The Byrds and I (Part Six)

The time has come for brand new entries in my Byrds and I series, in which I tell the story of my life through each album by my favorite band. Previous entries were...

1). Mr. Tambourine Man
2). Turn! Turn! Turn!
3). Fifth Dimension
4). Younger than Yesterday, Best of the Byrds Vol. 1 and Blur's Think Tank
5). The Notorious Byrd Brothers

Part Six: Sweetheart of the Rodeo (1968)

Strike up a conversation with any music fan about the Byrds and Sweetheart will more than likely be the first record thar comes up. This is an odd and sometimes frustrating - it features just two original members and sounds nothing like any Byrds album that came before. Drummer Michael Clarke was replaced by Kevin Kelley, and Gram Parsons joined on guitar and vocals. Parsons stint with the band would only last a handful of months, but it dramatically changed their sound and left a very lasting impression. In fact, Parsons's contributions to the Byrds may be the most notable, second only to those of McGuinn.

Parsons's father committed suicide in 1958, when Gram was just 8 years old. His mother remarried and Gram would take the last name (Parsons) of his stepfather. His mother suffered from alcoholism and would eventually die of cirrhosis. Gram attended Harvard, studying theology, but left after just one semester. A small figure in the LA music scene, he would come to the attention of Byrd Chris Hillman, who wanted to take the group in a country/bluegrass direction. My dad had a song he would sing about Gram - "He was a man with a plan/country boy with a rock and roll band/Joined up with a band called the Byrds/and played country music like you never heard." The results of Sweetheart of the Rodeo would lay the foundation for what we think of today as alt-country.

"You Ain't Goin' Nowhere"


Parsons contributed several vocals to Sweetheart, however most would remain unheard for a number of years due to a contractual issue. A short while later, Parsons refused to play in South Africa, citing his opposition to apartheid, and was subsequently fired from the band. A year later, he would steal away Hillman to form the Flying Burrito Brothers and would continue to change the nature of country music. Parsons died of an overdose in 1973 in the Joshua Tree desert of Southern California.

My dad talked an awful lot about Parsons. He'd grown up in Fontana - not too far from that Southern California desert. He never went to college and described his high school years as somewhat troubled. After high school, he'd tell me of the pilgrimage he made to Joshua Tree to find Parsons. He said the first thing he ever told Gram was, "I thought your hair was longer," and he always felt stupid for having said that. He told me that the two bore a strong resemblance and if Gram was too drugged out to stand up for a Burrito Brothers photograph, my dad would stand in his place. I really have no idea whether these stories were true or not, but they felt pretty real as a ten year old.

Gram's "Hickory Wind" always makes me think of my dad - not the version on Sweetheart, but instead the live duet with Emmylou Harris on Grievous Angel. "In South Carolina, there're many tall pines," he sings, though I've never been to South Carolina and I can't imagine dad ever did either, but when the next line recalls, "I remember the oak tree that we used to climb," that makes me think about childhood. "But now when I'm lonesome I always pretend/That I'm gettin' the feel of hickory wind" ... I always loved that part.

I once asked my dad if he'd thought Parsons had committed suicide. My dad said he hadn't but that he knew what he was doing; that he knowingly was killing his body slowly over time. Again, I can't say whether my dad ever knew Parsons, but when I think about that statement now, and given how much my dad identified with Gram, it's pretty clear to me that he was talking about himself.

"Hickory Wind," Keith Richards