled); nor were they featured in as many magazine articles as The Police, Blondie or Elvis Costello, but in a business that placed more value in the idea of three ex-Byrds together than one flying solo, each of them could count their blessings: they were signed to a major label (Capitol), had decent publicity, toured extensively, and had a modest top-40 hit.

But as we know, it all fell apart, and rather quickly at that, with Gene at the centre of the drama that unfolded in late ‘79/early ‘80. In an eerie replay of the events of March 1966, Gene left the band, except this time instead of getting off an airplane, you could say Gene flew—or was thrown—out of a skyscraper. Or at least that’s the impression we’re left with from the perfectly bizarre/dreadful/dumb (take your pick) cover art from City, the final LP from McGuinn Clark & Hillman (or, if you want to be technical, the debut LP from “Roger McGuinn * Chris Hillman featuring Gene Clark”).

Received wisdom tells us that Gene’s substance abuse and erratic behaviour led to his departure. Indeed, this quotation from Hillman, taken from Rogan’s Requiem for the Timeless Vol. 1, and used as a set-off quote set-off quote on the MCH Wikipedia page, places the blame squarely upon Gene:

"Gene started to go nuts again. We were trying to keep him in line, like 'Come on, Gene, don't do this! You're getting crazy again!' We tried to do this second album and it was really horrible. We couldn't even get him to sing."

Above: Closeup of the one image of Gene in a leisure
suit on the cover of City, which begs the asking
of the musical question: did he jump or was he pushed?

Unfortunately, anyone with an interest in getting two sides to this story was out of luck. As noted by the late Johnny Rogan in my interview with him, Gene never shed any light upon these matters; nor was he ever pressed on the reasons why things soured with Roger and Chris, or the veracity of claims made about his addictions and mental health issues.

But even if he had been grilled by a skilled interviewer in an on-the-record discussion, one needs to remember that during interviews Gene was not known for talking shit publicly about fellow musicians behind their backs, so it’s unlikely he would have offered anything more than the tried-and-true “musical differences” explanation. And I don’t think he ever discussed his personal substance-abuse issues publicly, which effectively stalled further inquiry. We are left with only the hearsay of those who knew him, friends or otherwise.

Won’t Let You Down

It must have been obvious to all concerned that Gene was on his way out the door during the recording of City. Be that as it may, I have to question the wisdom of deliberately rebranding the group “Roger McGuinn * Chris Hillman Featuring Gene Clark.” Along with Gene’s no-shows at what were to have been MCH concerts, this was another not-so-subtle indication that all was not well with the trio. But in terms of Gene’s star power and cachet, this amounted to a shockingly public demotion. Gene seems to have lacked the kind of managerial/PR backbone that would respond to this display of disrespect in a decisive manner. There also exists, however, the possibility that Gene was fine with it; relieved to be out of the situation.

I submit that the damage to Gene’s reputation was considerable.

Let’s start with that dreadful cover. On the first LP, Gene’s surname sits dead-centre—just as he stood onstage with the Byrds 14 years before. On the second LP, however, Gene’s name, although centred, is dropped, placed beneath Roger’s and Chris’ names. Roger/Chris also benefit from a tacky red band which makes their grey-lettered names stand out more than Gene’s. Obviously, this was no accident. It was a message.

We see tall, corporate-looking buildings in a large metropolis, with individual photos of Roger and Chris tossing in the wind, appearing as if thrown from a corporate window. But where’s Gene?

Well, if you look carefully, a little picture of Gene—two, in fact—can be seen, close to the placement of his name. Notice, however, that Gene didn't get the inter-office memo and is not dressed in the official City business attire (i.e. white shirt/black tie, with optional walkie-talkie accessory) and opted for the leisure suit (about which I have questions, but that’s another matter entirely). So what happened? Did Gene miss the photo shoot? Or did he tell Roger that the idea was dumb, and he was out of his mind? What this cover was intended to represent remains a mystery to me, even today. I’m aware of the abandoned “songs about the city” album concept, but what is this image supposed to tell me? What am I to glean from it? Why is Roger on a walkie-talkie? (Yes, I know he loves gadgets, but why is he on a walkie-talkie?). Incidentally, that is the only image of Gene on the cover. He is not pictured on the back cover, or inner sleeve.

The consequences of Gene’s leaving MCH/MHfC were both immediate and severe: bereft of the security of label support or the prestige that came from being in a band with a recent top-40 hit, Gene got smacked down into the minor leagues. Again.

The Firebyrds

I’ve no idea whether it was clear to those who knew him, but with benefit of hindsight, a disturbing pattern emerges related to Gene’s psyche. Time after time, Gene was drawn to the spotlight, the perks of fame & success, and yet once reached, he would go out of his way to perform shocking, bewildering acts of self-sabotage, that would often necessitate his starting over again, from scratch:
Quitting the Byrds (1966)
Dillard & Clark’s unnecessarily disastrous live debut (1968); cf. Johnny Rogan, Requiem for the Timeless, Vol 2, pp. 94-95 (the band was under-rehearsed; also, Gene & Doug were on a bender).
Disruption of Derek Taylor’s ‘Farewell to Hollywood’ party, (March 28, 1968); cf. Johnny Rogan, Requiem for the Timeless, Vol. 2, p. 88.
Alienating David Geffen at Asylum (1974)
Alienating Al Coury at RSO (1977)
McGuinn Clark & Hillman (1979/1980)

And so, after keeping a low, pretty much invisible, profile through much of 1980 and ‘81, Gene, gaw’bless ‘em, rolled up his sleeves and started over. He formed a band, dubbed it the Firebyrds—in keeping with the album he’d been recording on the cheap in fits and starts—and duly hit the road.

I’ll level with you. I am not a fan of the Firebyrds period. When compiling the tracks for the Firebyrd Project, I found it a chore to wade through the surfeit of boots from the circa ‘84 shows. To my ears, Gene is on autopilot, performing robotically. As a band leader, I don’t think he put much effort into the (re)arrangements of the material. There was a looseness about these gigs that betrayed a lack of passion and commitment; a pervading sense of purposelessness. Joylessness. Firebyrds shows reek of boozy half-heartedness, akin to a bunch of NHL old-timers renting the rink for a weekly game of shinny. Maybe if I heard them on a decent recording I’d feel differently. Certainly their take on “She Loves You” was a nice effort.

20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds/

Jerry Lewis Telethon/ Solid Gold

Was this Gene's lowest ebb? Yes. Cringey? A little. People remember this stuff, and not in a fond way. One might argue that it was this move, above any other, that did most of the heavy lifting as far as promulgating the stigma. Gene assembled a band whose members, in some cases, had no connection to the Byrds whatsoever (Blondie Chaplin? Rick Danko?). He traded on his legacy for the sake of some quick bucks/tawdry exposure. And after most of the recognizable names had fallen by the wayside, he insisted upon carrying on, appearing on lame shows like Solid Gold with his Byrdy band of Mulleteers.

With such an extraordinary assemblage of talent, one wonders why didn’t these still-talented orphans of the 1960s didn’t try to create something new, organic, and viable, with all-original material, instead of revisiting their back pages night after night? Had Gene toured with Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, Michael Clarke, Blondie Chaplin, et al, and simply called themselves—well, I dunno, anything other than the Byrds (I’m now thinking The Mulleteers has a nice, pirate-y vibe to it) I don’t think the stigma would have become so deeply ingrained. Why? Because it would not have seemed like such a desperate, naked cash-grab, something rock fans as a species tend to look down upon.

These days, however, I'm inclined to look upon Gene’s actions from a compassionate perspective, as opposed to one taken by the judgmental, fist-pumping rock purist I once was. For fuck’s sake, the man had a family to support. And he did the best he could. He never tried to release a record with this lot, he simply toured to earn a living. Punters had the choice of either attending the shows or staying away.

Above: The controversial “20th Anniversary Tribute
to the Byrds” tours inflicted considerable damage
on Gene’s reputation.
Clockwise, from top-left: Richard Manuel; Gene
and Rick Danko; Michael Clarke; Rick Roberts,
Gene, Rick Danko.

Above: Gene with "The Byrds" at 1986 Jerry Lewis Telethon.

While there is nothing inherently wrong with this clip

performance-wise, the misleading billing and cheesy/tawdry,

decidedly unhip venue made it clear that Gene was struggling.

Above: Gene with "The Byrds" on Solid Gold,

late 1980s.

As I said, looking at this from a more compassionate perspective, the mere fact that he stooped to this level indicates how bad his situation really was. But seeing a McGuinn dig like this (taken from from the archived Byrd Watcher site) must have been tough to bear.

— Roger McGuinn

Exclusion from Columbia/Legacy Byrds box set (1990)

I think it’s highly significant that after Gene left MCH, Roger McGuinn never worked with him again in a professional capacity (with the sole exception of Roger’s 1984 performance at McCabe’s, at which Gene joined him for a couple of songs). Otherwise, for all intents and purposes, Roger was done with him.

Which makes it doubly sad that in 1989, when McGuinn, Crosby & Hillman took legal action over Michael Clarke’s use of the Byrds’ name, Gene positioned himself as sensible peacemaker, often adopting an “Aw, shucks, fellas, can’t we get along?” tone in the press. Gene hoped for a rapprochement that would never come.

Above: Los Angeles Times, January 5, 1989

Even after this public mea culpa/not-so-subtle hint, Roger, David and Chris did not invite Gene to participate in the various legally inspired performative reclamations of the Byrds name in 1989, nor in the creation of new “Byrds” material tacked on the end of the 4-CD Byrds box set, released in October 1990. And apparently Sony/Legacy were perfectly content with Gene’s exclusion from the project.

Above: The reformed “Byrds,” with Bob Dylan at

the Roy Orbison Tribute, February 24, 1990.

Imagine how Gene felt. (Photo by K. Mazur)

Having been selected as Columbia/Legacy’s designated “musical consultant,” one may reasonably conclude that Roger wielded considerable power and influence over what material made it on to the set. For many Gene Clark fans, the failure to include top-shelf Clark/Byrds material like “Here Without You” “If You’re Gone” and Set You Free This Time” appeared to be an act of pure vindictiveness, specifically designed to marginalize, downplay, and diminish Gene’s role in the Byrds’ story. Many, including Chris Hillman and David Crosby, criticized Roger for his role in this tawdry displace of hubris. From John Einarson’s biography of Gene, pages 294-295:

“I think that box set was slanted way too much toward Roger and not enough toward me, Gene, or Chris,” insists David. “I think that’s definite. And I don’t think Roger thought twice about it, he just did what he wanted to do. He is a very selfish guy.” Jim Dickson agrees. “McGuinn doesn’t think Gene was as important to the Byrds as he was. That’s why he put more of his stuff on it.”

“Crosby and I were not involved in that first box set,” insists Chris, “but David and I will be involved this time. There will be more of Gene’s songs. I’m not trying to undermine Roger, I wish him all the best, but let’s be fair here. We will fix it.”

Chris maintains that the box set is an embarrassment rather than a crowning achievement to the group’s career. “The artwork on those four CDs looked like new age massage music. Also, the choice of songs was abysmal. Roger had a consulting fee and worked with someone at Columbia. Some of those gems from Gene were not included.”

Above: Apart from slighting Gene in its track

selections, Chris Hillman quipped that individual

covers in the 1990 Byrds box set would’ve been appropriate for

“new age massage music.”

Chris kept his word. The track list of the There is a Season box set did, in fact, include more of Gene’s music. It was a necessary righting of a historical wrong. It’s just a shame that Chris and David didn’t say anything while the first box set was being compiled…when it would have actually mattered. The appearance of the 2006 box did a boatload of nothing for Gene Clark, who had to suffer the ignominy of watching his legacy being erased in real time, and then attend an awards ceremony and smile alongside the guy who did it to him.

In any event, it’s my belief that Gene’s legacy was adversely affected by what was, in hindsight, a devastating one-two combination: 1) Exclusion from the 1989 reformation—from which any fan would logically draw a negative inference, given the inarguable popularity of the McGuinn/Crosby/Hillman alliance; and 2) His diminished presence on the 1990 box set, which might be seen, in retrospect, as an emotional coup de grâce.

This was a pivotal moment in the rise of the stigma. When he passed away in May 1991, a mere seven months after the release of the box set, it would likely have been for many fans the first time they had heard Gene’s name mentioned in the press in years. Roger McGuinn, on the other hand, flying high off the success of the Byrds box set, capitalized on the exposure and released Back to Rio in January 1991–the same month the Byrds were inducted in the RRHoF.

Post-1991

Rip-offs/cash-ins etc.

In the years since Gene's death, little has been done to eradicate the '80s stigma that clings to Gene's music. To the contrary, some posthumous releases have, either consciously and inadvertently, done more to promote the stigma than dispel it.

How about we start with the numerous low-rent versions of Firebyrd that have polluted the Gene pool over the years?

In the above graphic, the top-left and top-middle are the original Takoma cover and its UK counterpart. The rest? The work of hacks, ignoramuses and profiteers. The unintentionally hilarious part is how incredibly bad these people are at what they do.

In the middle row, far-right, we have a typically tacky re-release of Firebyrd (on Portugal’s Movieplay Gold label, 1999) that uses an early-1970s-era picture of Gene (the same picture that graces the cover of Flying High—which came out the year before; coincidence?). The graphics on this cover are closely mimicked by 2015’s Vinyl Passion release (bottom row, left), except whoever did the layout on this shoddy effort didn’t notice they had misspelled the title (“Fyrebird”). No problem, amirite? because the graphic artist, like, totally nailed the not-at-all cheesy flame font.

Astonishingly, this same misspelling of the album title has been copied by subsequent opportunistic labels and grey-area vultures alike. EU fly-by-nighters are releasing poor-sounding, widely bootlegged shows of Gene Clark and the Firebyrds as “Gene Clark — The Fyrebirds [sic] Live at the Rocking Horse Saloon Hartford Conneticut [sic!] January 13 1985.”

Somehow, they managed to misspell both the band’s name and the state in which the gig took place. Quite a feat. Doesn’t get more disheartening than that, especially with Gene’s name in huge letters.

Caveat emptor.

Under the Silvery Moon (2001 & 2003)

Above: The 2-CD edition of UTSM, which this writer
acquired off eBay shortly after it was withdrawn in 2001.

Circa 2001, there was considerable buzz over on the old Yahoo Gene Clark List when news broke of Under the Silvery Moon, which was a well-meaning, if woefully executed, project thrown together by Pat Robinson, Gene’s former songwriting partner in the informal collective known as CRY (Clark, Robinson, York). I say woefully executed because neither Pat nor Delta Deluxe had shown the good sense (legal, moral, business) to contact the Clark Estate, either for purposes of apprising them of their intentions, or seek their input. Given the circumstances, with Gene’s name displayed in huge lettering, the Estate’s annoyance was clearly justified. The release was stopped through legal means, but not before an unknown number of 2-CD sets had been made, and subsequently sold through eBay.

Not only had Pat neglected to go through proper channels, he had shown a disturbing lack of regard for quality control, having seen fit to release material that was not up to the standards of work released during Gene’s lifetime (a standard of QC that has been upheld by the Estate, whose respect for Gene’s work has been exemplary). Some of these songs were clearly work tapes, never meant to be heard by the public.

The recordings ranged from formal, full-band studio efforts (“Mary Sue”) to crudely captured demos (“That Part of You”) recorded/written with Gene (and John York) in the 1980s. The contributions by The Band’s Rick Danko and ubiquitous session pianist Nicky Hopkins were, in fact, minimal, so their vaunted presence on the cover seems cheap and misleading.

Inevitably, Pat Robinson’s misstep ended up reflecting poorly upon Gene’s name, not his. The resulting debacle made it clear that, through no fault of his own, Gene had somehow managed to piss off everyone, including the hardcore fans who paid big bucks on eBay for copies of the withdrawn 2-CD set, who found the material subpar, as well as those who couldn't afford to buy/missed out on the eBay sale, who felt cheated out of their opportunity to own subpar material.

But seriously, anyone who missed out was not missing much. On many of the tracks, the sound was tinny, harsh, grating—and slightly wonky, indicating possible damage to the masters. “Mary Sue,” for one, has never sounded quite right to me.

An abbreviated, single-CD version was prepped by Kai Clark, who gamely attempted to weed out the poorer selections and improve the sound quality. That version, released two years later in 2003, succeeded in many ways, but the damage to Gene’s ‘80s reputation was already done.

American Dreamer 1964-1974 (Raven)

Released two years after Gene’s death, Raven’s 1993 compilation, American Dreamer 1964-1974 was clearly a labour of love; an early attempt to put into proper perspective the importance of his legacy and the gravity of his loss (although one notes that the title itself is inaccurate, and should be 1965-1974, since no 1964 recordings are included).

Musically, however, this is a fine compilation; a fascinating testament to not only the speed at which Gene became a world-class writer, but also the breadth and scope of his reach. It even throws a bone to the hardcore Clark fans with the addition of a bonus track: the Hinshaw mix of “Full Circle Song.” But the built-in cutoff date begs questions, doesn't it? "So that's it? No Volume 2? Did Clark fall off the planet in 1975? His other stuff wasn't worth adding to the project? Good to know..."

Flying High (A&M)

Similarly, 1998's career-spanning Flying High compilation, while a worthwhile effort that made a convincing case for a thorough reassessment of Gene's body of work, was noticeably skewed towards the 1965-1974 era. The 1980s appear to have been covered quickly; an afterthought.

Presumably the compilers wanted to make a case for Gene Clark’s songwriting, and yet, astonishingly, over an entire decade (1979-1990) is represented by a paltry three songs—all of them covers: “Fair & Tender Ladies,” from So Rebellious a Lover (1987); Phil Ochs’ “Changes” from 1990’s True Voices compilation; and Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man” from Firebyrd (1984). "So he never wrote a worthwhile track after 1977, eh? Good to know."

As a fan, one can’t help but infer that the compilers did not see much worth in Gene’s 1980s recordings, released or otherwise. To be fair, the possibility exists that for some unknown reason (licensing issues?) the compilers were prevented from using certain material, but really I’m just guessing. Again, I’m loath to come down too hard on those responsible because I was not there; I wasn't privy to their decision-making process. Overall, it is a fine introduction to Gene’s oeuvre, contains many pivotal bonus tracks, and made available a clutch of tracks that had been hard-to-find or out-of-print for years (the Two Sides tracks, to name three). But really, they let Gene down with those last three songs.

Epilogue

I do not expect to change many minds with these pieces. Stigmas are often difficult to get past. Negative associations are hard to shake. I understand the attraction of the 1960s—the clothes, the vibe, the sensibility, and especially the music. I get the allure of the 1965-1974 period. And there’s no question that the 1980s were difficult for Gene, along with many of his contemporaries. But it is both foolish and arrogant to assume that any working artist, especially one of Gene’s calibre, woke up on January 1, 1975, and found himself suddenly bereft of talent; rendering worthless anything done subsequently.

Yes: behind the day-glo of the 1980s there was considerable darkness.

One must look for the sparks in the dark.

Special thanks to Jim Tweedie/@zobalob for support & assistance during a rough time.

Requiem for Rogan 14-02-53 — 21-01-21

2021-04-19T00:55:00.016-04:00

Writer Johnny Rogan passed away in January 2021 at the age
of 67. Apart from writing the definitive history
of the Byrds, he also published books on John Lennon,
Van Morrison, Ray Davies/The Kinks,
Neil Young, and the Smiths.

I felt I owed it to Johnny to reread the entirety of our correspondence before writing this post ... and yet I have no idea why. Was it out of some vague notion of preparedness? Getting my facts straight (as a tireless researcher, he might’ve appreciated that)?

Maybe I was seeking solace in cold, dry facts as a form of emotional detachment?

And yes, as a matter of fact, I have been overthinking this.

In the end, I decided I would consult the emails only for purposes of verifying the times, dates and accuracy of whichever quotations I wanted to share. It’s not my intention for this to be a detached, scholarly piece. And yet, it was our likeminded approach to writing about the music we love—scholarly, yes, but also methodical, respectful, and emotionally invested—that ultimately made it possible for us to become acquainted. I was going to say become friends, but I’m unsure whether we were. And so it’s difficult to balance the nature of my grief in a personal way.

I will leave it to others to write the definitive tributes that Johnny so richly deserves. This is simply going to be a post about the guy I came to know during the course of our correspondence; one that began in late 2014, and continued, in irregular spurts, until our last exchange in the autumn of 2020.

Thoughts & Words

In my opinion, the totality of Rogan’s Byrds-related works—Timeless Flight (1980), Timeless Flight Revisited: The Sequel (1997), plus Volumes 1 and 2 of Requiem for the Timeless, not to mention his contributions to the exemplary Byrds reissue program of the late 1990s/early 2000s—constitutes what is simply the finest, most complete, well-researched record we have of America’s greatest band.

He was so good at this. The guy turned band politics into the stuff of high drama. Somehow, he made me care about the members of the Byrds, including—and I cannot stress this enough—the ones I actively disliked. He brought caricatures to life, and he also told me, oftentimes in excruciating detail, the sad circumstances of their deaths.

On a more personal level, I find myself missing our chats about the Byrds and Gene Clark. I could usually count on Rogan to provide a fulsome response to my theories, even if he thought them daft.

Our communications took various forms: some were dashed off quickly—a brief question/an almost instantaneous reply. Other times we penned elaborate, old-fashioned letters of considerable length. I enjoyed these exchanges the most, because we were both able to stretch out and elaborate on Gene’s work.

