, just like the original Columbia cd (CK 9349) as I posted earlier. The original 45 single had the credits listed as: G. That's pure speculation on your part, 'Driver 8', and a HUGE stretch- give me a break! I'm as big an admirer of Gene Clark's songwriting as the next guy, and I'll agree with you that he deserves the lion's share of the writing credit for "Eight Miles High", but to blatantly claim that McGuinn and Crosby added their names against his wishes- after he was out of the group- is preposterous and not supported by any valid evidence. We had been listening to these tapes of Indian music, Ravi Shankar, and John Coltrane all this time because we enjoyed listening to that kind of music,it was good traveling music. So I just came up with a couple of chords to play the poem to Roger and David Crosby with. "I started writing a poem that didn't have any music to it.And the poem had words to it like"Eight Miles High, andwhen you touch down, you find that it's stranger than known." I was into it because I was writing about a trip we had just done to England and the culture shock going over there and being very famous and having to live up to that. In a 1978 interview with CHUM radio Toronto, Gene shared the story of how "Eight Miles High"Įmerged as a collaboration between the three Byrds songwriters. Allegedly he had problems with his rhythm on guitar, which is why the original plan of Gene playing rhythm guitar and Crosby bass was scrapped in the early days and Hillman came on board.[/QUOTE Beyond a bit of tambourine and harmonica, how many tracks Gene Clark played on at all is an interesting question. What are your thought?!? You guys know more than I do about recording practices, standards, mechanisms. It's a shame the RCA master of "Eight Miles High" wasn't the one released, as I consider it to be far superior to the later Columbia take (which is already amazing enough), although it probably wouldn't have fared as well on the charts. If The Byrds thought the original versions were definitive at the time, then there must have been extenuating circumstances or a different view on the RCA masters at the time, to have made them abandon those versions. etc may have, at the time, taken the opportunity to "polish" up the songs, essentially re-evaluating the RCA masters as demos. Or, on the other hand, the band or producer/engineer. OR, perhaps, they wanted to make the songs more commercial (which the Columbia versions do sound, comparatively). This all leads me to believe that, perhaps, Columbia wasn't satisfied with the darker and "weirder" vibe of the original RCA versions and also wanted the band to "clean" up the songs when they already had to re-record the tracks. I understand why the solos differ, because besides the main "line" of it, it seems like much of it was improvised to begin with, in my understanding. If the bandmembers thought the RCA masters were the definitive versions of "Eight." and "Why", then why (no pun intended!) did their take(s) at Columbia change so much?įor "Eight Miles High", the song was noticeably sped up (a bit), had higher, and crisper vocals and a less dark feel overall, in comparison to the original RCA master which had very low, chanting, hypnotic vocals and a much slower intro. However, there is something I don't understand here. David Crosby has been quoted, throughout the years, as saying that he prefers the RCA masters to that of the Columbia versions. Due to this, The Byrds had to re-record the single in Columbia, and the new masters (especially "Eight Miles High") noticeably differed from the original RCA versions. However, Columbia, The Byrds' label, refused to release these masters as they weren't recorded in a Columbia owned studio. As all good Byrdmaniax know, "Eight Miles High" and "Why" were originally recorded in RCA owned studios.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |