Gene Clark SACD of unreleased recordings

I believe I read here ages ago that Chip really isn't all that interested in anything involving Gene. Given how Gene yanked the rug out from under him, I can't say I blame him. We should be lucky we got "If I Hang Around" even if in an altered form.

I have a feeling that if Laramy Smith was required to sign off on the release of that stuff, it would never see the light of day. He's said some pretty harsh things about Gene online.

 

I'll buy a decent transfer of 7:30 Mode in any format. Definitely one of Gene's finer moments as a singer-songwriter...

 

So what? What did Gene owe Chip? And as for Laramy Smith, what makes his word the truth? He sounds like a jerk to me.

 

If Gene were alive and Smith or Douglas still had bitter feelings after 50 years, fine. But he's long gone and some of the material they did with Gene back then came out plus Douglas added himself to If I Hang Around (which was actually pretty cool) so why would they suddenly refuse to let a few outtakes come out? To spite a few hundred Clark fans? If they wanted to really stick it to us, they'd release some samples to torture us and then say we can't have any of it.

 

Good points. Incidentally, Laramy Smith passed away in 2012. I'm not aware of what became of his archives, but someone is maintaining a website in his honour. His association with Gene Clark figures prominently on the page.

 

Since we're headed down this road without a map..... what about the tapes allegedly in the possession of the late Terry Messina?

Idealistic comment of the day: If only the Byrds would reform for anotgehr album, and express interested in overdubbing some of Gene's 'lost' songs. I know, never gonna happen.

 

That's an old article which I've seen before. I don't know what some points of it are getting at like "Kelly Katherine was to be the couple’s second child, but she was, alas, reportedly stillborn – on the summer solstice of 1943. Nothing suspicious about that. Nor about the peculiar fact that, while Gene and other members of the family would be laid to rest in the Sommerhauser family plot at St. Andrews cemetery in Tipton, “Kelly Katherine’s is a solitary stone at the far south end of the cemetery.” What the heck is the writer insinuating? Plus I never thought that Gene and Gram were anything alike. They came from completely different backgrounds. Also, insinuating that Gene had a different father is very far fetched since Gene's mom was a DEVOUT (extremely) Catholic. So I think it's highly unlikely. Who writes this stuff???

 

The author seems to have a very wide ranging and creative mind, finding 'coincidences' everywhere. However, he also seems to occasionally stumble on something factual and interesting, if not as relevatory as he thinks. From the first posting:
"But David Crosby is much more than just the son of Major Floyd Delafield Crosby. David Van Cortlandt Crosby, as it turns out, is a scion of the closely intertwined Van Cortlandt, Van Schuyler and Van Rensselaer families. And while you’re probably thinking, “the Van Who families?,” I can assure you that if you plug those names in over at Wikipedia, you can spend a pretty fair amount of time reading up on the power wielded by this clan for the last, oh, two-and-a-quarter centuries or so. Suffice it to say that the Crosby family tree includes a truly dizzying array of US senators and congressmen, state senators and assemblymen, governors, mayors, judges, Supreme Court justices, Revolutionary and Civil War generals, signers of the Declaration of Independence, and members of the Continental Congress. It also includes, I should hasten to add – for those of you with a taste for such things – more than a few high-ranking Masons. Stephen Van Rensselaer III, for example, reportedly served as Grand Master of Masons for New York. And if all that isn’t impressive enough, according to the New England Genealogical Society, David Van Cortlandt Crosby is also a direct descendant of ‘Founding Fathers’ and Federalist Papers’ authors Alexander Hamilton and John Jay." Kind of puts Crosby's latest song "Capitol" in a new light. David Crosby Talks About His New Album, Protest Songs, and the Random People He Meets on Twitter

 

Not a fan of Croz. ☹

 

Later in the article he comes right out and says that he believes Gene's family was involved in a cult and that they ritualistically sacrificed his sister. While at another point he questions whether schizophrenia is a valid diagnosis. Given the paranoid and bizarre tenor of some of the assertions in that article, I suspect the author has been diagnosed as schizophrenic at some point in the past and is resistant to this diagnosis. The article is an odd mixture of fact and some really bizarre paranoid fantasy.

 

Reading your post made me recall a book called WEIRD SCENES INSIDE THE CANYON: Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & The Dark Heart of the Hippie Dream that was published a few years ago. I considered buying it at the time, but in the end didn't. I now see that it has a chapter all about Gene Clark. I wonder if anyone following this thread has read it, and, if so, could shed any light on its contents?

 

David Carradine's autobiography has one or two weird stories about Gene.

 

exactly

 

It's ridiculous speculation and an insult to Gene and his family.

 

David Carradine was a weirdo himself. I wouldn't believe anything that guy said about anyone.

 

"Ridiculous speculation" is putting it mildly. It's pure delusional fantasy.

 

Oh my gosh I read this book! It's completely bonkers. I think his main thesis was that the folk rock and singer songwriters who settled into the LA scene were from military families and therefore government operatives working from the inside to discredit the younger generation and bring the hippies down. Or something like that - he couldn't seem to come up with any concrete believable evidence, however. To be honest I don't remember most of it...

 

For heaven's sake.

 

I cannot speak regarding Smith, but I would strongly encourage Chip Douglas' name not to be dragged through the mud on this conjecture. There's no "sudden refusal" to release songs because Chip doesn't have the tracks people surmises he has, specifically the 1966 Gene Clark Group recording session. He'd be just as interested as we are to have those tracks located. There has been a thorough accounting of his reel-to-reel tapes and he doesn't have them. If he did, he'd certainly do his best to make them available but he does not. End of story. There's no ill will from Chip towards Gene at all.

 

I want to read that but I doubt want to pay money for it.

If only there was some sort of bookstore type establishment that allowed some sort of temporary, cost-free access to a book. If there was I'd ask them.

 

Some interesting news from John Einarson in the the latest Gene Clark newsletter:

October 1, 2017 no. 7

 

How many Holy Grails can there be?!

 

Gene recorded a lot of stuff. The challenge is finding it. They're scattered all over the place.

 

I know one thing: if unearthed Gene Clark music is made available, I'm not pre-ordering, or ordering, from Sierra!

 

Well said. Chip Douglas (and other members of the GC Group) have in recent years performed with Kai Clark.Including the launch of the reissue of Two Sides........j