And really, this was the true magic of the connection: Rogan and I were able to talk about Gene with great facility, and at depths I’d only reached with select few in my life (a sad reminder that I’ve yet to meet another Gene Clark fan in person). If you’re reading this, odds are you can appreciate what I’m saying.

To befriend another hardcore Gene Clark fan is, for me, a rare, precious connection because there simply aren’t that many of us around. And when a rare connection is suddenly, irrevocably severed—by death, estrangement, misunderstanding, or any other circumstance—the loss is real.

As lifelong Clark/Byrds sponges, Rogan and I had mutual appreciation of the intricacies of Gene’s documented history: the strange twists and turns, abrupt exits, aborted side trips, bit players and assorted minutiae. This is not intended as a brag, just evidence of a shared musical passion for an obscure offshoot of a more well-known entity (i.e. The Byrds). And it was this that enabled us to develop a kind of shorthand in our chats: “Are you a Silvery Moon or Gypsy Angel guy?” he once asked me. To most people, this would appear to be a straightforward question about the merits of one album over another, like “Which do you prefer, Sticky Fingers or Exile on Main Street? Who’s Next or Quadrophenia?” In the context of our discussion, however, the implications of the query involved much more.

As Rogan put it, there were really two Genes in the 1980s, the “one still doing amazing work like ‘Have You Seen the Faces of the Dreamers in the Rain’ [a major unreleased work, the writing of which he chronicled in Requiem Vol. 2–The Clarkophile]... the other cutting songs like [Smokie’s] ‘Living Next Door To Alice’ and the Pat Robinson stuff, which is OK in part but not his best by any means.”

We understood the latter-Gene’s rationale, but preferred the work of the former: the rawly recorded private demos from a weathered, yet still-vital poet who—over a decade after No Other’s commercial failure had broken his spirit—still roamed the cosmic range.

Our greatest moment of bonding came in our shared belief that, contrary to popular opinion, Gene’s 1980s writing sometimes reached the same artistic heights as his more critically acclaimed works (and it’s this theory that will be dealt with in my next blogpost).

I’ll miss bouncing my peculiar Clark-related theories off him—very much a case of the student seeking approval from his teacher. But most of all, I’ll miss the guy who wrote a book that played a key role in changing the course of my life.

Get to You

I sent my first email to Johnny Rogan on December 3, 2014–a gushing bit of fanboyism, capped off with the corniest subject line ever: “A sincere thank you.”

Before you laugh, however, consider for a moment that hitting *send* on that first email was the culmination of a series of events that stretched back several years, to around 1998, when I bought Timeless Flight Revisited at Tower Records, during its brief residence in Toronto. After reading that book, I felt sure we were cut from the same piece of dark brown suede; I felt sure he was as much a “Clark man” as I.

Apparently, I was wrong about that—as anyone who has ever read my interview with him will attest. But in my defence, I must say it was a presumption based on the fact that I hadn’t yet read anything that remotely reflected the esteem in which I held Gene Clark. Everything I’d seen up until then had propagated the still-popular belief that The Byrds = McGuinn. That Rogan went out of his way to state Gene’s importance in the group’s success—and did it with such eloquence—made a huge impression on me. I mean, for heaven’s sake, I memorized entire passages of his book, didn’t I? I think it’s fair to say that but for Johnny’s work, this blog would not exist. Moreover, without the one-two punch of Timeless Flight Revisited and John Einarson’s Gene Clark biography, I doubt whether I would’ve had the confidence to become such a passionate defender of Gene’s legacy.

Stranger in a Strange Land

My desire to contact Rogan began tentatively, with sporadic web searches in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Alas, all my attempts to obtain his contact info were unsuccessful. Gradually, I came to the conclusion that—unlike 99% of people in the world, and 100% of the internet’s habitués—Rogan did not wish to be found. He did not crave attention, he avoided it. There was no website, no Twitter account, no Instagram—in short, no social media/online presence whatsoever (years later, prior to publication of Requiem for the Timeless Vol. 2, I gamely offered to start a Twitter account for him. He politely demurred).

In short, I felt Rogan was an unashamed Luddite. And like every other aspect of his personality, it was both part of his charm and an occasional source of exasperation. He acknowledged the existence of social media, but would never bow to it, nor allow his brand to become associated with, or reliant upon, it. But it could be frustrating if I needed to get in touch with him quickly (e.g. when we were both working on The Lost Studio Sessions release) because he didn’t always have access to a computer while in Ireland. One was forced to wait until such time that he ambled over to use the library’s computer—the mental image of which struck me as quaintly charming, but also a bit frustrating when I needed answers in a hurry.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. In around 2010, I came to learn through a third party that Johnny did, in fact, have an email address (!!!)—however, I would not be furnished with the address until he had first provided formal consent. From that, I assumed he had been subjected to unwanted inquiries from disgruntled fans of Van Morrison, Morrissey and/or Marr, Neil Young, or other Byrds Nyrds. When I was finally green-lighted to contact him, it felt like I’d been given the keys to the executive men’s room or something—I mean it was great, sure, but also seemed a little...I dunno, primadonna-ish? I was only sending an email. And we all get unwanted emails, right? His was not a sensibility that I understood—but I wasn’t a famous writer either, so what did I know.

But it was this aspect of his character—his stubborn refusal to modernize, even when it stood to make life easier and more efficient—that eventually came to irritate me, especially as it pertained to his caretaking efforts vis-à-vis unheard/undocumented works by Gene Clark. One time, when he told me about his Gene Clark cassettes (he did not say how he obtained them; but based on references in his book, I’m assuming Terri Messina and Trace Harrill were sources of some) I asked him if he had ever considered digitizing these cassette treasures. To me, nothing could be more important than preserving and cataloguing rare works by The Master. It is a duty. Not only do I think it makes great sense, I think one is obliged to do so, if only out of respect for the artist. It may sound corny, but I believe it’s a sacred trust.

To my astonishment, Rogan said rather casually that the cassettes had not been digitized, nor had he taken any steps to copy or otherwise preserve the original tape.

I was flummoxed. You know that feeling of dread when you sense a bad situation could get infinitely worse if you keep digging—but you keep digging regardless, because you need to know the truth?

That.

So I asked him if he’d made plans to ensure the survival of the tapes in the event of his passing. He said he hadn’t—nor did he care what became of them if he died unexpectedly.

Over the course of our acquaintance, I found his comments could be hurtful, on occasion; a touch patronizing, sometimes smug or insensitive. Professionally, he had written things in his books that I found questionable, objectionable, dubious, even downright tasteless (e.g. the inclusion of tawdry Gene-related stories in Requiem for the Timeless Vol. 2). This remark not only disappointed me, it flat-out infuriated me. In terms of my idolatry of Rogan, it was a moment of reckoning: my own version of the scene in Quadrophenia when Jimmy discovers Ace Face is a bellboy. When I received news of his death that day in early February, I assessed the loss in terms of the writer we lost, the man his friends and partner lost—and the potential loss of Gene’s unheard works, now suddenly thrown into jeopardy.

Anger—blindly righteous, beaten, unfocused, and ultimately impotent—carried the day.

Kathleen

My introductory missive to Rogan (the aforementioned “A sincere thank you”) was a hilarious combination of stilted tones and effusive praise. I guess I overdid it a bit, but now, in light of his passing, I’m actually glad I got the chance to tell him those things. I’m glad I shared those feelings with him. In his reply, he told me he was moved by my letter...which, in turn, moved me. Now that he’s gone, I can take some measure of comfort in knowing I told him all of the things I wanted to tell him. At my age, that is not always the case; one isn’t necessarily afforded that chance. Sometimes things are left unsaid or unexplained. Sometimes the rapprochement one fantasizes about never comes to fruition.

When I received his reply, in late December 2014, I was stunned to hear that he had read this blog and was particularly impressed with my take on ‘Kathleen.’ Perhaps this was my in with him—I did not know. I was duly, if momentarily, chuffed, of course...but that soon gave way to feelings of intimidation. I became even more self-conscious after that (no small feat!). On the whole though, the awareness that Rogan occasionally checked out my work pushed me to check and re-check my facts. His influence was also felt in the way I conducted interviews. At that time, occasionally awestruck and tongue-tied, I was sometimes hesitant to push my interviewees for answers; I would occasionally allow myself to get thrown off track. Rogan’s unparalleled knack for sniffing out key details—recollections that effectively put the reader in-the-moment, as it happened—helped me to at least make an effort to probe for more interesting answers from my interviewees, as opposed to settling for talking points and well-rehearsed anecdotes.

What I did not tell Johnny is that ‘Kathleen’ has always been a special song for me; it looms large in my personal mythology. Discovering it was like finding The Great Lost Gene Clark Song I always dreamed I’d find. Suffice it to say, no one else seemed to hear the otherworldly beauty I found there, but that didn’t stop me from counting it among Gene’s finest. I never had the feeling that I had made any kind of impact with that post, until Rogan mentioned it. He understood me. And I felt validated by his reaction.

Around the time Requiem for the Timeless Vol. 2 was published, Rogan asked me a couple of times during our back-and-forths whether I had purchased a copy yet. At first I thought, “Wow, for a guy with no website, no social media accounts, and whose books are difficult to track down at the best of times, he’s suddenly doing a hard sell on me?” When the book finally arrived—pretty much the size of the concrete slab on the cover of Who’s Next—I told him I’d received it. He instructed me to look at the footnote for “Kathleen,” on page 406.

Yes, it’s only a footnote but it means a great deal to me.

Everybody’s Been Burned

I would find out rather quickly that although Rogan said he was moved by my introductory email to him, it didn’t mean that he was going to go easy on me. He could be light, unexpectedly chatty in one email, sharp and business-like the next. If I assumed too much, or even slightly mischaracterized his position on something related to the Byrds/Gene Clark, he would immediately fire back a snarky reply that left no doubt where he stood. Facts mattered to him, which was fair enough. After all, no one wants to be misrepresented. But the unnecessarily prickly retorts to offhand comments had me convinced he had no interest in being my friend. We were merely scholarly acquaintances, both enrolled in the Byrds program, except he would always be the popular upperclassman.

I think it’s fair to say I wanted him to be my friend, and it’s a peculiar quirk of my personality that I continued to hope that I might win him over. Because of this, a curious pattern developed: any time I began to feel as though a deep friendship might be in the offing, the tone of his next reply would quickly disabuse me of that notion, and I would be taken to task about some minor issue that had apparently set him off. He became haughty and professorial, addressing me in a formal, terse manner, as though I were an underling. Condescension, however, is the one thing that sets me off. His words were always so cleverly phrased, however, that I couldn’t always be sure. Was I being too sensitive again? (the answer was invariably yes). More than once I said out loud, “Fuck you, asshole,” after reading his messages, although I now chuckle at the memory. His tone was authoritative, occasionally imperious and hurtful, but again: his position was always clear.

On one occasion, he seemed exasperated with me after having learned of my involvement (a few years before) in what turned out to be a dubious Byrds-related project. I tried to play it down, but in truth I felt incredible shame at that moment: he’d found a bona fide skeleton in my closet, and I was embarrassed to have it thrown in my face. And as embarrassing as it was, he was absolutely right. His reproach stung, of course, but I’m quite certain I’ll never make the same mistake again.

But it was our bonding over the unheralded excellence of Gene’s long-form epics/mystical works of the ‘80s that I’ll cherish the most. Of course I’m speaking of songs like ‘Communications’ ‘Pledge to You’ ‘Your Fire Burning’ ‘Freedom Walk’ ‘My Marie’ ‘Dark of My Moon’ and others. This aspect of Gene’s work is given the short shrift—eclipsed, I think, by the officially released works from the period, the lingering stigma of the 20th Anniversary Byrds tours, and the overdue celebration of No Other as an overlooked, one-of-a-kind classic. At first he wasn’t having it, and would say that for every ‘Communications’ there were quite a few lesser tracks: overtly commercial songs, remakes, or other fruitless pursuits. Gradually, however, we came to agree that Gene’s ‘80s writing was compartmentalized, often dictated by situations and happenstance: if he had time, he composed on his own with his Tascam recorder (Gypsy Angel); if he was trying to be commercial, he would record covers or less idiosyncratic, more conventional originals (e.g. the 1990 recordings with John Arrias; the Silvery Moon stuff with Pat Robinson and John York).

And, after I finally received my copy of Requiem for the Timeless, Vol. 2, I came to learn that he had one more surprise for me.

The greatest thrill for me in reading Rogan’s works came from his detailed descriptions of Gene’s unreleased works. I will never forget the first time I read about ‘Communications’ or the Sings for You-era material. It was like a glimpse into a secret vault. Some think he oversold ‘Communications,’ but I think he nailed it perfectly—all of this material was edge-of-the-seat info for me. So when I came to the section of RftT Vol. 2 that covered the early ‘80s Firebyrds period, I was not expecting much.

That all changed, however, when I reached the section in which he talks about the still-unreleased ‘Have You Seen the Faces of the Dreamers in the Rain?’ Rogan, who obviously had access to a worktape, provides a fascinating fly-on-the-wall glimpse of Gene the poet at work: writing lines, experimenting with different words and phrases, revising, always pushing for the best possible iteration. It is truly compelling stuff, the most in-the-moment account we have of Gene Clark working on his art. Had the song been a dog, I would still consider it an invaluable historical record. But ‘Have You Seen The Faces...’ did not sound like a dog. It was another towering achievement; another lost ‘80s epic:

This is GC at this most creative in my view; he's actually composing the song in front of our ears and it's an epic, in every sense. I find it difficult to believe that it ends here with this rehearsal/practice as it's such a potentially important work. I can tell you that I've seen the lyrics of the song in Gene's hand. On the tape box it reads, 'Have You Seen The Faces Of The Dreamers In The Rain', but on the lyric sheet Gene has already precised the title to 'Dreamers In The Storm', even though it's 'rain' not 'storm' in the lyrics/recording. I can only speculate, but the fact that we have the full lyrics extant at least suggests there are additional attempts on cassette although, alas, no evidence at all that he ever attempted the song in a studio.

— Johnny Rogan, January 14, 2019

Rain Song

In the summer of 2017, I was making my way through RftT2, forcing myself to read it slowly, at a leisurely pace, to make it last (Note: at this point, I’d never even heard the title ‘Have You Seen the Faces of The Dreamers in the Rain?’).

After reading the passage devoted to ‘Echoes,’ I was so impressed with Rogan’s take on it that I sent him an email to tell him so. That’s what Rogan’s writing did: it made me excited about Gene’s work. I was inspired by his words. He motivated me.

In typical fashion, Rogan ignored the compliment altogether, and stated he was glad I was taking my time to read it slowly. And then, out of nowhere, in a paragraph unto itself, he said the following:

I was thinking of you when I wrote about ‘Have You Seen The Faces Of The Dreamers In The Rain?’

— Johnny Rogan, August 17, 2017

Of course, I immediately scuttled all plans to read the book slowly, and flipped to the relevant pages. And I knew right away what it meant: Rogan had unearthed another unheralded ‘80s epic to add to the list.

At this point, you may be wondering if I ever got the chance to hear ‘Have You Seen The Faces Of The Dreamers In The Rain?’

Alas, no. You see, it was on one of Johnny’s cassettes.

But I’ll let you in on a little secret...I believe he was a Clark man, at heart. I figure a friend would know such things.

I’m going to miss him very much.

All I Want is a posthumous hit

2021-02-27T16:46:00.072-05:00

Note: The following is a rewrite of a piece first published on The Clarkophile in 2008.

“All I Want”

Written by Gene Clark, Tom Slocum and Shannon O’Neill
From This Byrd Has Flown (1995)
Recorded in 1987/1991

With the sharp left-turn of their hugely successful Cabriol/“Pink Moon” ad in 2000, Volkswagen found Nick Drake’s short-cut to stardom, albeit 26 years after his death. Could one of Gene’s songs perform the same feat?

Know

I first heard Nick Drake’s music in 1987, after I was given a 90-minute Maxell cassette of his work. I didn’t know much about him except that he was deceased, English, a bit of a cult artist, and I’d probably like him. It didn’t take much more than the first 15 seconds of “Way to Blue” to hook me; Nick has been a part of my life ever since.

What does any of this have to do with Gene Clark?¹ After all, in terms of of style, voice, career, backgrounds, they couldn’t have been less alike; the music they made was, both literally and figuratively, continents apart. In spite of this, they communicated with me on the same deeply personal level. About things men ought not mention. Things like loneliness. Pain. Rejection. Loss. Sadness. Self-doubt. Their music provided the kind of dignity that is often denied under such circumstances, and became the soundtrack of innumerable silent crushes, sucker-punch rejections, barroom melodramas, and the odd midnight rendezvous.

And Nick dared to call out the black eyed dog of depression; the hound that stared me down in the dead of night.

Because the corporeal Nick was no longer around to defend himself, I felt honour-bound to defend him, as I did Gene. If you wanted to have a go at Nick, you had to go through me.

Pink Moon gonna get ye all

In 2000, Volkswagen enlisted the help of Nick Drake’s starkly elegant ‘Pink Moon’ (1974) for what turned out to be a surprisingly effective TV ad campaign. I heard about Nick’s posthumous fame before I actually saw the commercial. When finally I did, my reaction was equal parts exhilaration and bewilderment. I was glad, but suspicious.

As I recall, the whole experience of seeing Nick mentioned in newspaper articles felt a little surreal; things felt disturbed, out of place. The music and images did not belong together. Before that commercial, this particular combination of images and sound would only have been possible if I’d been listening to the Fruit Tree box set with the muted TV for company. The rock snob in me felt that Nick didn’t belong in something as tacky as an ad. And for a bloody car? He was above this.

Open wide the hymns you hide

What I failed to understand back then was that, for people who had never heard of Nick Drake, it made perfect sense. It was a damn good commercial. From the striking blue-hued visuals and well-cast actors (who communicated through facial expressions only), to some crisp editing and a mercifully brief shot of the “Cabriol” tag, this was a slick and confident soft-sell production. I have no idea how the ad affected sales of the Cabrio, but it certainly helped sales of Nick’s CDs. Suddenly marketable, his music was subsequently featured in films like The Royal Tenenbaums, Serendipity, and Garden State. Amazingly, a new generation found Nick’s music, and perhaps reminded the rest of us how good he was.

Below: Volkswagen’s Cabrio ad; two comments left on YouTube (click to enlarge).

This Byrd Has Flown Can Fly

All of this has led me to wonder if there could be similar success for a Gene Clark song in a high-profile ad. I had hoped the appearance of Gene’s work on the OST of a massively popular show like NBC’s This is Us would kickstart something similar, but we haven’t really seen it, have we? Like Drake, Gene never had a solo hit single, but Gene lived long enough to record much more music than Nick, which deepens the pool from which a likely candidate might be drawn.

So here’s my question: which Clark solo song from the years 1966 to 1991 would have enough commercial—as in TV commercial—potential to recreate the Drake effect: i.e. capture the hearts of a new generation?

I can think of a few songs from Gene’s canon that might suffice, but in terms of catchiness, directness, and emotional clout, I have chosen ‘All I Want.’

‘All I Want’ is a track recorded in 1987 and 1991, posthumously released on 1995’s This Byrd Has Flown (essentially an attempt to reintroduce the Firebyrd LP with remastered sound, and augmented by three additional tracks)). The song was written by Gene and his buddy Tom Slocum, with additional work on the final arrangement by Shannon O’Neill. It boasts a warm, typically sensual vocal from Gene, with an impressive list of backing musicians, including 'Sneaky' Pete Kleinow (The Flying Burrito Brothers), Rick Marotta (John Lennon, Paul Simon) on drums; Albert Lee (guitar); and Jeff Porcaro (Toto). All are terrific; “Sneaky” Pete turns in a typically memorable performance on pedal steel.

As per both Tom Slocum and John Einarson’s book, Gene’s stately lead vocal was recorded during his final studio session, sometime between January, 1991, and his death that May. It is a mature, dignified performance; the sound of a man who, in another reality, was about to enter an exciting new phase in his career. Can you imagine hearing this vocal over the radio in 1991? I would’ve been stopped in my tracks the second I heard “I’ve been countin’ hours, and it’s lonely, lover/ And it’s all because of you.” But even even months away from his untimely passing, Gene’s ability to deliver a commanding, definitive vocal remained largely undiminished. The harmony-heavy chorus (featuring Herb Pedersen) is lush, unabashed AOR; its lyrics, simple and universally accessible: "All I want is your love, all I want is your kiss, all I want is to hold you."

So far so good, right? Can’t miss, right? Not so fast.

"I know that you know a million Casanovas, lover

And you know that I know a million bitches too

But there ain't a hundred of them gonna snow you under

Or blow your cover or make you feel blue."

Apart from the melody, which I’m fond of, I find the entire bridge objectionable: awkward, sexist, trite. It’s tough-guy talk that feels...forced. Perhaps not surprisingly, in the liner notes to This Byrd Has Flown, Tom Slocum alludes to some disagreement between the co-writers: "As a song it was and is, lyrically and musically, an even split, but we both had some reservations about it. He wasn’t sure about my ‘bitches’ line and I wasn’t quite happy with the ‘blow your cover’ bit."

Well, turns out they were both right. But at least I know who to blame for the “bitches" line. I get that it’s commonly used in lyrics, but apart from the equally puzzling “interbred bitches” line in ‘Del Gato’ (co-written with Rick Clark) Gene didn’t feel the need to use it in any other lyric. It pleases me no that Gene himself disliked it. Whenever I hear the song, I imagine it was sung through gritted teeth.

It isn’t a line Gene Clark would have ever written. From the get-go, Gene’s lyrics filtered relationships through a respectful, if unrelentingly melancholic, chivalric code. I have no idea if Clark led his life according to this code, nor do I particularly care, but the "bitches" lyric is antithetical to Gene’s personal style of songwriting. To his credit, he does not pull off the "bitches" line very well.

With a different set of lyrics, ‘All I Want’ might have been a late-period classic for Gene. As it stands, some intrepid commercial ad person may wish to snip the chorus in all its lush AOR glory and use it in some advertisement to sell toilet paper. Or life insurance. Or how about one of those pharmaceutical commercials on CNN with a voiceover like: “Consult your doctor before using Despairigone. Side effects may include constipation, skin rash, dizziness, drowsiness, dry mouth, headache, insomnia...” with 🎶All I want is your love, all I want is your kiss”🎶 providing the necessary counterpoint.

Mark my words, if this were to occur, Gene Clark would finally have that solo hit single that eluded him during his career.

And that, my friends, would be a pleasant side effect. I’m sure Nick would agree.

Listen to “All I Want” below.

Notes:

1. The greatest cover-that-never-was: imagine Gene singing Nick’s ‘Which Will.’ You can just hear it, can’t you?

RIP Johnny Rogan 1953 – 2021

2021-02-15T23:24:00.005-05:00

I will be posting my thoughts about Johnny Rogan in the coming weeks. For now, I just want to reflect upon our mutual love for the Byrds and Gene Clark.

Johnny Rogan, leading music biographer, dies, aged 67

A Time to Gain, A Time to Lose...Time: ‘She Don't Care About Time’

2021-02-07T13:42:00.005-05:00

‘She Don’t Care About Time’

(Gene Clark)

Hallways and staircases every day to climb

To go up to my white-walled room out on the end of time

Where I can be with my love for she is all that is mine

And she'll always be there my love don't care about time

I laugh with her cry with her hold her close she is mine

The way she tells me of her love and never is she trying

She don't have to be assured of many good things to find

And she'll always be there my love don't care about time

Her eyes are dark and deep with love her hair hangs long and fine

She walks with ease and all she sees is never wrong or right

And with her arms around me tight I see her all in my mind

And she'll always be there my love don't care about time

Above: ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ graced
the B-side of another time-themed song,
‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’ — the group’s second #1 of 1965.

“Maybe someone can explain time”

— ‘Some Misunderstanding’ (1974)

Recently, it occurred to me that the Byrds’ second #1-single of 1965 (‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’ c/w ‘She Don’t Care About Time’) could be interpreted as a thematically linked statement about the nature of time. Now, I’m not suggesting this was a conscious artistic decision by the band (as in the case of the Beatles’ Liverpool-themed double-shot of ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’/‘Penny Lane’), however, I felt the observation was timely in terms of this discussion of one of Gene’s thematic standbys.

And the reason why? Time itself was a wellspring of inspiration for Gene’s songwriting. Ironically, like many writers before him, Gene found infinite possibilities for expression contained within finite periods of time.

Time is inherently unknowable, untouchable; it exists beyond our grasp, even as it sits in the palms of our hands. But in the hands of a poet it may be manipulated, reshaped, controlled. It may be stretched like an rubber band, or molded like clay. It may also be ignored, rendered impotent.

Throughout his career, Gene used the mysteries of time as the ultimate barometer of his pain. Occasionally, time assumed the form of an invisible oppressor or hanging judge (perhaps even a proxy for God). Whether contemplating the ramifications of having too much (‘Lonely Saturday’) or too little (‘Here Tonight’), or simply throwing up his hands at the sheer complexity of its mysteries (‘Some Misunderstanding’), Gene enlisted time’s malleability as a measurement of loss, anguish, dread, passion, and joy.

But Gene would not always cast himself in the role of time’s victim. There are instances in which he took it on, challenged it, displayed open defiance of its authority (‘Pledge To You’). With ‘She Don’t Care About Time,’ he employed a complex metaphysical conceit to achieve a kind of poetic end-run: time was simply left behind.

But why would time have been at the forefront of his mind in mid-1965? He was only 20.

The Byrds 1965: From Ciro’s to Heroes

On February 4, 1965, a brand-new L.A. band called The Byrds made their live debut at “Howdy Hop,” held at Ingalls Auditorium, East Los Angeles College. The most recent member to join, bassist Chris Hillman, had come aboard only four months prior, in October 1964. The band’s name had been chosen around the Thanksgiving 1964 dinner table, while riffing on Gene Clark’s suggestion of “The Turkeys.”

On March 20, 1965 they logged their first appearance at Ciro’s, a venue that would become part of their legend. Their debut single, ‘Mr. Tambourine Man,’ recorded in January, was released on April 12. It would reach #1 on the Billboard chart in June.

All of that, in the first six months of 1965.

Imagine, for a moment, experiencing those changes in real time, while also bearing in mind the bizarre event that lay ahead, when Gene Clark stepped off the plane before its departure from L.A. to New York (March 1966). I often wonder about the extent to which the group’s accelerating whirlwind of the professional obligations (performances, travel, fans, managers, writers, publicity agents, deadline-driven recording sessions) might’ve prompted Gene Clark to suddenly stop the ride (both literally and figuratively), to reflect upon time as something that had been irretrievably lost.

Or perhaps he felt he had lost himself.

Ciro’s poster promoting
appearance by then-new
group on the Strip, The Byrds.

But at that specific time it had to have appeared, at least to anyone paying attention, that Gene Clark was on a roll. Seemingly entrenched as the Byrds’ principal songwriter, he was young, handsome, and blessed with an uncanny ability to write a steady stream of quality songs (the Byrds’ debut featured three Clark originals and two co-writes). Astonishingly, even while caught in the now-infamous cycle of touring-recording-touring that’s proved the undoing of many songwriters (the “sophomore slump”), Gene presented a clutch of impressive new songs for Turn! Turn! Turn!, the Byrds’ second LP. They toured England, met the Beatles, opened for the Rolling Stones in the US. And then, on December 12, 1965, the Byrds capped off one of the greatest success stories in rock, when the walked onto the hallowed stage of the Ed Sullivan Theatre to perform their back-to-back #1 hits.

Not a bad year’s work, really—but that doesn’t even begin to list Gene Clark’s personal accomplishments as a songwriter. At the very moment he took Sullivan’s stage that day, Gene had already recorded or written an entirely new batch of songs, all of which demonstrated stunning growth: ‘That’s What You Want,’ ‘Eight Miles High,’ ‘The Day Walk,’ and ‘She Don’t Care About Time.’ Each song was a proverbial giant leap forward, especially when compared to 1964’s likeable-but-derivative stompers, like ‘Boston’ and ‘You Movin’.’¹

From Ciro’s to Heroes: Screengrabs of Gene Clark
from The Byrds’ appearance on The Ed Sullivan
Show, December 12, 1965.

The Song Not the Singer

In many ways, ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ was the best of them all. It is fresh, imaginative and invigorating. And while the Byrds’ version is definitive², this piece is intended to stress the song and its writer, not the singer(s) (with apologies to the Rolling Stones). Its construction is flawless. It stands as evidence of the Byrds’ true magnificence as a group: a moment in time at which their disparate backgrounds and conflicting personalities were overpowered by the glory of the music they created.

It was a personal triumph for Gene Clark.

As a composition, ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ dignifies any genre or arrangement—but you needn’t take my word for it. Think of any random song and try to imagine how it would sound, played in other styles. It’s not always an option. I often think of the song as a living entity unto itself; it breathes and speaks of the composer’s brilliance; it is imprinted with Gene’s DNA. It is not necessarily dependent upon, nor tethered to, a particular riff (with apologies to Roger’s Rickenbacker) or studio trickery that might prove difficult to replicate in a live setting.

It is among the most sublime songs in the Byrds’ entire catalogue, and a revelation as to the scope of Gene’s poetic aspirations: at its core, it speaks to the irrelevance of time as a construct; one that is susceptible to a poetic end-run. Extrapolating that thought, one might dare to view it as Gene Clark’s bid for immortality.

Over the course of his career, Gene himself demonstrated the song’s versatility by presenting it in no fewer than three different guises, separate from the nascent power-pop version made famous by the Byrds: on 1973’s Roadmaster, it took the form of a slow country weeper (see link below); in the mid-‘70s, the Silverados recast it as breezy California MOR.

In late-period live performances, Gene brought the song full circle. On the posthumously released Silhouetted in Light (1992) Gene performed it as it was doubtless composed—solo. It may be initially off-putting to hear the joyously winding melody stripped of its harmonies and youthful exuberance, “chiselled by pain,” presented as a sepulchral dirge.

But listen again.

It is a song written by a young man, played by his older self. In his voice one detects the toll taken by time along the road of excess. If the corporeal man failed to reach the palace of wisdom during his time, this stirring performance stands as a reminder that true artistry transcends time.

And therein stands the palace of his poetic wisdom.

Above: The Byrds on the Ed Sullivan Show,
December 12, 1965.

The Byrds’ take on the song is a thrilling piece of power-pop that predated coinage of the term. McGuinn’s distinctive Rickenbacker riff and Michael Clarke’s serviceable take on Ringo’s ‘Ticket to Ride’ beat are both noteworthy. But it’s those trademark Byrds vocals, wrapped around Gene’s mesmerizing melody, that command most attention. In the hands of the Byrds, the song became an showcase for Clark, Crosby and McGuinn, in that no single voice sang lead (as opposed to, say, ‘I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better,’ which featured Gene as lead singer with Crosby and McGuinn adding backup). The Byrds, whom Crosby once said could sing like angels, were certainly blessed from above on the day they cut this song. The Byrds’ version, in fact, sounds so glorious that it might tend to overshadow Clark’s lyrical ambitions.

And what to make of those lyrics? It’s debatable, of course, but when heard against the circular clang of McGuinn’s riff, the image of someone dashing up a flight of stairs to reach a “white-walled room out on the end of time”certainly feels like an early stab at a psychedelic turn of phrase. But it’s much more than that. The majesty of the song lies in Clark’s inspired metaphysical conceit: those who dwell within the white-walled room are not so much untouched by time as beyond it, on another plane of existence. The white-walled room is untouched, pure, sacred. Time is no real threat to the lovers’ bliss; it is easily circumvented. Reality and, in fact, eternity, is what exists within the white-walled room, much like John Donne’s transformation of a bedroom into an “everywhere” in “The Good Morrow”:

Above: Portrait within a portrait of the band
that created a masterpiece. Photo by
Dezo Hoffman.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,

Which watch not one another out of fear;

For love all love of other sights controls,

And makes one little room an everywhere.

Here, “an everywhere” carries the same logistical significance as Clark’s “end of time”: the private moments shared within “one little room” and the “white-walled room” sustain the lovers everywhere they go, and through good times and hardship (“I laugh with her, cry with her”).

The woman in the song is characterized as calm and confident (“she walks with ease”), understanding, and non-judgemental (“all she sees is never wrong or right”). She is satisfied by the substance of a man’s character, rather than searching out a man of substance (“she don’t have to be assured of many good things to find”). From these lines, one may also infer a great deal about the narrator’s character. Clearly he appreciates these qualities in her—especially the last. Perhaps he, like the poor boy in the Brigands’ 1966 song, ‘(Would I Still Be) Her Big Man’, fears being exposed as impoverished; that his worth as a man might be determined by his material wealth, or lack thereof. It’s pretty much the same idea (roles reversed) that Paul McCartney tried to communicate in ‘She’s a Woman’ (“My love don’t give me presents/I know that she’s no peasant”), only Clark accomplishes it without using such crude language. McCartney’s line had none of Clark’s poetic lilt, or courtly respect for his lover. Conversely, Clark may have written the line from the perspective of a wealthy man, who has fallen victim to someone attracted more by the man’s money than the man himself. Remember, the sudden deluge of composer’s royalties that came Gene’s way (after ‘I Knew I’d Want You’ graced the B-side of a number-one single, ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’) might have, at some point, attracted the attention of materialistic women.

The single greatest line in the song is saved for the end: “And with her arms around me tight, I see her all in my mind.” While it’s true that many of Gene Clark’s greatest songs deal with romantic heartbreak, documented here is a moment of pure romantic joy in which, if only for a fleeting moment, the corporeal world (felt in an embrace) connects with his lover’s essence (“I see her all in my mind”) in creation of a perfect moment on a sublimated plane—not in time, but beyond it, out on its edge, where even the very concept is both quaint and irrelevant.

An imaginative escape from clock-related responsibilities and obligations in the context of a song is one thing, but the real-life, clock-watching pressures of being a Byrd was quite another. So with the climactic December 12, 1965 appearance on Ed Sullivan, the Byrds made a powerful statement that put the exclamation mark on a successful year. The were now bona fide stars.

But astonishingly, less than three months later, in a moment that has never been fully analyzed, explained, or examined, Gene Clark inexplicably left the band. His time in the Byrds had run out.

The Byrds - ‘She Don’t Care About Time’

Links to notable cover versions:

Chris Hillman Flamin’ Groovies Michael Carpenter & the Banks Brothers

Richie Furay Skydiggers World Cryan’ Shames

Leo Koster The Grip Weeds

Gene Clark - “She Don’t Care About Time”

from Roadmaster (1973)

Gene Clark

“She Don’t Care About Time”

Recorded in 1990

Released on Gene Clark & Carla Olson Silhouetted in Light (1992)

and In Concert (2007)

Notes

The big exception to this, however, is another World Pacific demo, ‘Tomorrow is a Long Ways Away,’ which stands as an intriguing predecessor of ‘She Don’t Care About Time.’ The song’s title suggests an acknowledgement of clock-related responsibilities of the near-future, but then Gene’s crooning middle eight suggests possibilities of a union beyond time: “If you will stay here with me forever/I want you to know that my love for you will never die.”
There are three different recordings of SDCAT: 1) the 45 B-side; 2) Version 1 (included on first Byrds box set and bonus track on 1996 remaster of Turn! Turn! Turn!; 3) Version 2 (included on Sundazed’s The Columbia Singles ‘65-‘67, see image below). At some point I’d like to compare the performances of each, but will save that for a standalone post.

Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

2020-12-17T12:54:00.023-05:00

From 1984’s Firebyrd, to the reputation-damaging 20th Anniversary of the Byrds tours and the tragic “Last Stand” at the Cinegrill, Gene Clark’s work in the 1980s/early 1990s has taken a lot of flak; some of it earned, some not. For the sake of context, I thought it might be helpful to pull back for a moment, and look at the careers of the five original Byrds—and other veterans of the 1960s scene—to see how their careers were faring during the same period; how they were handling changes in tastes and fashion.

Lapses in judgement were not exclusive to Gene Clark. Let’s revisit the “Dark Decade.”

Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

BYRD DROPPINGS IN 1980:

Clockwise from top left —

Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman featuring Gene Clark - City;

McGuinn-Hillman - McGuinn-Hillman;

Firefall - Undertow;

Graham Nash - Earth & Sky

(originally conceived as a Crosby-Nash project, but, you know, drugs).

Johnny Rogan’s 1997 book, Timeless Flight Revisited - The Sequel, was, as its title suggests, an updated edition of his 1980 biography of the Byrds. The sequel supplements the existing text, but also chronicles the surviving members’ activities through the 1980s up to, and including, the deaths of Gene Clark (1991) and Michael Clarke (1993). Significantly, in a series that covers the destinies of all ex-Byrds, the chapter dealing with the 1980s is entitled “The Dark Decade.” How bracing, then, to realize the title is, in one way or another, applicable to all, and not just Gene Clark. Given the scale of Timeless Flight Revisited (not to mention its successors, Requiem for the Timeless, Volumes I and II) it’s perhaps inevitable that the narrative unfolds through a Byrds-eye lens, as opposed to one that takes into account the contemporaneous music scene at large. This holds true even after each member has, er, flown the coop. What I mean by that is, after the Byrds ceased to be (between 1973 and the brief, legally recommended reformation of “The Byrds” in 1989), many fans are prone to thinking of the ex-Byrds vis-à-vis the actions/reactions/involvement of the others. If merely a reflex reaction for longtime fans, it’s also been suggested by the actions of the surviving members themselves. Whether the byproduct of old animosities, or a reliable means of generating publicity (or some calculated combination of the two) the dysfunctional brotherhood of the Byrds continues apace. In the last five years alone, we’ve seen:

1) David Crosby’s repeated Twitter appeals for a Byrds reunion (rejected by Messrs. Hillman and McGuinn);

2) David Crosby and Roger McGuinn forming a surreal, almost sickly sweet, mutual admiration society on the same platform;

3) David Crosby’s still-unexplained blocking Roger McGuinn on Twitter, which left an apparently mystified McGuinn wondering why...albeit publicly (below left);

4) Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman touring the Byrds’ 1968 LP Sweetheart of the Rodeo in 2018.

5) Hillman’s Bidin’ My Time album (2018), which included many deliberate nods to the Byrds: an updated version of Gene Clark’s ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ plus musical contributions from McGuinn and Crosby;

6) Chris Hillman’s 2020 biography, Time Between: My Life as a Byrd, Burrito Brother & Beyond, which uses a Byrds-era pic on its cover.

He was a friend of mine:
Notorious Ex-Byrd
appears surprised when
his even notorious-er
ex-Byrd Twitterbro
blocks him.
Result: draaaaa-ma!

Rogan knew all of this—that these men would be forever linked in spite of their protestations to the contrary—before anyone else, which is why a chapter like “The Dark Decade” was necessary for understanding the bond they shared in a post-Byrds world.

But this compartmentalized, Byrds-eye view of things in which each of our heroes rode the crest of a never-ending wave of fame was upended, if not convincingly slapped down, on December 31, 1979. The exactness of the date is symbolic here, not indicative of any historical moment. But by 1980, in the bifurcated wakes of punk and disco, the implications of an ever-changing musical landscape were laid bare. Ahead lay a future much more uncertain—and indeed, for Gene Clark, more perilous—than it had ever been. No longer America’s Answer to the Beatles, the Byrds were now representative of the old guard, forced to prove their relevance. A “Dark Decade” indeed.

Above: The Byrds on the Ed Sullivan Show, December 12, 1965.

A time to break down

In 1965, the Byrds were a household name: before the year ended, they had achieved two back-to-back #1 singles, both of which were performed the Ed Sullivan Show on December 12, 1965 (55 years ago this month). They toured England; met, befriended, and been given the thumbs-up by Beatles. At that time they rivalled the Beach Boys for the title of best American band.

Above: Split Enz - ‘I Got You’ (1980)

Fast-forward 15 years, and the ex-Byrds found themselves struggling for relevance in an inhospitable musical milieu. Think of what was popular in 1980. How could, say, Gene Clark’s music have possibly found an audience amid the peak years of disco, punk, post-punk, new wave, and synthpop? Let’s take a quick look at the two Clark-penned songs released in 1980 (on the City LP), both of which found him lagging behind the times. McGuinn Clark & Hillman’s ‘Won’t Let You Down’ was a fine song, yes, but in many ways a self-conscious throwback to his signature song, ‘I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better.’ It broke no new ground and seemed formulaic; a little stiff, both in execution and production. Similarly, ‘Painted Fire’ was a ‘50s-style rocker that felt forced, unnatural. Both songs lacked the immediacy and power of a track like Split Enz’s ‘I Got You.’ That song used its ‘60s influences as a springboard for a newer sound, while MCH seemed tethered to the same roots they’d helped establish in the first place.

In the end, all of the ex-Byrds either struggled as solo artists, clung to each other in various configurations, or simply dropped out of the rock spotlight altogether: musical variations of the fight-or-flight impulse.

At one time, the Byrds rode alongside Bob Dylan like some righteous, suede-jacketed posse; a point further underscored by their decision to cover Dylan’s finger-pointing pronouncement of generational shift, “The Times They Are a-Changin’.” By 1980, however, they could have quite easily been on the targeted end of the finger.

A personal recollection (1979-1980)

At the time, I was oblivious to all of this, and deep in thrall of The Byrds’ Greatest Hits, which I bought in 1979, when I was 15. At that time, I was also listening to the Beatles (together and solo), Dylan, Blondie, the Police, the Who, Buzzcocks, the Jam, and the Sex Pistols. I remain fond of these bands—alas, some more than others (e.g. The Who became a lifelong obsession; the Police, a mere footnote). The passage of time and gradual exposure to thousands of other artists, cultures and styles of music played a large role in how things ultimately played out—which is, I’m quite sure, how it is for all hardcore music fans.

The Byrds, however, have never gone out of rotation for me. They’ve never been left behind. I love their contradictions, their paradoxes, their disparate personalities, their quirks; I love their ability to reconcile opposites and conflicting impulses, even if only for two minutes. From the day I purchased The Byrds’ Greatest Hits, I was obsessed with not only the music, but also the look of the band, as reflected on the bottom of the back cover, which featured small black & white pictures of the first four LPs. In terms of what I considered a cool look, it was all there (although by 1979 the fashions were over a decade behind, which reveals much about my sensibilities).

The back cover of The Byrds’ Greatest Hits
LP, with the four cover images that have
fascinated me for decades.
Below: The fantastic four, in colour!

