287. The Byrds, "Mr. Tambourine Man"

 


"These songs all sound exactly the same," my wife said when we were listening to this in the car yesterday and you know what?  She kinda has a point.  When you push a 12-string Rickenbacker up to the highest thing in the mix on every song, yeah, they're all gonna sound the same.  "That's called having a distinctive sound, honey," I replied, and then she pushed me out of the car.  I'm dead now.  

We all know that cover songs are popular, and that in the 60's it was trendy to cover songs that had literally just come out like a week earlier, but this album goes beyond.  Not only are more than half the songs covers, most of those are covers of Dylan songs, including the title track.  But, no question, the Byrds gave that song their own spin, changing the key and the arrangement and adding that 12-string, instantly making a classic sound that influenced thousands of bands, including R.E.M., Tom Petty, and the entire Paisley Underground movement in the early 80's.  It's really a beautiful song, and a beautiful sound.

Speaking of covers, one of the Gene Clark-penned originals on this album, "I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better," maybe the best original song on the album, was later covered by Tom Petty on Full Moon Fever, as we recently saw.  "Here Without You," another Clark original, was later covered by Reigning Sound, which makes perfect sense if you know Reigning Sound.  Covers!  That's our theme today.

So yeah, maybe the songs all do sound kinda the same, but that sound is so great and distinctive it's no wonder this album reached so far so quickly.  

Does this album deserve to be in the Top 500? Totally.

Comments

  1. StoneyOctober 13, 2021 at 11:52 AM

    Gene Clark was their secret weapon in the early days. I wish I had been smart enough to go see him when he was alive.

    ReplyDelete

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