The Byrds scored a major triumph at New York’s (traditional folk and jazz) club, the Village Gate,
The Byrds electrifying performance: The backstage area was jammed, as every hipster singer and musician in New York City gathered together in homage to the original “folk rock’’ group.
“They bring their imaginative, dizzying electric guitar and rhythm interplay to an often ear-shattering set of climaxes,’’ wrote Bob Shelton in the New York Times.
“The Byrds’ sound, while in the folk rock vein, contains a highly complex rhythm line. The group makes use of the Indian Sitar raga rock,” wrote the knowledgeable trade paper, Billboard.
“They certainly angrify the cyclosmic infinitudes with their nerve-wretching am-plification of contemporary rock-folk themes,”’ reported G. Welton Seldom in a famous London weekly newspaper.
“The foursome’s lengthy set wove their numerous hits, “Mr. Tambourine Man”, “Turn, Turn, Turn’ etc., with a variety of numbers from early rock tunes (“’Roll Over Beethoven”) to highly current items.
A special pleasure-filled interlude was the amazingly beautiful reading that the boys gave to Pete Seeger’s ‘Bells Of Rhymney” with Jim McGuinn setting a torrid pace with his flying fingers. “Eight Miles High’, one of the group’s hits which caused a great deal of controversy, closed the set with an enthusiastic band,’’ said Cash Box magazine.
It was impossible to get an interview on opening night so we came back ten days later, after all the quotes had died down.
The Byrds Electrifying Performance
As we walked into the Byrds dressing room their road manager was just turning the TV off. “The picture is fading.”
Jim McGuinn was sitting quietly in one corner of the room. Chris Hillman was slouched on a couch. Several people, mostly girls, sat silently staring at the floor, the walls, ceiling, blank TV set and each other.
Finally one of the girls started talking about the comedian on the show. She remarked, “It must be tough to be a comedian.”
After a brief pause, Jim opened his eyes and said, “Oh, I don’t know. It must be tougher to be a turtle.”
Later, an 8-year-old boy was brought backstage to meet the Byrds. He stood wide-eyed in the middle of the room, looking at everyone sitting down, doing and saying nothing.
He left, disillusioned.
Dave Crosby came bounding enthusiastically into the room. “Hi everybody!” He stopped, looked around, meditated for a ‘minute and a half, then picked up and started tuning his guitar.
Zal Yanovsky, wearing his cowboy hat, came in. Dave, who was wearing a black cowboy hat, said, “‘Zal, you’re the only person I know who has any taste in hats.”
Then it was time for the Byrds to go on stage, so Jim tuned his guitar, Chris got up and shy fuzzy-mustached Mike Clark, who had been standing in the shadows, came out of the hallway leading to (or from, depending on which way you were going) the back exit.
Actually, the Byrds had been filming a TV documentary for ABC-TV the past few days so they were very tired. That’s why we didn’t want to disturb them with an interview. Aren’t we nice!
That’s what it’s like backstage on a slow night.
Readers may enjoy a recent podcast I created where Jim and Dave discuss their album “Fifth Dimension.
Further reading: sixties press review of their debut LP “Mr Tambourine Man”
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