Unlike the greatest hits LP, however, the first four were not as easy to find at that time in London, Ontario (during my weekly trips to the music shops, I remember seeing, on a regular basis, the following: Sweetheart of the Rodeo, Untitled, and The Byrds’ Greatest Hits Volume 2). So, for a long time, I simply immersed myself in the 11 songs I could hear, and remained quietly fascinated by the artwork and song titles of the first four LPs—always on high alert in the event they turned up. Anyway, at some point, Sam the Record Man did stock a very small supply of the first four as expensive US imports. I am delighted to report that, over a period of weeks, I was able to afford them. To finally see those sleeve images—and in colour—was, at the risk of sounding corny, a genuinely thrilling moment. But the greatest thrills were yet to come: it was through the acquisition of these albums that my obsession with Gene Clark began in earnest.

I have related the above story not for purposes of indulging in nostalgia-induced wankery, but to explain how hard it was to reconcile my feelings about the look and sound of the Byrds—the elements that made me a lifelong fan—with my subsequent experience with the then-current option: McGuinn Clark & Hillman. I remember feeling great anticipation ahead of their appearance on American Bandstand in support of their debut LP (the AB video of the performance used to be on YouTube, but has since been removed). I mean, come on, these were my guys, after all, but it wasn’t some old documentary, it was happening today. Now. This, was a new band for me to get into. When Dick Clark introduced them, I was very excited.

And then they mimed to “Don’t You Write Her Off.”

I thought it sounded like Pablo Cruise.

By the time the song ended, I already felt a profound sense of disappointment. It was the kind of disappointment that is so devastating and personal when one is young, and a hero has failed.

Rightly or wrongly, the resulting stigma from that performance stuck with me for decades. Shortly after that appearance on AB, I recall seeing the then-newly released McGuinn Clark & Hillman LP in the shops. I picked it up, carried it around with me as I walked through the store. But in the end, I put it back on the rack. When the followup, City, arrived in 1980, I was much more decisive: I looked at the cover, thought it looked dumb, and quickly forgot about it. I was moving on to other things. My tastes included the nine albums grouped below, all of which remain very dear to me.

The MC&H album? I picked up the CD around 1990, by which time I was deeply into Gene’s music. To this day, I detest everything about that album.

Top row, left to right:
Joy Division - Closer; The Jam - Sound Affects; The Clash - Sandinista!
Middle row:
The English Beat - I Just Can’t Stop It; Talking Heads - Remain in Light; The Pretenders
Bottom row:
XTC - Black Sea; The Cure - Boys Don’t Cry; The Psychedelic Furs

A time to weep

But hitting the wall of 1980 was not an affliction that affected ex-Byrds only. The vast majority of ‘60s veterans faced the same harsh realities amid changing fashions, studio production innovations, and musical sensibilities. I’ve discovered an interesting pastime: compile a list of 1960s bands/musicians (liked or otherwise) and compare their various methods of coping with the changes they’ve adopted out of fear or pressure to modernize. To quote the Buzzcocks, you can almost hear the collective cry of “Oh, shit!”

In some cases, visual makeovers were used as declarations of relevance, examples of which include Linda Ronstadt’s new-wavy bob/dayglo lettering ensemble on the cover of Mad Love, and the Grateful Dead’s windblown/disco-suit look on Go to Heaven). Elsewhere, big shot Billy Joel sounded much like an entitled, arrogant asshole you always took him for in his unfocused response to New Wave, ‘It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me.’ Billy smacks down up-and-coming musicians (without naming them, of course), trendy fans, and music writers...all in 2:57! It’s even got the requisite Saturday Night Live sax solo, a staple of late ‘70s records. Sooo cutting edge.

Only rarely were transitions as effortless as those undertaken by Mike Kellie (Spooky Tooth) and Alan Mair (The Beatstalkers), veterans of the UK’s 1960s rock/psych scene, who went on to create fine music with Peter Perrett in the Only Ones, during the height of punk.

Elsewhere, big-name acts like the Rolling Stones carried on, seemingly too big to fail. Let’s face it, Emotional Rescue (1980) was no Let It Bleed. It was a middling effort; an excuse to mount a large, lucrative tour. To this day, the Stones remain a draw, in spite of having distinguished themselves as rock’s most notorious example of diminishing returns. There are many ways to interpret history, but in terms of artistic integrity, I believe that the Stones more or less hit the wall in 1980, and maintained their “superstar” designation by dint of their past triumphs, with the assistance of generational momentum.

Turning to those in Gene’s orbit, one need only look at what Doug Dillard was up to in 1980, to get a sobering sense of how 1960s artists were coping with changing times.

On Permanent Wave (pictured at left) a 1980 LP by Dillard Hartford Dillard, Gene’s erstwhile duo partner Doug Dillard presented a truly bizarre 1980 remake of 1968’s evergreen “Something’s Wrong.” If you would seriously proffer this as superior to the original, or even a worthwhile experiment, I shall have to ask you to step outside. Compared to this schlocky embarrassment, Firebyrd seems like a bona triumph on the level of No Other.

Meanwhile, to a man, Gene’s erstwhile co-pilots in the Byrds found themselves hitting severe turbulence in 1980:

DAVID CROSBY

When David Crosby’s love for drugs eclipsed his love for music (epitomized by the now-infamous hash-pipe incident, in which Crosby halted a studio jam to mourn the loss of broken drug paraphernalia), a planned 1980 Crosby-Nash LP was ultimately released as a Nash solo outing, Earth & Sky. And Crosby still didn’t get the hint.

ROGER MCGUINN, CHRIS HILLMAN

After Gene Clark drifted away from Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman during sessions for the City album (released in early 1980)—a move that saw his image removed from publicity handouts, his name reduced to third billing—the duo sputtered in mediocrity, and eventually called it a day...but not before they had seen fit to record the 100% Clark-free McGuinn-Hillman LP, which they foisted upon punters later on in the same year. I never bought that one, either.

MICHAEL CLARKE

Michael Clarke’s improbable run as “ex-Byrd to Appear on the Most Hit Songs in the 1970s” (as a member of Firefall) ended in—you guessed it—1980. Sadly, it was Michael’s addiction to alcohol that led to his being replaced on Firefall’s 1979 tour. His last album with the band was 1980’s Undertow. Apart from an appearance on an early-‘80s Jerry Jeff Walker LP, Michael spent the remainder of his career as a minor leaguer on the bar circuit.

And what about Gene? Did he have a plan after leaving MCH?

He hooked up with old buddy Jesse Ed Davis, went to Hawaii, came back and recorded gorgeous demos on the still-unreleased “Glass House Tape”—but few people would have been aware of this information. To anyone at the time, Gene’s days as a major label artist had come to an ignominious end; he was no longer viewed as a marketable star. Remember, only six years before, his songwriting on the Asylum Byrds album had earned him the right to record 1974’s No Other—a testament to his talent, in spite of the fact he had not scored a hit single as a solo artist. This was an astonishing fall from grace, exacerbated by the fact that he deserved so much better, and lived to see things get so much worse.

Interestingly, McGuinn, Crosby and Hillman would mount successful comebacks before the end of the decade. After a wise tactical retreat—during which time he doubtless trusted that everything would work out fine in the end—McGuinn came back strong (as we shall see in the next instalment) with a carefully executed strategy.

Hillman, largely absent from rock’s commercial radar from 1980-1986, found great success with the Desert Rose Band in the latter half of the decade. This success, however, came after he had changed genre lanes, and headed outta Dodge for the country.

The most surprising rally, however, was mounted by Crosby, who had spent nine months (out of a five-year sentence) in a Texas prison for drugs and weapons offences, yet somehow reemerged as a fully re-energized force: not only did he reinvent/reintroduce himself to old/new fans by penning a successful autobiography, he made a self-lampooning appearance on The Simpsons, and released a generally well-received solo album.

Gene Clark, who more or less jettisoned himself from rock’s A-list—on more than one occasion—was pretty much out of the game for good this time. Absent the kind of visionary management/fixers who guided the unlikely comeback of a rotund, outspoken, walrus-moustachioed, aging ‘60s hippie, Gene Clark flailed in many directions, all of which amounted to bupkis.

While other avenues led to dead ends, he never abandoned one particular pursuit, for which we should be grateful.

He kept writing songs.

Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991)

2020-11-22T14:59:00.001-05:00

NOTE: For ease of reference and for purposes of this discussion, I have divided Gene’s career into three distinct periods:

Early - 1963-1969 (New Christy Minstrels, The Byrds, Early Solo, Dillard & Clark)

Mid - 1970-1979 (Mid Solo, Asylum Byrds, McGuinn Clark & Hillman)

Late - 1980-1991 (Late Solo, Firebyrds, Clark Robinson York, Gene Clark & Carla Olson)

Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991)

Composed well into his 40s, at a time when he did not even have a record contract, “Your Fire Burning” is the apotheosis of Gene Clark’s enduring artistry; the most convincing testament to the value of his Late Period works—and yet it has gone largely unnoticed by the Clark cognoscenti; a mere spark in the dark.

Over the past three months, I have written extensively about “Your Fire Burning” as part of the planned series I began earlier this year. As I became immersed in writing, however, I found myself becoming obsessed with a slight variation on the same topic: common perceptions and prejudices vis-à-vis Gene Clark’s Late Period work (as defined above). And so, thousands of words later, I have decided to organize and present my efforts in easier-to-digest sections.

“Gene once appeared at Aron’s Records to sign LPs and chat. He was promoting a new album at the time, of course. This is in L.A. [circa 1984]. Three people showed up to chat with him. Three people. He manfully put up with it and chatted with the three folks there, but it must have broken his heart. It would have mine.” — Sid Griffin, writer, musician (The Long Ryders, The Coal Porters)

Counterclockwise from top left: Images of
Gene Clark from Early, Mid & Late Periods

For many music aficionados, Gene Clark’s reputation as a songwriter is primarily based on the flawless string of contributions to the Byrds, and his extraordinary run of LPs in the late ‘60s and ‘70s. The 1980s, however, has always been a bit...problematic. Mention the songs from this period, and even the staunchest Clark fans tend to see it as a tragic patch for “poor Gene” (Gene’s fans tend to be overprotective, if inadvertently patronizing). It is a period for which phrases like “Cinegrill” aka “Gene’s Last Stand,” “20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds,” “bar circuit,” “substance abuse,” and “Firebyrds” hang like ominous clouds over his final decade, because, for many fans, these were their most immediate associations with Gene’s career at the time of his death.

When fans are pushed for honest opinions of Firebyrd, his final solo album released in 1984, winces of disappointment are commonplace (although their disappointment would doubtless pale in comparison to what Gene experienced at the album’s record-signing event, as described above in Sid Griffin’s account). But how many of them are familiar with the cache of posthumously released Late Period gems? Or the other cache of still-unreleased material, circulating or otherwise? And for heaven’s sake, why isn’t “Your Fire Burning,” quite simply the the greatest song the man ever wrote, widely hailed as such? It is the apotheosis of a style Gene had been perfecting since “Here Without You” in 1965.

If the Early and Middle period works are seen as a time “you may embrace,” the Late Period remains “a time to refrain from embracing.”

A Line of Demarcation: The Late Period — 1980-1991

One of the original aims of this blog was to spotlight Gene Clark’s lesser-known compositions—especially those written during the tragic third act, or what I like to call the Late Period, encompassing the years 1980-1991. Facts tell us that there were few Gene Clark releases during this time. One cannot deny the grim reality that substance-abuse issues, and the health problems flowing therefrom, all took a toll on Gene’s life, family, and music. Lurid details are indeed out there, if that’s what you’re after. But I have no interest in acknowledging, refuting or deflecting them.

That said, I have no intention of sanitizing Gene’s life, or minimizing the effects of substance abuse upon him, or those whose lives were affected. It is the disease I abhor, not the man. I will not judge him, except to say that somehow, in spite of every indignity and humiliation he faced in the 1980s, and beset by the ruthless addictions that eventually killed him, Gene Clark still managed to create music of uncommon depth and beauty.

Albums of new material credited to Gene Clark,
released in the Late Period (1980-1991)

Any discussion/examination of Gene Clark’s officially released work in the Late Period will be limited to a mere three albums. Into this vacuum, many fans have relied on an abundance of bootleg material (consisting mainly of live shows from the Firebyrds and 20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds tours) to fill in the gaps in Gene’s musical history. This is understandable, of course, but the live shows do not always present Gene in a positive light. Nor do several-generations-removed transfers of bootleg home/studio demos. More often than not, these recordings, widely traded in the Clark community or sold on eBay by soulless profiteers, tend to support our worst assumptions: that Gene was going through the motions, abusing himself, resting on his laurels, and utterly dependent upon his Byrds credentials, some 20 years after he left the band. The image of a boozy, 40-year-old guy playing 20-year-old hits in smoky barrooms for an audience of barflies is, alas, accurate, but it’s only one component of the story. That stuff paid the bills. It was work, and hard work, just as I imagine being introduced by a spiky-haired host as “The Byrds” in a tacky 1987 appearance on Solid Gold was hard, but for different reasons. All of this nonsense took a toll on Gene’s reputation. And it took up considerable amounts of time.

Without necessarily arguing with that relentlessly negative narrative, I simply ask you to consider the view from a wider lens, one in which the totality of Gene’s contemporaneous songwriting is taken into account. Seen in this way, a different characterization emerges: throughout this entire period, Gene was an artist whose artistic drive, although occasionally thrown off course by pressures from within and without, remained largely intact. The Late Period songs offer ample proof that, musically speaking, there was much more going on with Gene than is commonly thought.

The Gene Clark we all know and love—the restless, mercurial artist; the complex poet, the querying mystic—was forced to the sidelines on occasion, but was never truly abandoned. Gene experimented with many styles (including synthpop and Caribbean) and worked with a variety of collaborators (Pat Robinson, John York, Andy Kandanes, John Arrias, Trace Harrill). Some of the resulting material was unashamedly commercial (“Something About You Baby”); other songs ventured into then-current/now dated production styles (“The Panther”) that had no resemblance to any established Clark sound. Gene also made an attempt to reinvent himself via the film industry, and submitted material for use in soundtracks of successful franchises (“Carry On” ultimately rejected for The Karate Kid Part II). He hustled songs to the Traveling Wilburys (I believe he sent them “Love Wins Again”) hoping for the big break that would reestablish his status as world-class songwriter. And for the Clark connoisseurs among us, those who find their deepest connection with Gene through his dark songs of romantic yearning and loss, there was partial return to epic-length mystical workouts last heard in the No Other era (“Your Fire Burning” “Pledge To You” “Communications” “If I Don’t Have You” “I Saw a Dream Come True”)

Perhaps due to my experiences on Twitter and music forums, I’ve become conditioned to expect witless, drive-by smackdowns in response to nuanced opinions. For that reason, I assume the knee-jerk response to the previous paragraph would be something along the lines of “Well, he failed, didn’t he?” Commercially speaking? There’s no question. The synthpop experiments, for the most part, sounded calculated, stale, cheesy (although there is something compelling about “The Panther” and a few others, although Gene’s affected country drawl is wildly inappropriate—like Willie Nelson singing Duran Duran). The pop songs weren’t hits; The Karate Kid II producers opted for Peter Cetera’s “The Glory of Love”; the Wilburys obviously declined.

Do you recall the final line of the final song on Gene’s final album for a major label?

“Situations weigh the anchor once more.”

This, more than any other line, captures the essence of Gene Clark’s predicament, perhaps more than even he realized.

The situations and circumstances that relegated a writer of Gene’s stature to toil in the depths of obscurity are maddening, to say the least. We feel better when able to assign blame. And as a man who suffered from, and was eventually killed by his addictions, Gene made a convenient scapegoat.

The material that went unreleased in his lifetime reveals flashes of undeniable brilliance; an artist reaching his peak, even as his life ebbed. And yet the many album-less orphans that have materialized in the years since Gene’s death have gone largely ignored in our collective assessment of Gene’s Late Period work; they exist mere sparks in the dark: a fire burning from afar.

Update on THE BYRD WHO FLEW ALONE DVD

2020-11-16T15:37:00.004-05:00

THE BYRD WHO FLEW ALONE

Clarkophile Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5/5

If you’ve been waiting for a Netflix showing of the 2014 Gene Clark documentary THE BYRD WHO FLEW ALONE to materialize, I’ve got bad news: it doesn’t appear to be in the offing.

There is good news, however...

Director Paul Kendall tells me that there are still a few copies of the DVD that may be purchased, but that there won’t be any further pressings made.

My advice? Contact Paul Kendall at info@foursunsproductions.com for information about ordering a copy of your own.

THE BYRD WHO FLEW ALONE: THE TRIUMPHS & TRAGEDY OF GENE CLARK is a must-buy for fans of the Byrds & Gene’s solo work. It is a moving testament to Gene’s life & artistry, told by family, friends & colleagues who knew him throughout his life, including erstwhile Byrds Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman & David Crosby; Barry McGuire; Kai Clark, Kelly Clark (RIP), ex-wife Carlie (RIP); Carla Olson, Saul Davis & more.

Elsewhere, I’m trying to figure out a way to breakup my latest post, because it exceeds 5,000 words, which is far too much for a blogpost, I think. It’s coming, please bear with me.

Roadmaster/Hinshaw Mix FAQ

2020-09-07T13:57:00.032-04:00

Gene Clark — Roadmaster

The Roadmaster/Hinshaw Mix FAQ

If you’ve ever read about Gene Clark’s problem-ridden April-June 1972 sessions at Wally Heider Studios—sessions that would ultimately form the backbone of 1973’s Roadmaster compilation—chances are you’ve encountered discussion of what's commonly known as "the Hinshaw mix." But what are we talking about when we use the term? As Gene's popularity grows, a lot of bad information gets shared online. I'm hoping to clear up any confusion with the following FAQ, which is based on what I've seen Facebook, music boards, Instagram, Twitter, et cetera. If, after reading this, you have any questions about the Hinshaw mix, I'd be happy to attempt to answer them, or take steps to contact people whose knowledge exceeds my own. Feel free to leave a comment below and I'll do my best to answer.

So, here we go. In my experience, the following are the most commonly asked questions:

What is the Hinshaw mix?
Why wasn't the Hinshaw mix used?
Who is Hinshaw?

Has the Hinshaw mix been officially released?

So in this post I'll tackle all of the above, plus some logical follow-up questions.

What is the Hinshaw mix?
The Hinshaw mix is a rough mix of eight songs recorded between April-June 1972 by producer Chris Hinshaw, Terry Melcher’s assistant, who was enlisted to complete the sessions after Melcher left the project.
The eight songs recorded during Hinshaw's tenure are:
‘Full Circle Song’ | ‘I Remember the Railroad’ | ‘Rough and Rocky’ | ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ | ‘In a Misty Morning’ | ‘Roadmaster’ | ‘I Really Don’t Want to Know’ | ‘Shooting Star’

Why wasn't the Hinshaw mix used?
Before leaving the project (the reasons for which are discussed below) Hinshaw created an eight-song acetate that featured his rough mix of completed work. Since Chris Hinshaw's work was limited to these eight songs, it is therefore a mistake to use the term "Hinshaw mix" when referring to any other song or mix related to the Roadmaster era.
When Jim Dickson took it upon himself to resurrect the project, he decided to disregard the mixes created by Hinshaw, and created the familiar mix that has been available since Roadmaster was first released on the Dutch Ariola label in 1973.

Has the Hinshaw mix been officially released?
Short answer: Not all eight songs, no, but a few have slipped out in a convoluted, typically Clarkesque fashion.

Hinshaw’s alternate/rough mix remains officially unreleased in its entirety (although isolated tracks have turned up elsewhere and will be noted in part 2 of this piece), and over time has taken on almost mythical status among fans, many of whom are naturally drawn to the allure of the unheard. Fans’ appetites were further whetted by John Einarson’s enthusiastic championing of Hinshaw’s mix over Dickson’s in his biography of Gene, Mr Tambourine Man, the Life & Legacy of the Byrds’ Gene Clark. Much like the Gene Clark Sings for You acetate, the absence of aural evidence creates a blank space in Gene’s story, vulnerable to the emergence of a fan-driven narrative that offers an exaggerated extrapolation of revelatory aspects of the mix. As with every other aspect of Gene’s life, the answers are never easy. They require context and detail.

As Gene’s fan base continues to grow—thanks, in large part, to the steady stream of excellent archival releases overseen by the always-quality-conscious Clark Estate—a lot of the old stories and legends are being unearthed and shared on social media. It is, of course, wonderful to see widespread interest in all things Gene, but it’s also important to know the facts that gave rise to the legends.

Above: Chris Hinshaw, circa 1971

Who is Chris Hinshaw?

The idea to create a Hinshaw mix FAQ came to me this summer, when I was struck by the sudden realization that not only did I know very little about this pivotal figure, I did not even know what Chris Hinshaw looked like!
And when a simple Google search turned up nothing, I figured it was incumbent upon me to do my due diligence before attempting to write the Hinshaw mix FAQ, lest I be accused of spreading bad info. Alas, even after receiving game-changing information from an anonymous source that effectively kickstarted my research (see photo at left) many questions remain unanswered.

Elsewhere, attempts to contact Hinshaw’s daughters have been unsuccessful. My research is ongoing, so the following will be revised as new information is uncovered. But here is what I have learned:

Recording engineer and producer Chris Hinshaw was born on January 15, 1946, in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles County, California. By the age of 23 he had earned engineering credits on a pair of late ‘60s blues-rock classics: Harvey Mandel’s Cristo Redentor (1968); and Taj Mahal’s legendary double set, Giant Step/De Ole Folks at Home (1969). It’s worth noting these were his first professional credits. After that impressive one-two combination, Hinshaw worked steadily—and with some fairly big names, including Chicago (Chicago II, 1970); The Byrds’ (Untitled) and Byrdmaniax (1970 and ’71 respectively, working alongside Terry Melcher). [Interesting Gene Clark-related fact: Hinshaw worked with the Raiders (formerly Paul Revere and the Raiders) on their 1970 LP, Collage. Conscripted into the by-then depleted ranks of the Raiders, reduced to the duo of Paul Revere and Mark Lindsay, was none other than Freddy Weller, who penned and recorded the titular track to the Gene Clark album that Hinshaw would go on to produce.]

Above: Chris Hinshaw's professional engineering credits
include Harvey Mandel's Cristo Redentor (1968); Taj Mahal's
legendary double set, Giant Step/De Ole Folks at Home (1969);
Chicago's second album (1970); and Raiders' Collage (1970).

Hinshaw also engineered Sly and the Family Stone’s epochal There’s a Riot Goin’ On. And it was through this fateful relationship with Stone that, as we shall see, Hinshaw would both earn his career’s most prestigious credit, and make (what appears to have been) a career-killing blunder.

For whatever reason, Hinshaw’s career seems to have peaked in 1973, with the twin triumphs of Sly and the Family Stone’s Fresh and Gene Clark’s Roadmaster. For reasons that aren’t clear, Hinshaw's career effectively stalled after that. What credits he amassed from 1977 until 1986 were noticeably fewer and farther between than previous, and with less-celebrated artists. However, since the vast majority of them involve acts associated with Hula Records, based in Honolulu, he may have moved out of the LA area during this period. Assuming the information gleaned from Discogs is correct, Chris Hinshaw’s final credit would appear to be on Southern Pacific’s Killbilly Hill album in 1986, though it’s not clear in what specific capacity he served.

Sadly, Christopher Alfred Hinshaw was killed on April 30, 2004, in a single-vehicle accident on Hickory Hollow Parkway in Nashville, Davidson County, Tennessee. He was 58 years old.

Did Chris Hinshaw produce all of Roadmaster?

No, Hinshaw produced the 1972 sessions, specifically songs 4-11 on the LP, when it was released in 1973. Jim Dickson produced tracks 1-3.

Above: With credits like Sly and
the Family Stone's There's a
Riot Goin' On and Fresh (above left)
Chris Hinshaw's career
appeared to be on the ascent
in the early 1970s.
What happened?

Why were the Roadmaster sessions abandoned?
It’s a pity that Hinshaw is not here to respond to accusations that it was largely his fault that the 1972 sessions came to a premature end. But the oft-repeated story goes like this: at some point in the sessions—and, significantly, on a day Gene was not present—Hinshaw invited Sly Stone to the studio. His motives for doing so are not known, but as mentioned, he had worked with Sly on There’s a Riot Goin’ On, released the previous year; he also would end up working on Stone’s 1973 LP, Fresh, so it does not strain credulity to wonder if he was angling for his next gig before completing his current one. In any event, Stone, who arrived with an entourage, is alleged to have essentially commandeered the studio, and in so doing run up significant charges, all of which wound up on Gene Clark’s account…which in turn left A&M Records on the hook.

Assuming the above is true, Hinshaw is justly blamed for his failure to maintain order and take control of the situation, especially since it was he who instigated it. Not only was this a shocking lapse of professional judgement on his part, it was a total betrayal of Gene Clark, whose best interests he was presumably hired to represent, to the best of his ability.

As we know, Gene's project had been initially upended by Terry Melcher's decision to bow out of the sessions (apparently due to lingering emotional toll wrought by his proximity to the infamous Tate-LaBianca murders and injuries suffered in a serious car crash). What is never pointed out here is Gene's magnanimity in allowing Melcher’s assistant to be catapulted onboard and entrusted to steer the ship. Hinshaw betrayed that trust.

Unfortunately, the decision ended up costing Gene in more ways than one.

Rick Clark, Gene’s brother, told John Einarson that this “fiasco” effectively “doomed that record.” He went on to say: “I blame Chris Hinshaw for all that because he was the one who called Sly and had him come down. It got really weird. Clarence [White] and I got really disgusted, and he packed up his guitars and left.” Add to that a comment from Jim Dickson, who said the young engineer-cum-producer was “too spaced out and the album never got finished,” and it becomes apparent that the contretemps surrounding Hinshaw’s conduct delivered the album’s coups de grâce. After all, without A&M’s support, there was no album to complete.

But it’s also interesting to note, even apart from the Hinshaw-Stone incident, the perfect storm that was gathering around this album. In retrospect, it seemed doomed from the start.

Familiar faces made up the core band of the 1972 sessions
Chris Ethridge (top)
Clockwise, from left—
Byron Berline; (Chris Hillman) Sneaky Pete Kleinow,
Michael Clarke; Clarence White.

1972 was an extraordinarily busy year for Gene. There were many variables at play, in a constantly shifting dynamic. Take, for example, the uncredited presence of Roger McGuinn at the sessions (he is heard quite clearly on the Hinshaw mix). By dint of his appearance at this specific juncture, juxtaposed with momentous events that would follow soon thereafter, it’s not a stretch to say that whispers of a Byrds reunion might’ve caused Gene to lose a bit of focus.

But don't take my word for it; John Einarson made the same observation in his biography of Gene: “Roger’s presence [at the 1972 sessions] was, in fact, a harbinger of things to come and one of the reasons the sessions would ultimately be abandoned.” Well, I wouldn’t go that far. I’d submit A&M's pulling the plug on the project was the most significant factor in the demise of the original Roadmaster project, but an obvious question that no one has apparently ever asked is: where exactly was Gene that day when things got out of control? Why was he absent? Rick Clark says he and Clarence White were there. It seems a bit out of character, especially when one remembers musicians’ testimonials to Gene’s focused presence throughout the No Other sessions. Had he already mentally checked out, moved on to the Byrds reunion? Was he jamming with Roger? The Byrds reunion promised a huge payday. With a young family to support, who could blame him for following the money? And Gene had a well-established pattern of moving on suddenly (as people like Laramy Smith found out).

The only problem with that explanation is that the sessions for the reunion did not take place until October of 1972 –– a full four months after the original Roadmaster ground to a halt.

But if a potential Byrds reunion added one distraction/complication, yet another came in the form of Jim Dickson, who reappeared on the scene with the (frankly harebrained) idea of having Gene re-record vocals of tracks from his first album (the ill-fated Early L.A. Sessions project, 1972) –– a stunt that took up precious time, and went nowhere.

Clearly, Gene Clark had a lot going on in 1972; the possibility exists that he may have been overtasked. A&M's decision to slam the brakes on Roadmaster may have given him some breathing room to pursue the lucrative Byrds reunion, but it doesn't mean he abandoned the project. How could he abandon it, if A&M had already abandoned him?

Hinshaw’s failure to assert control in the Sly Stone incident was, in my opinion, egregious. It was careless abrogation of his duties as producer, and the fatal final blow to the Roadmaster sessions proper.

After A&M made the decision to pull the plug on the project, there wasn't much Gene could do, so he simply moved on.

How did the Hinshaw mixes differ from the released mix? Is it better?
For my take on this, stay tuned for Part 2 of this piece in which I'll answer the theoretical question: “How would I compile the definitive Deluxe Edition of Roadmaster”?

If you’ve enjoyed reading this piece, kindly consider making a small donation to my continuing work on this blog.

Kai Clark's Silver Raven: Track by Track

2020-06-02T14:37:00.005-04:00

Last November, I posted an interview I did with Kai Clark about the then-imminent release of Silver Raven, a tribute to his father's music.
I'm delighted to say the album was released in April, and has received positive reviews from publications like Shindig! and Goldmine.

If you're cynical about tribute albums as a genre, or a wee-bit precious about the idea of anyone other than Gene performing his songs, all I can say is you will be pleasantly surprised with what Kai and co-producer/drummer Jim Moreland have created. This is a moving, energetic, powerful set of extremely well-chosen songs that tick all the appropriate boxes: The Byrds; staples from Gene Clark's touring days, and lesser-known favourites of hardcore fans.

On the whole, the production remains faithful to the sound and spirit of the original recordings, but make no mistake: there's much more going on here than simple replication. The performances from Kai and his band are forceful and confident; the choices they've made in approach to the music are, in a word, inspired. Take "Polly," one of the standouts from Dillard and Clark's second album. Kai's arrangement is augmented by stately Rickenbacker 12-string and emotive strains of pedal steel; it's a combination that lifts the tracks into an ethereal alternate universe, one that effectively posits a glimpse of what the 1969-era Byrds might've sounded like, had Gene remained. The juxtaposition of majesty and despair is breathtaking.

I've pretty much lived with this album for the last two months; it's been the soundtrack for this otherwise nightmarish Covid-19 period, but it has not been stigmatized by that association. If anything, it's helped me cope with doubt and fear in rapidly changing times. Listen to Kai's take on "Turn! Turn! Turn!" and you'll know what I mean.

Silver Raven:

Track-by-track summary

1. I Found You (Gene Clark)
Originally released in February 1967 on Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers, “I Found You” was also the b-side to the leadoff single “Echoes”. Kai and his band reignite the sensual groove that made this one of the standout tracks from his dad’s first solo outing.

2. Mr. Tambourine Man (Bob Dylan)
The Byrds’ signature track—the first of two #1’s they scored in 1965; and the vehicle by which the world (via Ed Sullivan) got its first glimpse of 21-year-old Gene Clark standing centre-stage, shaking the titular instrument—was of course written by Bob Dylan, a pivotal influence on Gene’s early songwriting efforts. Kai and his band provide a reverential yet driving interpretation of a bona fide American standard.

3. Train Leaves Here This Morning (Gene Clark, Bernie Leadon)
Kai's take on “Train” is an ingratiating remake of a song that became a staple of his father’s live shows (first released on 1968’s The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard and Clark); one that features an effortlessly tasteful contribution from a past member of Dillard and Clark, fiddler extraordinaire Byron Berline.

4. Here Without You (Gene Clark)
Gene Clark’s tenure in the Byrds may have been brief, but each song he gave them was a gem. Alongside the KC Band’s respectful homage to the Byrds’ shimmering arrangement, Kai offers a tender reading of his father’s timeless classic.

5. Silver Raven (Gene Clark)
Dark and mysterious, much like the songwriter himself, “Silver Raven” was originally released on Gene’s celebrated 1974 masterwork No Other. Kai takes things in a slightly heavier direction, leading the band into a hypnotic, swampy groove, sweetened by some tasty slide work, rich backing vocals (by Kai’s wife Amber, and Aubrey Littlefield, her niece), alongside Kai’s most nuanced vocal to date.

6. Kansas City Southern (Gene Clark)
First recorded as an upbeat country-rocker (on Dillard and Clark’s Through the Morning Through the Night), later recast as a swaggering rocker on 1977’s Two Sides to Every Story, Kai’s arrangement is based heavily on the latter, but the peppy harmonica work (contributed by legendary musician and photographer Henry Diltz) and sublime pedal steel remind us of the song’s country roots.

7. Gypsy Rider (Gene Clark)
A late-period gem, “Gypsy Rider” was originally released on Gene Clark and Carla Olson’s 1987 duet album, So Rebellious a Lover. Carla Olson reprises her role as duet partner, in an achingly beautiful remake of one of Gene’s most cinematic compositions, here given new depth with the addition of Byron Berline’s wistful fiddle.

8. Turn! Turn! Turn! (Pete Seeger)
The Byrds’ second #1 of 1965 is yet another track that is synonymous with Gene Clark’s era-defining tenure in the band. Kai’s fresh and inspiring take on the track, featuring the epochal tones of the 12-string Rickenbacker, is both a fond look back to those halcyon days, and a reminder of the song’s enduring relevance and wisdom during times of crisis.

9. Polly (Gene Clark)
A love song of aching beauty, “Polly” was introduced to a new generation of fans via the 2007 Robert Plant/Alison Krauss collaboration Raising Sand. Kai’s updating of the song makes brilliant use of 12-string Rickenbacker and Kevin Post’s evocative use of pedal steel, both of which add elements of majesty and doom.

10. Your Fire Burning (Gene Clark)
Posthumously released on 1992’s Silhouetted in Light (a recording of a February 1990
performance at McCabe’s with Carla Olson) “Your Fire Burning” is perhaps the most poignant evidence we have that, at the time of his passing, Gene Clark’s music was hitting new heights
of artistic brilliance. While the song may not be as well-known as some of his father’s other material, Kai certainly appreciates its magnificence, and again enlists the help of Carla Olson as duet partner.

The results are both celebratory and elegiac.

11. Eight Miles Higher (bonus track) (Gene Clark, Roger McGuinn, David Crosby)
The album’s finale is a triumph for all concerned: The Byrds’ early psychedelic classic opens with a darkly compelling groove (courtesy of bassist/guitarist Don Segien and drummer/producer Jim Moreland), soon augmented by some extended lines from a down-and-dirty 12-string Rickenbacker and terrific ensemble vocals—all of which leads to a thrilling climax for both the song and album.

CD copies and download options: Kai Clark Music

Update

2020-05-16T16:05:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone,

I apologize for disappearing after only posting part one of my planned three-part series on "Your Fire Burning," but as I'm sure you can appreciate, things got very scary and very surreal for me—and very quickly—at the outset of the ongoing Covid-19 crisis. Parts two and three have been set aside for now, but I have every intention of finishing them later in the year.

During the lockdown, I have used the time to work on some pet projects that are near and dear to me, two of which are related to Gene Clark:

Bill Rinehart story

Above: Bill Rinehart (far left); Gene Clark,
Joel Larson, and Chip Douglas

I've resumed work on my story about the late Bill Rinehart, who was a close associate of Gene's throughout the bulk of 1966, and played a pivotal role in the Sunset Strip scene, as a member of the Leaves, the Gene Clark Group and the Merry-Go-Round. Bill's is a wild, if ultimately sad, tale, but one I feel compelled to tell. During his peak years of 1965-1972, Bill partied with and performed alongside some of the biggest stars of the time, including Sonny and Cher, Dave Mason, Cass Elliott, Leon Russell, Rick Danko, the Wrecking Crew, and many more.

Bill Rinehart, 1968

What I've found most interesting about Bill's life and career is that time and again, there was really no situation so perfect, and so clearly demonstrative of fate's benevolent, intercessory hand seeking to ensure his stars were perfectly aligned for success—that he wouldn't go out of his way to scupper. I am not romanticizing Bill's propensity for self-sabotage, simply documenting it, while allowing those who best knew him to posit their theories.

Roadmastery (Echoes newsletter)

The fab graphic for Roadmastery created by Indigo Mariana

On a lighter note, I'm very excited about a new column I'm contributing to Echoes, the Gene Clark newsletter, published by Indigo Mariana aka Neon Brambles (Gene-Clark.com). I want to thank her for giving me the opportunity to indulge my fondness for researching the picayune pockets of Gene's recording career.

What is Roadmastery?
One of the first things you learn on the road to becoming a hardcore Gene Clark fan is that nothing, and I mean nothing, goes in a perfect, straight line. There is no logical flow to anything; no starting at A, heading to B. Because heading down the road to B, just when you think you’ve got a firm grasp on the wheel and the destination in sight, another fact suddenly emerges to throw you off course.

If you’re truly committed to taking a deep dive into Gene’s recorded output, you’re guaranteed to find exceptions, anomalies and curiosities at every turn. This isn’t a “One Way Road”—it’s a fascinating, labyrinthine journey of a lifetime, replete with innumerable twists, turns, U-turns along the way—and, as we’ll see, some mysterious diversions akin to cozy cul-de-sacs.

So far I've contributed three columns, which I'd like to invite to read (you can also subscribe!)

Echoes March 2020 issue:
The Trip from The American Dreamer (1971) to The Farmer (1977)

Echoes April 2020 issue:
Uncovering the covers: the circa ’85 demos

Echoes May 2020 issue:
Seventh Avenue Train (aka Hula Bula Man, Hula Mula Man)

In memoriam: Kelly Eugene Clark (1971 - 2020)

Lastly, I want to dedicate this blog entry to the memory of Kelly Eugene Clark, Gene's eldest son, who passed away recently.
To Kai, Amber, Indy, and all members of the Clark family, I wish to extend my deepest condolences.

Grace of peace come over us.

Recorded 30 years ago today...The Top of the Mountain: 'Your Fire Burning' (Part 1)

2020-02-03T05:36:00.003-05:00

Gene Clark & Carla Olson — "Your Fire Burning" from Silhouetted in Light
Recorded February 3rd, 1990, at McCabe's, Santa Monica, CA
Released February 1992

The Top of the Mountain

In 2014, I began a seemingly endless series of posts that counted down my TOP 50 Gene Clark songs. Almost six years on, I will now confide that I had mixed emotions about that whole series of posts—mainly because I'd knowingly put myself in the position of adopting a lazy, modern style that reflects the fast-food side of journalism: the dreaded listicle.

At the time, I felt that this approach would not only allow me to cover a lot of Gene's best moments in a shorter span of time (now I'm inclined to think, what was the hurry?) but it would also provide the perfect opportunity to spotlight Gene's often-ignored accomplishments from the 1980s forward.

And so looking back at the TOP 50 posts, I can laugh at some of the ridiculousness of the exercise: upon what basis did I decide that 'Polly' (#26) rated more highly than 'No Other' (#38)? And what of 'After the Storm' at #48, which barely made it on the list at all—yet I can remember commuting to work one day and having a sudden urge to hear that specific song over any other, and becoming frustrated when I realized I hadn't thought to sync it to my iPod.
And so while I freely admit the exercise was largely a sham, I did put a lot of thought into the top 20 songs, and especially the top 5, posted below (with embedded links to my corresponding blogpost for each):

1. Your Fire Burning

2. My Marie

3. She's the Kind of Girl

4. Strength Of Strings

5. Echoes

As you can see from the links, there's posts on this blog specifically devoted to each song—except the number 1 song. Even in the TOP 50 countdown, I limited my thoughts to a few words:

To my knowledge, there are only four extant versions of this song. The first is a sketch demo, just over two minutes long. It is included on the fan-created 7-disc "box set". The second is a rather echo-ey demo featured on Gypsy Angel; the third was recorded during Gene's tragic "last stand" at the Cinegrill from April 1991; it gives us a glimpse as to how the song might've sounded when fleshed out by a full band.
The fourth, recorded with Carla Olson at McCabe's in 1990, the one I've chosen as my number 1 Gene Clark song, is the closest we'll ever have to a definitive version. Though rough in places it, like 'My Marie', stands as a testament to Gene's extraordinary ability to turn what might've been just another let's-just-play-get-the-money-and-go-get-a-drink gig into a one-of-a-kind, life-changing experience. At the end of the song, Carla Olson says only: "Gene Clark."

Because nothing more needed to be said.

Committed, passionate, dignified, blessed by the angels, this is, quite simply, as good as it gets. Here it is, folks, the top of the mountain.

Up until now I've avoided sharing my feelings about "Your Fire Burning." Oh, sure, I've trumpeted its brilliance at every opportunity; I went out of my way to spotlight it in my first story for Shindig!; over the years I've rhapsodized about it on numerous music sites and web groups, told friends about it, etc. But I've never talked about it at length.

Why?

Well, perhaps it's because the song holds great personal importance to me; it looms large in my own personal mythology. It is inextricably tied to specific people, places and situations in my life.

My reticence comes from the feeling that I'm too close to it; that I'm incapable of anything resembling objective assessment. The greatest fear, however, is that I won't do it justice, or capably explain its lasting significance to Gene's legacy.

Upon its release in 1992, the year after his death, it had the distinction of being the first previously unreleased song of Gene's that I'd heard from his latter-day output (the Echoes compilation, released in September 1991, featured previously unreleased material from the 1960s). Recorded on February 3, 1990—and released two years to the month later on Silhouetted in Light, in February 1992—it was recent enough to feel new and fresh to me...even as it signalled the beginning of Gene's remaining 15 months with us.

And so the poignancy was built-in, unavoidable. For me, the song resembled something akin to sacred music: impervious to the slings and arrows of critical assessment. It could never be anything other than the top of the mountain; the finest, most distinguished of accomplishments.

Time has not dimmed this view.

The mourned provides solace for those in mourning

In 1992, I had a roommate who worked in a record store. To the best of my recollection, it was he who brought news of the imminent release of Silhouetted in Light. I seem to recall placing a special order for the album, so that I could get it as soon as it was released.

When it arrived, I quickly scanned the back cover to check out the songs Gene and Carla has performed that evening. "Your Fire Burning" made an impression on me before I'd even heard it. For starters, it struck me as odd that Gene and Carla opened the show with a brand-new song (assuming the track list was kept intact); secondly, I was intrigued by the time of 6:41. (Note: I would not hear the No Other album until 1993, so the idea of a six-minutes-plus Gene Clark song was foreign to me.) I quickly assumed that the excessive length would be due to introductions, on-stage banter, tuning, etc.

And it was under this assumption that I hit play on the CD and started to leave the room to get something, only to be stopped in my tracks by Gene's voice.

"'Your Fire Burning' in two..."

They were going right into the song? I turned around, sat down. I listened.

The top of the mountain was within view.

The year of 1992 was among the roughest of my life. Apart from the fact that I—The Only Living Gene Clark Fanboy in London, Ontario—was still grieving Gene's death in a solitary vacuum, I was also besieged by a series of losses and disappointments that left me reeling. The arrival of 'Your Fire Burning' into my life felt like a posthumous gift from the spirit of Gene Clark himself, as though he were somehow capable of sensing my despair, and sending me solace in song. And while that was merely a fanciful thought to comfort myself in a time of distress, the reality of how the Silhouetted in Light album came to be recorded and ultimately released, is enough to make one believe in the abiding power of angels.

Scratched and nicotine-stained,
my personal copy of Silhouetted in Light
betrays the extent to which I
turned to it duringin difficult times.

The Butterfly Effect: how one small act gave us Silhouetted in Light

The Butterfly Effect: In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state. —Wikipedia

There are times when I marvel at the various ways in which a simple, seemingly inconsequential, choice can spark a chain of events that can create a huge impact further on up the road. Such is the case with the McCabe's version of 'Your Fire Burning', a song that was not captured in a polished studio recording before Gene's death. All extant versions are treasured, of course (and will be duly discussed in Part 2), but it is this version that first captured my heart and remains, to this day, the closest I've heard to a definitive recording of by Gene Clark. But the chain of events that led to its existence are a perfect example of the a positive manifestation of the Butterfly Effect.

In Timeless Flight Revisited, author Johnny Rogan asked Saul Davis, Carla Olson's husband and Gene's erstwhile manager, about the circumstances under which the tape was made:

"At the end of the night, the sound person tapped guitarist Duane Jarvis on the shoulder and said, 'Would you like a tape?," Davis recalls. "He gave it to Duane and we we didn't even know about it. After Gene passed away, Duane called me and said, 'By the way, I have a tape from McCabe's.' I said, 'I can't believe it.' It was primitive but perfect as far as being a representation of that night and allowing us to put out something that people want to hear."

Was it a sudden impulse? Usual practice? Whatever the reason, had the sound person not had the presence of mind to throw a cassette into the soundboard, I would have never heard these precious six minutes and forty-one seconds of 'Your Fire Burning,' let alone the other performances captured on that distant evening, 30 years ago today.

And for that I am forever grateful.

******************************************

Coming in January 2020, Despair’s chains unbroken: Your Fire Burning

2019-12-29T20:22:00.002-05:00

January 2020 will see the arrival of the first instalment in a projected 3-part discussion of ‘Your Fire Burning’—a song that is of such massive personal significance to me that I’ve been hesitant write about it at length.

Until now.

Happy New Year!
Tom

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Review: Farm Team - Grooves & Ruts (2019 release)

2019-11-23T14:44:00.000-05:00

This is a slight diversion from my usual Gene Clark-related content. I'd like to post an album review I wrote about a recently released album entitled Grooves & Ruts, recorded by a Vancouver collective called Farm Team.

I wrote the review because I was deeply moved by the material. I'm posting it here because I feel that it deserves a wider audience.

Farm Team is a vehicle for singer-songwriter Simon Paradis, a musician I first met in London, Ontario in the late 1980s. Simon & I played in a band together for approximately two years in a band called Month of Sundays.

Simon Paradis (far left) with
Month of Sundays, December 30, 1989
at Call the Office in London, ON

Apart from being an extraordinary guitarist, he was sharp, quick-witted and funny as hell. His guitar playing had an immediately recognizable, unique style, and yet it was also well-rounded, with blues, jazz, rock chops to burn. Simon could play it all, and what's more had the scholarly knowledge to back it up. He was no bullshitter, he was the real deal. In those days, there were lots of hapless musician wannabes in London (of which I was one) but Simon was a guy that emanated that undefinable star quality that few possess, and which he, to his credit, seemed blissfully unaware.

Those impressions are all written in past tense, but as I recently told Simon, time and circumstance have only served to reinforce this belief. I hope you enjoy the review and the music it describes.

It is important that we support independent artists.

Farm Team — Grooves & Ruts

(Simon Paradis)

(Canada Council for the Arts)

Although nominally credited to Farm Team (a loose collective of seasoned Vancouver musicians), Grooves & Ruts is, at its core, another impressive offering from singer/songwriter Simon Paradis. And for Paradis—a veteran session player/producer for over 30 years who has, in recent years, amassed a formidable back catalogue, both as a solo artist and half of Stanton/Paradis—this 14-song, 52-minute work stands as a uniquely compelling personal statement about the resilience of the human spirit.

Paradis’ extraordinary creative run is welcome, not only because he is a gifted, insightful musician and songwriter, but because it represents a miraculous comeback in the aftermath of a near-fatal, life-altering 2007 workplace accident (the harrowing details of which are chronicled in this CBC article from 2018). After reading about myriad impediments he (and wife/writing partner Kara Stanley) faced during his recovery one cannot help but view the album as the ultimate manifestation of Paradis’ passion for music, both as a force for renewal and reclamation of one’s self.
Musically, Grooves & Ruts ‘14 3rd Ave’ begins with an exquisitely hazy wash of pedal steel, courtesy of Paul Rigby (Neko Case, A.C. Newman); it opens the album like eastern-facing curtains on a bright summer morning. Shortly thereafter it’s joined by acoustic guitar, brushed drums, tasteful bass and Paradis’ folksy vocals, and melts into a warm, inviting mid-tempo vibe that is largely reflective of the album’s overall approach. While certain influences are obvious—The Band, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Neil Young, to name but three—they are never aped gratuitously; merely offered a respectful tip of the hat in Paradis’ pursuit of his own vision and sound. One also feels less overt influences at play, as if the DNA of innumerable blues, jazz, country—even pop—masters were commingling inside the bones of the songs.

Paradis’ voice, like the material itself, possesses a disarming vulnerability: there are moments when it shakes and quivers—but never does it falter. And when he needs to, Paradis digs deep, summoning both ghosts of pain and angels of mercy, in the soaring choruses of ‘Boats’ and ‘Night is Here’. Where the former might be taken as an allusion to his post-accident recovery period (“I’m leanin’ hard into the wind,” he sings in a world-weary voice), the latter offers love and reassurance during one’s darkest hour. Sung in plaintive tones, augmented by glorious backing vocals that reinforce the concepts of support and selflessness at the song’s core, “Night is Here” is a stunning testament to the power of love as a healing force.

But Paradis knows it’s not as simple as saying love conquers all. The album is rife with disillusionment, disappointment, pain, suffering, and the bittersweet remembrance of how things were before—all of which is made excruciatingly clear in one of the album’s most poignant moments, “Save Me”. “This one is a study in juxtaposed realities,” Paradis said in an October 2019 interview. “Right after my accident, while in rehab, I realized that my ‘dreaming self’ hadn't made the same adjustment my physical self had. I had been a fully able-bodied person for 38 years of my life, so when I went to bed, I was able to stand, walk, run in all of my dreams, only to wake in the morning to find the (wheel)chair at the foot of my bed.”

Juxtapositions like this suffuse the entire album: there are befores and afters, gains and losses, pains and pleasures, highs and lows, darkness and light, rockers (the searing 'Mr. Hopeful', with Paradis wailing "Love, love, an elemental force!") and ballads ('Sweet Melinda'), questions and answers. So it seems like more than a coincidence that such juxtaposition carries over to the song titles themselves. And it is here that one finds the most satisfying takeaway from Grooves & Ruts: sung by a man who nearly died in a tragic jobsite accident, and who subsequently faced a long, arduous convalescence, “I’ve Been Better” sounds like the wryest of answers to one of life’s most innocuous questions: how are you? Tellingly, the album-ending track, “I’ve Been Worse,” a reprise of the former, might very well be Paradis’ equally wry response to the same innocuous question—except this time from a more hopeful perspective: that of a man who nearly lost everything, but now celebrates the reclamation of his life in song.

Grooves & Ruts is available from CD Baby.

Raven 'bout Gene: Kai Clark talks about his new tribute album, Silver Raven

2019-11-10T21:20:00.005-05:00

Roughly coinciding with 4AD's mammoth reevaluation of Gene Clark's 1974 masterpiece No Other (released last week) and what would have been Gene's 75th birthday on November 17th, son Kai Clark is poised to release Silver Raven, an 11-song tribute album that traces his father's career in music. Suffice it to say each of the handpicked tracks—popular classics, Byrds-era favourites, under-heard gems—hold special significance for Kai. With guest performances from his dad's former colleagues Carla Olson and Byron Berline, and spirited backing from the members of the Kai Clark Band, the album is both a loving celebration of his dad's accomplishments and a welcome opportunity to introduce Gene Clark's music to a new generation of fans.

(More info on the Silver Raven album)

It's been over five years since Kai Clark last chatted with The Clarkophile; in that time, much has changed, in terms of his father's legacy. Kickstarted in part by the dual successes of Paul Kendall's wonderful documentary, The Byrd Who Flew Alone and Beach House and Co.'s magnanimous one-off tour of the No Other album, it's apparent that we are witnessing a significant reassessment of Gene Clark's entire oeuvre and his place in rock's pantheon. To wit, a steady stream of archival releases, enough to please any Clarkoisseur (The Lost Studio Sessions; Back Street Mirror E.P.; Gene Clark Sings for You; Here Tonight: The White Light Demos) has rather convincingly demonstrated the value of material that remained unreleased during Clark's lifetime.

These releases constitute much more than play-once-and-file-away curios for Boomer diehards. They are evidence of a long-overdue re-evaluation of Clark's importance as a serious artist.
It is evident that both fans and cognoscenti have finally conferred upon Gene the kind of respect and attention he was rarely afforded in his lifetime. In many ways, not the least of which is its enormity (both in size and cost), 4AD's lavish box-set treatment of No Other is the final piece of evidence needed to make a rock-solid case: Gene Clark can no longer be regarded as a "cult artist."

Clearly, for those of us who love Gene Clark, this is an epochal moment, if not a universally acknowledged seismic shift in the foundation of rock's hierarchy. Gene's message has been heard.

And so it was my great pleasure to spend an afternoon in October talking with Kai about his new project. But I also wanted to dig a little deeper and find out about Kai as an individual, as opposed to Gene Clark's son, who is also the public face of the Gene Clark Estate (brother Kelly eschews the spotlight). Kai and I ended up talking about everything from chopping wood (from which he'd just taken a temporary break) to his childhood, his wife, Amber; their children, and their plans to leave California for Nashville to pursue his solo career in earnest. And, of course, we also discussed Gene Clark's transformation from cult hero to acknowledged songwriting genius.

Kai is gracious and affable; always consummate gentleman. He spoke with great affection for his father's music, and provided details about the songs selected for the project. Unfortunately, I'm not at liberty to reveal the full track list of Silver Raven just yet, but I will say that Kai selected wisely: there is something here for anyone who has ever been touched by Gene Clark's vast body of work.

Q: While we know quite a bit about your dad, I'm not sure everyone out there knows a lot about you. So I was wondering if you could tell the readers of the blog a little bit about your family?

Kai Clark: I think a lot of people didn't really know that my father had two sons. I mean, it's not like he really spoke about it much. Only the people that were close to him really knew that he had a family. And I think part of that was probably due to, you know, the bitter separation between my mom and him. It was devastating for him, I'm sure, them splitting and my mom leaving with us kids. And so I think that life was kind of separate from my father.

I was born in Mendocino and I lived there until I graduated high school. I lived with my mom and then I would visit my dad in summers, often. Some summers we wouldn't do that, maybe 'cause he was on the road or this or that. So we would visit in the summer months when we were off of school and then we would be with my mom for the rest of the time. But often my mom and my dad didn't talk. So I actually have a funny story where my mom sent me on a Greyhound bus to stay with him in the late '80s and didn't tell my dad. I called my dad from the Greyhound bus station in downtown LA, which was like one in the morning—not a place you really want to be at. I called and my dad answered and said, "Hey, how's it going? Why are you calling so late?" And I said, "Well, are you gonna pick me up? I'm here at the bus station." He says, "What do you mean you're at the bus station?" I said, "Well, I'm here at the bus station." He says, "Where?" And I said, "Downtown LA." And he didn't have a clue that I was even coming down. So yeah, it was pretty funny. I don't think he was very prepared, as a family man, you know, with the lifestyle he had.

When I graduated high school, I went to Lake Tahoe, where my mom was in a recovery program for her drug addiction, so I stayed with her for a while. I fell in love with Lake Tahoe. I loved the mountains up there. It's a beautiful place.

I've always pursued music, but to pay the bills, I've always had to work odd jobs. So I've been a waiter, worked in construction—I've done pretty much everything. Since I had been in the restaurant industry most of my life, I went to culinary school and graduated in 2004 from the Cordon Bleu in San Francisco.

Q. When did you meet (wife) Amber?

Kai Clark with wife Amber and children,
Taylor, Ava and Kaynon.

KC: I met Amber in 2007, here in Northern California. We had both had bad relationships. She had gone through a bad marriage, and so we weren't really looking for anything too serious. But we quickly realized how much we had in common and how good it was with each other. So we spent several years just enjoying life and traveling around.

She's amazing...she did choir for many years before she met me. When she started singing with me, I realized she had this great ability to harmonize. So it's very enjoyable to have a wife who's musically inclined. And after 13 years of singing with me, she definitely knows my style.

We had our first boy Taylor in 2010, and then we had our daughter Ava in 2012. Kaynon, our second boy, was born in 2015. And we've bought 20 acres up here, near the Sierra mountains. It's been a joy.

But I think as the kids get older, we're ready to move off the mountain. I've kind of burned out on the whole California music scene. I just don't feel like it's what it used to be. LA was a very hard music scene, I think. Northern California has a better music scene, but with my style of playing and everything else, I feel like California has kind of become this TV/American Idol kind of pop culture thing. It's not really the roots of music that I enjoy. So that's why we're considering moving out to the Nashville area next year.

Q. I want to talk about the new album. What was your and the band's attitude going into the studio? Was is intimidating to take on these legendary songs, or was it a relaxed atmosphere?

KC: Well, I think we had been playing enough of the material live for long enough—you know, I've been working with Jim Moreland, my drummer for close to 20 years now. I think we went into the studio knowing that this was something that we had wanted to do for a long time. Me, especially; I've had this kind of on my mind for years, but I never felt like I had the band or the opportunity—or maybe the knowledge and the experience—to do the album justice. I think the most intimidating thing about going in to record an album of my father's songs or songs he performed with, say the Byrds, was the amount of material that there is to look at.

Obviously, people are going to say, "Hey, why didn't you record this song"—because there's just so much, you know? I felt like a lot of the song choices were not only because we played them live, or they were in our heart, but also songs that I thought really deserved more recognition than they had gotten on the original release. So there was a lot of factors that went into it. I don't feel like we were really intimidated at all. I felt like we were actually excited to go in and, and start recording an album of my father's songs...but I'm very critical of my own musical performances. Obviously living up to my father's performances is very intimidating in a sense, because his vocals were so unique and distinctive and he was just such an amazing vocalist and songwriter.

Gene Clark's former duet partner Carla Olson
makes a guest appearance on Kai's new album,
Silver Raven.

But people are always going to relate it to the artists that did the songs originally. So obviously they're going to relate it my father, his performance on the original songs. And so that's—that's a little intimidating.

But we really enjoyed making the album and I think it was just the perfect time. And you know, I think it was just fate that it's coming up on my what would've been my father's 75th birthday. Much of the stuff that's coming out, like the 4AD release of No Other, we didn't even know about that when we started this project.

Q. Right. I mean it just seems to be falling into place all at once.

KC: Yeah, for sure. And I love seeing the recognition. If you look at Gram Parsons, just as an example, I mean the recognition he gets is amazing, you know what I mean? And of course, with due respect, he was a great songwriter and another pioneer of combining different kinds of music. But I think Gene, my father, definitely deserves that respect in music history and also in music songwriting and creation of new music by blending different genres. You know, he was definitely pioneering some stuff. With the No Other album, you look at that and—nobody was doing anything like that at the time. So I think that he was definitely always thinking ahead.

Q. The lavish box-set treatment being given to [No Other], to me this would have been unthinkable 10 years ago, 20 years ago. This would not have been done. And to me this just feels like kind of sweet vindication for his work.

KC: Well, there's always the people that are going to critique it— there's definitely people that'll be like, you know—it's almost like they don't want Gene Clark to be a mainstream name because they are attracted to the mystical aspects of his career as a cultish underground genius: this unknown (other than the Byrds) master of songwriting. So I think there is an aspect of my father that is very appealing; that his career with wasn't bigger than it was.

Q. Are you saying some fans romanticize the fact that his career wasn't more successful?

KC: I just mean that because of his obscurity some people believe it makes him more attractive as an artist in their view. They may believe that commercializing him will take away from the beauty of his work. And yes, they believe it makes it more romantic in a sense.

But I think my father was looking inside of himself for the songs, but he also was looking outside for the recognition that he wanted. I think he wanted people saying "You wrote a masterpiece"; you know, the pat on the back. And I don't think he really got that in his lifetime. It's sad, but at the same time, many artists pass away long before they got the recognition they deserve. And that's the way it works sometimes. So I'm definitely excited to see [his music] going out to a new generation; seeing my father get a lot of the recognition that he deserved for so long.

Q. Yes, I mean, how can that possibly be a bad thing? I mean, to me, this is just like finally reaching the top of the mountain. I mean, Gene Clark goes mainstream. That's really cool to me.

KC: I think what it does is open the door for people to discover more of his music because there's so much.

Q. But really, fame is a bit of a double-edged sword, in terms of how it affects you, because the more popular your father's work becomes, the more it draws nasty comments.

KC: Well, I think you've got to take the good with the bad. The world is both a wonderful and beautiful place and also a very nasty place, especially in the public eye. There's two sides to every story, no pun intended. But I mean I love the stories I hear. I often get contacted by people who say, "I got to meet your dad after a show and he took the time to like sign my"—this or that. And then you hear the other stories of, you know, he was a total a-hole. And that may have been due to alcohol or whatever situation he was in. I mean, you've gotta take the good with the bad and definitely, tragedy makes good headlines.

He definitely had qualities that I don't think people ever got to see because all they saw was what was either written in a magazine or in an article, or what the public's view of him was. So I got to see a lot of my father that people didn't get to see, which is special. And I think that people should know that he was very funny. He had a great sense of humour, he was always joking and laughing. And he was very kind to people that normally people of his stature just kind of shun, because they get it get it all the time. You get the guy going, "Hey, sign this!" or people following you around. It's gotta be a little annoying at times, but at my father was very good about that.

Q. Of the songs included set for inclusion on Silver Raven, do you have a personal favourite?

KC: Well, 'Silver Raven' is special to me, not just because it's off the No Other album, but it was probably the very first song in my father's that I ever learned to play, partly because it's three chords. [laughs] But the magic of my father's music is you could have three chords, but the vocals could take you on this journey.

For me it was special because I was going through a hard time in high school. My mom was using drugs and my dad was not in my life very much. And I used to go over to this guy's house who had guitars all over, all around. And it was kind of like a little escape for me; I could play all these guitars he had. There was an old cowboy guy named Chuck, who used to be a pro rodeo rider—good old cowboy guy. He would always tell me, "Hey, you gotta play that song 'Silver Raven.'" And every time I'd go over there and pick up a guitar, I had to play the song for Chuck. It became special, you know, because of that. It was like this song that had this history with me, that always stuck with me.

Sincere thanks to Kai Clark
For more information on Kai Clark and the Silver Raven project, click here.

If you've enjoyed this article, please consider a small donation at my Ko-fi page.

The Firebyrd Project Part 4: Conclusion

2019-05-01T15:00:00.001-04:00

I'm going to conclude the Firebyrd Project today with a reveal of the material that could potentially be used in the creation of a near-definitive document of the era. What new information I have uncovered related to previously undocumented tracks is included below, and in previous instalments of this series.

I have no doubt that, at some future date, a company will step forward with the necessary resources to take my ideas, build upon my work, and make them a reality.

Mark my words.

And now, imagine the following...

Thanks to Indigo Mariana/Neon Brambles for creating the cover mock-up.
Photo by Henry Diltz.

Raven in the Dark: Live, Studio & Demo Recordings from the Firebyrd Era, 1980-1984

CD 1

Mr. Tambourine Man
Something About You Baby
Rodeo Rider
Rain Song
Vanessa
If You Could Read My Mind
I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better
Made for Love
Blue Raven
She Loves You
Into the Night
Kansas City Southern
Dixie Flyer
Something About You Baby
Seventh Avenue Train
Silver Raven
Blue Raven

Tracks 1-9 Original Firebyrd release, 1984

Tracks 10-17 Gene Clark & The Firebyrds, Live 1983-1984

CD 2

Over the Mountain
Strange and Different Way
(Livin' in) Hard Times
Painted Fire
I Saw a Dream Come True
Shades of Blue
Crazy Ladies
Midnight Mare
I’ll Change Your Life
If I Don’t Have You
Love is Gonna Come at Last
Young Love
I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better
You're Gonna Miss That Somebody (aka Rest of Your Life)
Straight From the Heart
Easy Ride
Love Wins Again
You and I
Raven in the Dark

CD 2 Track-by-track notes

Over the Mountain (chorus only)
Exists as a 52-second snippet of a work in progress. But even as a brief fragment it is a stirring work, possibly envisioned as a No Other-esque epic. From Gene's dramatic, quasi-operatic singing style and obvious spiritual/religious/metaphorical significance of mountaintops, to the crushing finality of Gene's last strummed chord, I have the distinct sense that this song was intended to be a major work.
The lyrics are difficult to discern, possibly due to Gene's problems with his teeth, but it is, for the most part, a commanding performance. There is a moment at the 0:10 mark at which Gene's voice breaks, yet somehow I can't help but be moved by it. Even when Gene's voice falters, as it does here, it still carries a considerable punch.

I envision 'Over the Mountain' as a spiritual invocation of sorts, something akin to Brian Wilson's intentions for 'Our Prayer,' the leadoff track from SMiLE.

Strange and Different Way
Songs are open for interpretation, of course, but it's my belief that while 'Strange and Different Way' appears, at first blush, to be another one of Gene's songs of rejection, it's actually dealing with the same kind of metaphysical concerns as those later expressed in 'Pledge To You': intimations that a loving relationship that ends at a partner's death—i.e. final separation in this mortal life—amounts to mere prelude for blissful reconnection in the next:

I want my baby
She told me goodbye
And then she said maybe
We'll meet again on some bright sunshiny day
We'll be together
And we'll see each other
In a strange and different way.

I had a girl
I called her my lady
She meant more than all the world
She called me her baby
We'll meet again on some bright sunshiny day
We'll see each other
And we'll see each other
In a strange and different way.

This is one of the problematic inclusions in the set, as there is no way to determine its provenance. Another in a seemingly endless series of fascinating mysteries in Gene's career.

(Livin' in) Hard Times
Painted Fire
I Saw a Dream Come True
(See discussion in previous instalments of this series)

The Glass House Tape

December 1980

Recorded with Rick Clark, Thomas Jefferson Kaye, Jon Faurot and Garth Beckington

Shades of Blue

Crazy Ladies

Midnight Mare

I'll Change Your Life

If I Don't Have You

One of the most appealing things about this five-song set is its simplicity: acoustic guitars, rich harmonies, with Gene taking the lead on all (and in fine voice, to boot). Like the Sings for You demos, the Glass House tape has acquired a mythical status among fans. It's high time that fans were given an opportunity to dispel the myth and assess the reality. The good news is that it is a much better-sounding recording than SFY, and the writing is, for the most part, top-shelf Clark. One's enjoyment of the material, however, is largely dependent upon one's tolerance for the presence Tommy Kaye, both as writer (e.g. 'Shades of Blue') and vocal arranger.

I don't mind 'Shades of Blue', but by the same token, I don't think it deserved to be recorded on two occasions, the second of which came in the recording made with John Arrias. Of the two, the acoustic Glass House take is the superior cut, if only because it is not lumbered with the Motels/Quarterflash-like production cliches that were by well past their best-before date when Gene recorded it in the 1989-1990 period. Either Gene liked the song or Kaye somehow convinced him of its merit. Possibly both.

I had always hoped the GH version of 'Crazy Ladies' would prove definitive—and it might very well have been, had it not been for Kaye's heavy-handed vocal embellishments. To this day, the best versions remain the ones recorded by McGuinn, Clark (and Hillman) in the 1977-1978 time frame.

'I'll Change Your Life' positively soars with Merseybeat ebullience; at some point, it could have (i.e. should have) been translated into a power-pop arrangement.

'Midnight Mare', co-written with brother Rick Clark, is a bit of an oddity, but enjoyable nonetheless. The spontaneous outburst of assorted whinnies, hoots and hollers—perhaps jarring upon first listen—are refreshingly spirited, even exhilarating. If the following mathematical equation acoustic guitars + lush harmonies + 1980 leads you to a disappointing answer of Air Supply or the Little River Band, rest assured this stuff is far nowhere near that cynical in execution or intent.

'If I Don't Have You' is another classic Clark torch song, and would today be recognized as such, had had he had the inclination to record it for Firebyrd. I understand the artistic impulse is to move inexorably forward, never look back, but sometimes I wish someone had grabbed Gene by the lapels and said, "Gene, you must release this song."

Some may be wondering why I haven't included the legendary track 'Communications'. The short answer is that the most recent research undertaken by Rogan in his exhaustive attempt to uncover the truth (see footnotes for the track in Requiem for the Timeless Vol 2) suggests it dates from much later in the decade, towards the end of Gene's life, and was accidentally lumped in with the other five songs from 1980 due to, ironically enough, tape-trading miscommunications.

In truth, it sounds nothing like the other five tracks, and Gene's voice sounds weathered and on-the-edge, emotionally speaking, so I would tend to exclude it from this set. Should definitive, incontrovertible evidence emerge that it was among the songs recorded for the GHT then of course I would insist on its inclusion.

Love is Gonna Come At Last
Young Love
I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better

In the 1984 period, for unknown reasons, Gene recorded a slew of bizarrely chosen cover songs: 'Living Next Door to Alice', a sappy story-song that became a hit for Smokie in 1976); 'Needles and Pins', written by Jack Nitzsche and Sonny Bono, made famous by Jackie DeShannon and the Searchers, but in this case, as astutely noted by Rogan, inexplicably faithful to Smokie's arrangement in the '70s; two well-chosen songs by Badfinger, 'Love is Gonna Come at Last' & 'Baby Blue'; 'Young Love', written by Ric Cartey and Carole Joyner, was a hit for Tab Hunter in the late '50s; 'The Closer You Get' was a hit for Alabama in 1983; and yet another remake of 'I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better'. (Should you wish to hear them, all of Gene's versions can be heard here).

'Baby Blue' is my all-time favourite Badfinger song. And while on paper it makes total sense—pairing the man who wrote some of the sweetest proto-power pop of the 1960s with one of the finest examples of the genre as it matured in the 1970s—Gene misses the mark completely, hence its absence from the set. In truth, it doesn't sound like he knows the song very well to begin with, and the production and backing is coldly antiseptic, devoid of anything even approaching soulful commitment. On the other hand, 'Love is Gonna Come at Last' fares much better: Gene's voice rises above the robotic backing in a way that undercuts the titular expression of hope with world-weary resignation and an underlying sense of futility. Check out Gene's guttural reading of the otherwise throwaway bridge in the song, in which he infuses genuine passion (largely missing from the other covers) into the following lines: "I live for tomorrow, what it may bring/I live through the sorrow, live in a dream."
The guitar playing, while hopelessly tied to the usual assortment of '80s pedals and effects, offers another high point to the track.

As Rogan says, 'Young Love' succeeds "in spite of itself." As performed by a man of 40, we understand it is a song sung in reflection of a time long past. Gene's sincerity prohibits any sleazier interpretation. Unfortunately, the smoky burr that sometimes affected Gene's voice from around this point forward is on full display here, and is somewhat distracting once heard.

If you're keeping score, this is Gene's third re-recording of 'I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better' in as many years. To date, two of the three have been released: the 1982 NyteFlyte version came out on The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982; and of course, there's the ramshackle bar-band-like version on Firebyrd. I have included it in this set because it is, after all, Gene's signature song, and ultimately, it's interesting to compare the three versions. Sadly, while the countrified approach is certainly appreciated, Gene's rough-edged vocal simply doesn't work. The musicians sound like inveterate rockers doing their best impersonation of country players...with predictable results.

You're Gonna Miss That Somebody (aka Rest of Your Life)

Rogan knocks this song as an unashamed Elvis pastiche, but I think Gene does a masterful job on it. We've heard the tinny version on the dodgy Silvery Moon album, but there exists at least two versions of Gene performing the song accompanying himself on acoustic guitar that are worthy of release.

Straight From the Heart
Easy Ride
Love Wins Again
You and I
(The BUG demos)

For many years we've been under the impression that there were three songs issued on the BUG demos tape, but recently Whin Oppice disclosed that there was a fourth: a cover of Herb Pedersen's 'Easy Ride', which Gene had previously performed with Flyte at the Palomino engagement in 1982.

I haven't heard Gene's version in its entirety, but suffice it so say it sounds like a winner: fresh, breezy and instantly likeable. Here is Pedersen's version, dating from the same year Gene recorded it.

Many fans are familiar with the other BUG demos, 'Straight from the Heart', 'You and I' and 'Love Wins Again'. I don't think anyone would be averse to their seeing official release. They are all solid, well-sung Gene Clark originals, and would nicely sit alongside his best song from the decade. In truth, a collection of Gene's 20 best songs from the 1980s—a time during which he was largely forgotten—would demand that critics and fans take another look at his body of work.

Raven in the Dark
(discussed in previous instalment)

Thank you to everyone who took the time to assist me in this project.

That's it for me for a while. Taking a break to work on my Bill Rinehart story for Ugly Things magazine. I'll be back sometime in the summer to delve into another aspect of Gene's career.

The Firebyrd Project Part 3: Project update/Tolls and tales on Gene's road to The Firebyrds

2019-03-18T15:53:00.002-04:00

Cassette tape from the Estate of Pat Robinson,
from which the previously unknown,
undocumented song 'Raven in the Dark' was discovered.
(From The Collection Of Whin Oppice)

Previously undocumented Firebyrd-era song surfaces

'Raven in the Dark' features Gene Clark's vocal and acoustic guitar

In a surprising and timely development, a previously undocumented Gene Clark composition from the Firebyrd era has been brought to my attention by Clark collector Whin Oppice.

'Raven in the Dark', featuring Gene on acoustic guitar and vocal, clocks in at 4:53, and is said to feature elements of two other Clark songs: the still-unreleased 'Crazy Ladies' (written circa 1977) and 'My Marie', co-written with singer-songwriter Pat Robinson circa 1986.

The song, which appears in the form of a home demo, is included on a tape consisting of 14 songs, presumably copied for Clark collaborator Pat Robinson circa 1984 (see image, above right). The Fuji DR-II tape, entitled "Gene Clark (Songs, Demos & Unreleased)" was among the items acquired by Mr. Oppice in a sale organized by the Mr. Robinson's Estate, after his death on August 16, 2016.

All of the songs on the tape are closely associated with Firebyrd era, including the Byrds' Preflyte version of 'You Showed Me,' which Gene revived with the Firebyrds in 1983 and 1984.

This marks the third occasion on which Gene name-checked the ominous black bird in one of his songs (the others of course, being 'Silver Raven' from 1974, and its Firebyrd-era sequel, 'Blue Raven', from 1984).

Because the title, 'Raven in the Dark' (with its image of a dark bird/Byrd flying unseen) constitutes such a perfect metaphor for Gene's experiences in the early '80s, I've decided that it will be incorporated into the ultimate title of the Firebyrd Project.

The remainder of the material on the tape is familiar/documented material, either from official or unofficial sources:

Tracks 1-3: NyteFlyte demos (since released on The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982)
Tracks 4-6: BUG demos (unreleased, 1984)
Track 7: Preflyte
Track 8: This Byrd Has Flown
Track 9: Firebyrd
Track 10: Not sure which version this is, but various ones have surfaced over the years
Track 12-13: Firebyrd
Track 14 (reverse side of J-card): 'Rodeo Rider' (Firebyrd)

Sincere thanks to Whin, both for bringing this song to my attention and for sharing the J-card image.

Ahead of the reveal of my choices for bonus material in my imaginary 2-CD package, I have decided to write a brief overview of Gene's history as a live performer from 1965 to 1984. I felt that this would help establish context for what he was up against during this period of transition.

The Reverse Arc of Fame: Tolls and tales on Gene's road to The Firebyrds

Firebyrds Promo pic, circa 1984: L to R: Michael Clarke
Matt Andes, Gene, Peter Oliva, Michael Hardwick

One sometimes sees the pursuit of fame characterized as a long trip down a dark road, or maybe a difficult ascent to an ultimate peak. These terms serve both as evidence of the time invested in the endeavour (sometimes known as paying one's dues), and the struggles encountered along the journey to the top—or, as John Lennon once described it to his fellow Beatles—"the toppermost of the poppermost."

In the late 1970s/early 1980s—at a time when an evening spent catching live bands was considered a viable form of entertainment—venues held sway as a proving ground for aspiring groups to establish their credibility. Being in a bar band was a little like being being stuck in rock purgatory: no guarantee of deliverance. An implied, ever-present danger existed that a band might become forever locked between two states: i.e. what one was (unknown amateurs) and what one aspired to be (famous). As John Entwistle mused in The Who's sardonic 'Success Story':

Saturday night, I got a gig with the band
Playing the electric guitar
Someday I'm gonna make it
Gonna be a super duper star
Get a big flashy car
And a house for my mum
The big break better happen soon
'Cause I'm pushing twenty-one

Thus, over the decades, in what seems like a biblically inspired image, the most sacred of rock archetypes emerged: the godlike Brian Epstein saviour figure. How many bands, I wonder, were motivated by that one story? How many believed that if they worked hard enough, they too would ascend the arc of fame in that same way? How many bands believed that their saviour would emerge from the haze of cigarette smoke; one who stood apart from the sweaty, dancing melee, and felt compelled to use his tremendous clout to transform their lives?

You never know who may be listening to you

This archetype I've described above was so deeply set in our collective consciousness that it was used by Paul McCartney in the song 'Take It Away' (see video below) from the 1982 album Tug of War. In it, the mysterious Epstein-like figure is referred to as "some important impresario" in a manner that both romanticizes and reinforces the rising arc of fame I'm describing herein.

If you've ever read a biography of a successful rock band, invariably there's a chapter that focuses on the group's early days, playing the clubs and bars. It was a right of passage that could foment the seeds of a band's success, or hasten its erosion and demise. Tales of the road—the excesses, the bad food, coffee runs in winter, the triumphs, the indignities, the hilarious situations, the ribald stories of sexual conquest—are the sorts of things that build character, solidify friendships and engender a sense of camaraderie within groups (the Beatles' adventures in Hamburg being the most celebrated, romantic and hilarious...the image of a cap-wearing John Lennon reading a newspaper in his underwear
never fails to get a laugh out of me). The degree of fondness by which the lean times are recalled, however,
often depends on whether these hardships eventually led to widespread success.

Not everyone gets to look back at their salad days and smile. Not everyone makes it to the toppermost of the poppermost. In 1982, Paul McCartney could afford that (some would say smug) look back at his past hardships.

Video below: You may recall the star-studded video of 'Take It Away' (from the Tug of War album) featuring former Beatles producer George Martin, a very badly permed Ringo Starr (!!!) and actor John Hurt in the role of the "important impresario"

And that infrastructure is largely dependent upon belief in the idea that fame comes in the form of a rising arc: humble beginnings--> dreams of stardom-->early trials lead to success-->struggle, nagging self-doubt, unforeseen circumstances-->influential patron voices faith-->deliverance and stardom. The concept of the rising arc of fame existed for the Beatles in their early days, and to my knowledge, continues in various forms to this day (e.g. bedroom performances of cover songs posted on YouTube going viral, etc.).

But for others (including Gene), the rising arc within the classic rags-to-riches narrative—in which hard work, perseverance, and raw talent leads up the path to the top of the mountain—was cruelly inverted. In truth, Gene was plucked from relative obscurity to join the New Christy Minstrels; the Byrds had a hit record less than a year after forming. Compared to what he would face in later years, Gene Clark crested the arc of fame without breaking a sweat. Yes, the band toured—but only after they were stars. There was no trial by fire on the club circuit. For Gene Clark, the traditional arc of fame did not apply. The lean times, the times of struggle, came long after he had already achieved world-wide fame and fortune.

Compared to what he would face in later years, Gene Clark crested the arc of fame without breaking a sweat.

A nameless face in somebody else's show

The Byrds hit the big time without ever having to pack up their gear and leave the L.A. area. They had no experiences comparable to those faced by the Beatles in Hamburg. That's not a knock at them; it is simply the way things worked out: right place, right time, right connections. In any event, knowing what we know now, it's difficult to imagine those five guys—Clark, McGuinn, Hillman, Crosby and Clarke—embarking upon, much less less surviving, a rigorous travel schedule and years of struggle, without the benefit of a number-one record behind them. As noted by authors before me (and Gene himself in the perceptive kiss-off line from 'Echoes'), the Byrds were five individuals with vastly different personalities, temperaments and backgrounds; what hardships they did experience became, in their hands, another opportunity to promote further discord and alienation. Concepts of loyalty and camaraderie were virtually unheard of within their ranks (Clark and Clarke being the most notable exception). Theirs was a marriage of convenience. Whenever the Byrds faced adversity, it was usually exacerbated from within. If a gleefully detonated explosion amidships wasn't perpetrated with the intention of scuppering the ship on which the Byrds had sailed to success, it was surely to test its seaworthiness (I think Rogan's description of the chaotic video shoot for 'Set You Free This Time' is the perfect example of this).


The Byrds flew to London after reaching the toppermost of the poppermost. Photograph: Victor Blackman/Getty Images

In any event, the most immediate result of Gene's departure was the immediate cessation of all Byrds-related pressure (touring-related or otherwise). From that point forward it's worth noting that, while he did perform live on occasion (with the Gene Clark Group, in either of its incarnations) during the first couple of years of his solo career, Gene's earnings from his Byrds days enabled him to sidestep the stresses inherent with life on the road (except for a few notable occasions with his partner in crime, Doug Dillard). At that particular point, there was no immediate financial need for him to eke out a living as a live performer, so it's not surprising that he did not spend months or even years on the road like some of his contemporaries. And after Columbia unceremoniously dropped him in 1967, he had no label support anyway.

Surprisingly, this trend continued into the early 1970s—even in the face of the heavily hyped Asylum Byrds reunion. It's really quite astonishing to think that during the course of his much-ballyhooed machinations to reunite the original five, David Geffen failed to include a specific touring requirement in the band's contract, if only as insurance on his investment in the event the album was a failure. Surely this was de rigueur, even in 1973? Just over a decade later, in 1984, the Jacksons embarked upon a successful tour in support of the critically ravaged Victory album. One would assume that all concerned knew going in that the potential impact of bad reviews upon sales would be lessened by dint of their full commitment to promotion and live appearances. When the Byrds album faced reviews that were, generally speaking, lukewarm at best (prior to its becoming a staple of used record shops), no tour materialized, and the "band" went their separate ways. Presumably, Gene was well paid for this experience (and rightly so); a feat managed without having to reactivate any of the touring-related stresses that contributed to his departure in early 1966. It also kick-started a series of events that would bring about his magnum opus, No Other. In that respect, the Asylum Byrds album was an unqualified success for Gene.

He's been the first, he's been the last

Above: In 1975, a decade after he had first
attained worldwide fame and fortune
with the Byrds, Gene was forced to hit
the road like other struggling musicians:
packed tight in a broken-down Dodge van,
without the assistance of a label, or a hit record,
to help him along. He would face
a similar predicament only
a few years later, in the Firebyrd era.

But in 1974, the commercial failure of No Other changed everything. It is astonishing to think that at a time when he had just created what is today widely regarded as his masterpiece, Gene was essentially forced into earning a subsistence-level living by packing up his gear, getting behind the wheel, and taking himself and the Silverados out on the road. And so while contemporaries like CSNY played to vast crowds in stadiums, and Dylan and The Band stormed across North America in triumph, Gene laid aside his pride and did his time on the road. [Note: In 2014, I wrote about Gene's post-No Other road experiences in a piece that was included with the downloadable bonus tracks for High Moon's re-release of Two Sides To Every Story. It includes quotes from interviews I did with Silverados bassist Duke Bardwell, drummer Marc S. Singer, and bassist for KC Southern Band and later the Firebyrds, Peter Oliva. You can download it here: Backwoods Gothic: Survival in the Rock 'n' Roll Wilderness]

From limos and planes to small talk, cheap beer and wine

By virtue of his performances alone, one senses that Gene's back-to-basics tour of colleges and auditoriums with Roger in 1977 and 1978 hit the right balance between the stresses and pleasures of touring. Recorded evidence proves Gene was a consummate professional, who added as much passion to Roger's material as to his own. The audiences are respectful, attentive, appreciative, seemingly aware of the legacies and ongoing relevance of the two men. Two guitars, two stools and two voices was all it took, and the results were uniformly sublime. It seems to me that Gene was happiest when performing his songs in an atmosphere of simplicity. The formation of McGuinn, Clark & Hillman, and the subsequent release of their eponymously titled album, however, catapulted Gene back into the limelight, and the torrent of activity appeared to undermine Gene's sense of balance: out were the two simple stools, in came a drum riser, bright lights, the Albert Brothers, Miami, a hectic PR schedule, endless TV appearances, limos, planes—and the coup de grâce: a large-scale tour.

Back to basics with McGuinn-Clark (1977-1978):
two stools, two guitars, two voices.

(Living in) Hard Times: Bar Band on the Run (1984)

Focusing on possible live bonus material for the Firebyrd Project

Sadly, to my knowledge, there is no professionally recorded audio of Gene Clark's appearances, either solo or with the Firebyrds, in the designated period (approximately 1980-1984). Anyone thinking of undertaking this project needs to be aware of that fact from the get-go. Release-quality board tapes do exist, but they're a poor substitute for multitrack recordings, being flat, sterile representations that cannot benefit from a proper mixdown.

I Saw a Dream Come True
(Living in) Hard Times
In terms of our chronology, it appears that Gene's final, full-concert appearance with McGuinn, Clark & Hillman took place on or around October 12, 1979, in Alliance, Ohio¹. At this show he performed two new songs, 'I Saw a Dream Come True' (a 1984 version of which appears on the downloadable bonus tracks included with the above-mentioned Two Sides release) and '(Living in) Hard Times', which appears on the fan-created 7-disc "box set" bootleg. Based on the quality of the songs, and their appearance in the chronology at a truly pivotal moment (i.e. marking the end of the MC&H era), both of these songs should be considered for the Firebyrd Project—but not necessarily these versions. To wit, I have concerns about these specific performances: I have not heard the October 12, 1979 version of the former, so I can't safely vouch for it. I have, however, heard the performance of the latter, and while I like the song, I have reservations about the quality of the source tape (unofficial, of course) that appears to make Gene's voice wobble as if struggling for notes. This might conceivably be due to a technical issue, either at the event (e.g. poor monitors, Gene was routinely used as the soundman's guinea pig) or in the copying/ transference/degradation of the recording. That's for engineers to work out, unless a better-quality tape should emerge.
Recommendation: If it is determined the wobbliness is due to an erratic performance on Gene's part, I would suggest a thorough search be undertaken for a nicer home-demo recording, or something along those lines.

Gene reemerged with Jesse Ed Davis at McCabe's Guitar Shop on April 19, 1980, to perform before what was, by the sounds of it, a small handful of people. At this show he performed a lovely version of 'I Saw a Dream Come True'. I invite you to check out this version, posted below by longtime Gene Clark fan Howard "Skip" Way:

Gene is in good humour here—somewhat surprising, given the recent unpleasantness of having been phased out of McGuinn, Clark & Hillman (the City album, credited to “Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman, featuring Gene Clark” had been released in January 1980). He’s also in fine voice, with Jesse Ed providing tasteful, sympathetic backing throughout. Knowing what we know now, it is unbearably bittersweet to hear these two old friends, once kings of L.A. music scene, reviving past glories while facing the beginning of a brand new decade that would prove so difficult for both.

Painted Fire
While most of the set is made up of surefire winners and no-brainers (i.e. a logical mix of Gene’s better known songs with songs the two recorded together during the White Light and No Other eras), it’s nice to hear the two buddies revive ‘Stand By Me’, an outtake from sessions for the former. One can imagine the memories it conjured for Gene and Jesse a decade later. Some of the songs in this audience recording are marred by coughing, talking and other incidental sounds. The only new material in the set comes in the form of the lesser of his two parting gifts to Messrs. McGuinn and Hillman, 'Painted Fire' (the other being the superior ‘Won’t Let You Down'). I like this song much more than I used to, and I believe it's all down to the uncluttered instrumentation and Gene's gutsy performance of it here. The City version is pure jive, by comparison.

The more intimate venue may have indicated a backslide in terms of his career prospects, but Gene sounds unfettered and present. It stands as a refreshing counterpoint to the hokey piano-tinkling studio version produced by MC&H.

If You Could Read My Mind
She Darked the Sun
By the tail end of 1983, Gene found himself in what had to have been a wearying position, one that was remarkably similar to the one he faced in 1975. With 1982's NyteFlyte project shelved after an unfocused stand at the Palomino (albeit one that produced a breathtaking version of 'If You Could Read My Mind') and the completion of five Jim Dickson-produced demos (recently released on The Lost Studio Sessions 1964-1982) that failed to draw attention from labels, Gene was forced to reassess his prospects as a recording artist.

The sporadic recording sessions for Firebyrd hadn't yielded a finished product (or label interest), and Gene needed to earn a living. In the wake of punk and new wave, it was probably wise for him to adopt a straight-ahead, no-nonsense rock band approach to touring. Eschewing the kind of rollicking bluegrass he'd played in '75, and (wisely) dumping any of the slick-but-forgettable MOR material he'd played in McGuinn, Clark and Hillman days from 1979, Gene opted for a basic unit: bass, guitars and drums (limited keyboard/occasional pedal steel by Mike Hardwick, until his eventual departure).

Listening to tapes of various shows, and taking in the various lineup changes (it's unbelievable to think so much upheaval took place in 1983-1984 period), a clear downward arc takes shape in my mind. The first shows, while occasionally sloppy and frenetic, are listenable, pleasurable; Gene seems filled with enthusiasm for his new album, while the band creates a holy bar-band racket behind him (it is interesting to hear Gene and Michael playing songs for which they share a history, for example, 'She Darked the Sun', in an arrangement similar to the one recorded with the Flying Burrito Brothers in 1970, also included on The Lost Studio Sessions). Upon reflection, I've decided that I was a little hard on Michael Clarke in my previous post. Beyond his technical shortcomings, Michael brought a considerable amount of raw physical power to the table, a quality that's often lacking in more professionally trained drummers. Visceral power always works well in a bar-band atmosphere. That's not a back-handed compliment, it's the truth.

Blue Raven
Dixie Flyer
Gene seems excited about the new material (e.g. 'Blue Raven', 'Dixie Flyer') and makes multiple references to a "new album". At a January 16, 1984 show at the Continental Club in Austin, Texas, Gene introduces 'Tommy Kaye's 'Dixie Flyer' as "a brand new song off a brand new album"; during the introduction of 'Blue Raven' he says, "Here's another brand new song. Got a new album coming out in a couple of days," after which he pauses, and then, appearing to mock his own statement, adds, "Couple of days? Yeah, right..." (The sarcasm may indicate Gene's frustration with finding a suitable label, but in any event, Firebyrd would be released in March of 1984). Interestingly, 'Dixie Flyer' did not figure in the final track list. Maybe he came to resent the amount of subpar material Tommy Kaye was foisting on him? Who knows. But it seems worthwhile to note that Tommy's considerable influence upon Gene, apart from his ill-fated reappearance during the sessions with John Arrias later on, began to wane after his involvement with the Firebyrd L.P. Personally, I've never considered Tommy a major talent. Apart from No Other, I'm unable to name any other song or album on which his touch was instrumental in the creation of a truly great work. In many respects, I think Gene's insistence upon his involvement in Two Sides To Every Story was a major misstep.

However, in regards to 'Dixie Flyer,' I'm of the belief that a live version of the song should be considered for inclusion in the set over the studio take released on This Byrd Has Flown. This is purely out of a sense of preserving historical accuracy—in that Gene kept it in the set until the final shows in January 1985—not from any personal fondness for the song. Plus in these live versions, Gene's voice and personality are clearly and keenly felt, which is a refreshing change from the rather soulless studio version, which stands as ample evidence of Tommy's schlockier predilections.

You know, I knew a fellow a few years ago. I met him actually in 1965 in London, England, at a club called Blaises. I was playing there [August 6th, 1965—Clarkophile] with my old pal back here on the drums. And there were these two guys that came into the audience. And they both had on suede leather-kinda Levi's jackets and sunglasses and it sorta looked like John Lennon and George Harrison to me, you know. And that's who it was. And so afterwards, John had came upstairs, and he says, "I want to talk to you." And he handed me one bottle of wine. And he says, "Come on, we got some talkin' to do." And we spent a lot of time together up there. I really loved that guy. And I'd like to dedicate this song to everybody, and to John Lennon, because he wrote this song.

—Gene Clark, February 3, 1984, Shirley MA, introduction to 'She Loves You'

She Loves You
Into the Night

The spectre of John Lennon’s assassination hangs over Gene’s work in the 1980-1984 period. By all accounts, Lennon's murder hit him extremely hard and catapulted him into bouts of depression and deepening substance abuse. In the above-transcribed introduction to 'She Loves You' in 1984, Gene still sounds shaken and sombre. And there's something more than a little sad about hearing him say "I really loved that guy" to a roomful of buzzing barroom patrons.

As we shall see in Part 4 of the Firebyrd Project, the Glass House tape, recorded in December 1980, features a soaring homage to 1964-era Fabs in the form of 'I'll Change Your Life'. Less easily identified and articulated, however, is the spooky aura that surrounds these songs. It is a spookiness that I felt even before I found out they had been recorded in that awful month, that seemed to last a year.

Just as he had incorporated an early Beatles number into his tour with the Silverados circa 1975 ('I’ll Be Back'), Gene worked up a breezy take of the Fabs' 'She Loves You'. I find it very moving that on the two occasions in which Gene was forced to swallow his pride and head out on small-scale club-circuit tours ('74-'75/'83-'84), he reached back to the music that had initially transformed his life, as if drawing upon some sacred wellspring for sustenance and renewal. Consider this: at the same February 3rd, 1984 show from which the above Lennon anecdote was taken, Gene starts to introduce the next song, 'Vanessa': "I've always liked bad-girl songs," he says. But he suddenly cuts himself off, presumably after getting a signal from a band member.
"Oh, wait a minute. Do we have to change a string?" he says. "Go ahead and change a string."
But apparently, the changing of the string was taking longer than expected.
"Well, this is a contest to see how fast this guy can change his string," Gene says, forcing himself to chuckle.

You can sense that he's becoming uncomfortable.

"You know what..." he begins to say, but does not complete the thought. Instead, he pauses, and says simply, resolutely, "Okay,"—to a bandmate, the audience, or to himself.
At that moment, Gene begins to strum chords and rhythm that might easily have been the intro to 'Tried So Hard'.
"In the meantime, I'll play a li'l country song," he says.

But he is not playing 'Tried So Hard'.

The song is Lennon's 'I'll Cry Instead' from A Hard Day's Night. Of the numbers played that night, this impromptu cover (never repeated) comes well before his introduction to 'She Loves You' and the heartfelt story about being upstairs at Blaises when John Lennon handed him one bottle of wine and said, "Come on, we've got some talking to do."

Obviously John Lennon was on his mind that evening.

'She Loves You' should be included in the set. It's a mature, clever arrangement, one that maintains the energy of the original while not sounding at all juvenile when sung by a man fast approaching 40. By eliminating the accented stops, the song seems to glide through one's consciousness and take on new significance.
'Into the Night', another cover (written by Liz Anderson and Jeff Rollings) comes across like a rather shameless knockoff of Quarterflash (or something as objectionable). Somehow Gene makes it work².

"Well, now, the problem is the Firebyrds have all just quit now... Naw, I'm gonna do about two or three songs here with this little Ovation guitar..."
Gene Clark, Continental Club, Austin, Texas,
January 16, 1984

As 1984 wore on, attrition took its toll, as members came and went and performances became less professional. It must have been hard to sustain any level of camaraderie with so many hired guns passing through the ranks (Peter Oliva and Michael Clarke appear to have served longest at his side, but gone were the Andes brothers, Matt and Mark; Trace Harrill, Michael Hardwick...and other names that I've lost track of at the moment).

Elsewhere, Gene's voice, after bearing the brunt of singing virtually every song night after night in front of a loud rock band, begins to falter. To me, he sounds exhausted and quite naturally less committed to the performance, going through the motions, in pure survival mode: get there, get onstage, get off. When one hears audience tapes of Gene's heart-rending solo performances of classics like 'Here Without You' and 'Silver Raven'—not to the rapt attention and heartfelt appreciation he deserved, mind you, but to the hootin' and hollerin' of beer-swilling denizens of joints named Woody's Roadhouse and Jumbo's, it's hard not to be gutted by the pathos. At a show in early 1984, a guy in the audience yells out "Lou Reed! Sweet Jane!" In the YouTube clip of 'She Loves You' posted above, the band is introduced as the "Thunderbyrds"—which, quite understandably, draws Gene's ire.

After all he had accomplished, Gene Clark did not deserve this kind of ignorance. These aren't examples of dues-paying; these are examples of a genius being cruelly disrespected.

Sadly, in listening to these shows, one does not get the sense that Gene and his band were gaining any noticeable momentum. The performances from the late '83/early '84 period are, on the whole (based on the ones I've heard) tight and hard-hitting. But there's no evidence of buzz, that any momentum is being gained with these trips down the bar-band road³. And we already know that no Brian Epstein figure would magically emerge to pluck them from the bar circuit and lift them onto top-40 radio. Indeed, a disturbing trend seems to emerge. For the average Byrds fan (not to be confused with a Gene Clark fan), 'Vanessa' seems to have been the tune you tolerated while waiting to hear a rousing version of 'So You Want To Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star' (ironically, a song that Gene neither wrote, nor played on, but saw fit to put into the set). And judging by his next career decision—to embark upon the "20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds" tours—Gene appears to have made that same observation.

For the time being, Woody's Roadhouse was as good as it was going to get. The Firebyrds were now consigned to bar-band purgatory: set upon a treadmill that would never get better or easier, and could scarcely become worse, for as long as Gene decided to continue.

At some point, Gene had to have wondered why he was subjecting himself to this kind of humiliation. Bars are proving grounds. What did Gene Clark have left to prove? Inevitably, those aspects of Gene's music that made him a bona fide artist, poet, and star of distinction, were forfeited. Thus, any regard for nuance, subtlety, intonation, dynamics and enunciation—the very things that made Gene's music so deeply personal, yet simultaneously reflective of universal conditions of loneliness, despair and doomed love; the things that made it feel like he was speaking directly to (or for) you—were lost in the din of clinking glasses and scattered hoots.

Also lost in this environment: the fact that the still-mighty Gene Clark—a founding member of the Byrds, a guiding hand in the development of significant sub-genres like psychedelia, country-rock, folk-rock, and power-pop; an esteemed writer whose visionary poetry graced dozens of timeless classics in the '60s and '70s; a man who had met and earned the respect of peers like the Beatles—had been relegated to the role of coaxing drunken barroom patrons out of their chairs. "You know, there is a dance floor out here..."

Notes
¹According to MC&H drummer Scott Kirkpatrick, Gene did not make the trip to Europe in February 1980 for a scheduled tour (but reportedly "sat in" with them upon their return, at the Roxy, in March, 1980).

²Based on the uniformly high quality of the arrangements/performances as heard from various shows, plus the fact that both songs were recorded in the studio (though never finished), one has to wonder if 'She Loves You'/'Into the Night' is another example of a stalled/aborted/unreleased 45 in Gene's career.

³John Pattison of Toronto shares his recollections of seeing Gene and the Firebyrds at the Brunswick House in February, 1984. [Edited for clarity.]
"It was the ground floor of the Brunswick House. Couldn't have been more than 50-75 people there. It was very downmarket surroundings for such a legend. Funny thing is, I knew he was an important legend even at that time and was astonished at the humble surroundings. I was in awe of what he did with the Byrds (still am) and to this day I am in awe when I'm in the same room as an original Byrd (have met all 5).

John Pattison saw Gene and the Firebyrds on the ground floor
of the Brunswick House, at the corner of Bloor St. W.
and Brunswick Ave., Toronto, ON, in February 1984.

"The Brunswick at that time was maybe a bit of an odd place for Gene. I believe they had a live music policy but it was a place where university students drank at long tables with jugs of beer. I recall the vibe of the night was as if it was an oldies band, playing some old hits. Not taken the same as if it was the Horseshoe [Tavern, a more celebrated venue, which featured up-and-coming acts].
I do distinctly remember thinking that the circumstances were below Gene's stature but I was happy to see him, of course. It felt as if the audience didn't really, for the most part, grasp that this man had made a huge contribution to music. I almost wanted to say to the crowd, "Do you know who this guy is?"
Hard to believe that 19 years earlier he had been at the top of the pop world and hanging out with Lennon/McCartney. To be fair that was at a time when the Byrds were too recent to be the legends they are now.
I was a big Byrds fan but found few fellow fans at that time. The room was small and Gene was only about 20 ft away from me. I don't recall what they played other than the Byrds hits. For sure there were songs I did not recognize. Would love to see an old set list now. I don't remember totally but I was not acquainted with Gene's solo stuff except for Dillard and Clark. I only knew the five Byrds records. He definitely played some Byrds stuff from after the time he left the band. He played "So You Want To Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star" for sure. It was kind of a drunken boisterous crowd. When I saw him in '86 at the Diamond it was much more fitting of where he should be and he had some high level people with him, e.g. Blondie Chaplin on lead guitar etc."

The Clarkophile

Lost Dillard & Clark Song, “The World is Open Wide”

Back Street Mirror Revisited

Clarkophile interviewed by Houston Press for The Lost Studio Sessions

Record Store Day, April 20: Gene Clark - The Lost Studio Sessions 1964 - 1982

BREAKDOWN OF THE SESSIONS (1964, 1967, 1970, 1972, 1982)

Plagiarism of my work in the notes of BGO’s White Light / Roadmaster reissue

Review: Gene Clark Collected

Gene Clark - Collected

CD1

Your Fire Burning: A List of Extant Versions of Gene’s Late-Period Masterpiece

Your Fire Burning: A List of Extant Versions

Enter Rogan

Narrowing the time frame

Studio Version?

Known versions

1. Undated home recording 1989, The Otsego Kitchen, 14747 Otsego, Sherman Oaks, Ca (11:36)

2. KNBR San Francisco, 1990 (2:16)

From the unofficial, fan-created 7-CD Gene Clark Box Set, circa 2001

3. Gypsy Angel (Evangeline 2001) “The Otsego Kitchen,” 14747 Otsego, Sherman Oaks, Ca 1989 (7:51)

4. Silhouetted in Light/In Concert McCabe’s Guitar Shop, Santa Monica, Ca, February 3, 1990 (6:41)

5. The Cinegrill, Roosevelt Hotel, Hollywood, California, April 13, 1991 (8:34)

6. Kai Clark, with Carla Olson - Silver Raven (2020)

How I’d create a Deluxe Edition of Roadmaster

Roadmaster 2-CD DELUXE EDITION*

*An unofficial fantasy release

The Deluxe Edition that was never made

CD1 Roadmaster (Tracks 1-11 Original LP, released 1973)

The Alternate Roadmaster

CD2

Gene in the 1980s, Part 3: This far, and no farther

Previous posts in this series:1. Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991) 2. Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

This far, and no farther

In this, the final part of my series on Gene in the 1980s, I’ll examine the unfortunate stigma surrounding Gene’s work: it’s likely causes, the ways in which it was disseminated, and how it came to be accepted as fact.

Above: Screengrabs of Gene Clark on Canadian television, 1984.

Conclusions

Psychodrama CITY

Won’t Let You Down

The Firebyrds

20th Anniversary Tribute to the Byrds/

Jerry Lewis Telethon/ Solid Gold

Exclusion from Columbia/Legacy Byrds box set (1990)

Post-1991

Under the Silvery Moon (2001 & 2003)

Above: The 2-CD edition of UTSM, which this writer acquired off eBay shortly after it was withdrawn in 2001.

American Dreamer 1964-1974 (Raven)

Flying High (A&M)

Epilogue

Requiem for Rogan 14-02-53 — 21-01-21

Writer Johnny Rogan passed away in January 2021 at the age of 67. Apart from writing the definitive historyof the Byrds, he also published books on John Lennon, Van Morrison, Ray Davies/The Kinks, Neil Young, and the Smiths.

I felt I owed it to Johnny to reread the entirety of our correspondence before writing this post ... and yet I have no idea why. Was it out of some vague notion of preparedness? Getting my facts straight (as a tireless researcher, he might’ve appreciated that)?

Maybe I was seeking solace in cold, dry facts as a form of emotional detachment?

Thoughts & Words

Get to You

Stranger in a Strange Land

Kathleen

Everybody’s Been Burned

Rain Song

All I Want is a posthumous hit

“All I Want”

Written by Gene Clark, Tom Slocum and Shannon O’NeillFrom This Byrd Has Flown (1995) Recorded in 1987/1991

With the sharp left-turn of their hugely successful Cabriol/“Pink Moon” ad in 2000, Volkswagen found Nick Drake’s short-cut to stardom, albeit 26 years after his death. Could one of Gene’s songs perform the same feat?

Know

Open wide the hymns you hide

This Byrd Has Flown Can Fly

RIP Johnny Rogan 1953 – 2021

A Time to Gain, A Time to Lose...Time: ‘She Don't Care About Time’

Above: ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ graced the B-side of another time-themed song, ‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’ — the group’s second #1 of 1965.

“Maybe someone can explain time”

— ‘Some Misunderstanding’ (1974)

The Byrds 1965: From Ciro’s to Heroes

Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991)

A Line of Demarcation: The Late Period — 1980-1991

Update on THE BYRD WHO FLEW ALONE DVD

Roadmaster/Hinshaw Mix FAQ

Gene Clark — Roadmaster

Kai Clark's Silver Raven: Track by Track

Silver Raven:

Track-by-track summary

Previous posts in this series:
1. Sparks in the Dark: Why Gene Clark’s Late Period Songwriting Should Not Be Undervalued (1980-1991)
2. Dayglo Doom: Byrds Hit the Wall in 1980

Above: Screengrabs of Gene Clark
on Canadian television, 1984.

Above: The 2-CD edition of UTSM, which this writer
acquired off eBay shortly after it was withdrawn in 2001.

Writer Johnny Rogan passed away in January 2021 at the age
of 67. Apart from writing the definitive history
of the Byrds, he also published books on John Lennon,
Van Morrison, Ray Davies/The Kinks,
Neil Young, and the Smiths.

Written by Gene Clark, Tom Slocum and Shannon O’Neill
From This Byrd Has Flown (1995)
Recorded in 1987/1991

Above: ‘She Don’t Care About Time’ graced
the B-side of another time-themed song,
‘Turn! Turn! Turn!’ — the group’s second #1 of 1965.