Gene Clark Solo Albums-album by album & *now* track by track on p. 23*

I've always disliked this song...

 

Hey yo - looks like McGuinn is pissed...

 

Watch the very beginning of the video - Gene flipping the byrd... tensions where high with these 3

 

No offense to Chris Hillman, who I like a lot, but Gene & Roger should have remained a duo. This song is a million times better than what wound up on the album:

 

Similarly Release Me Girl is better in this clip too (last song)

 

Chris mentioned that there are some great live recordings of MCH that he has in the Gene Clark documentary.

 

I saw McGuinn Clark and Hillman at a little club in Southern California - The Golden Bear. Tiny place. Whatever contemporary production they had either chosen or had foisted on them on the album was absent, instead we got a very, very Byrds sounding show. They sounded great on both the old and new stuff. It was what the album SHOULD have sounded like. And on that night Clark was on fire. Just incredible. That night I became a fan and started searching out his solo stuff. So even though the MCH albums fall short, I have a soft spot for them because of that show.

 

The show I attended was at a small Theater Rutgers U in New Brunswick New Jersey. Sublime & Stunningly Original Sound of Clark & McGuinn.

 

Thanks for sharing. That whole sequence was beautiful....

 

As a DUO!

 

You're welcome! Don't they sound great??

 

I live about 6 blocks from where The Golden Bear used to be. I can only imagine what an awesome show that must have been. People around here talk about TGB with much reverence. There is a plaque where it used to stand.

 

Lucky you!

 

McGuinn looks a little in awe of Gene when he steps up his vocal on that last song. What a voice. There was a thread about whose voice would you choose if one could? I've changed my preference to Mr Clark.

 

I agree that the live versions of those MCH songs sound better to me. A bit less slick, a lot more natural for these guys, I think.

 

Both Gene and McGuinn have mentioned how their voices complimented each other and they do, but personally I prefer Gene's. McGuinn's voice is too thin and nasaly for my ears.

 

I remember when “Byrds” was first released, (in March 1973) being somewhat surprised back then by the inclusion of the the two Neil Young covers as well as Joni’s “For Free”, thinking all three songs were completely unnecessary, in as much as with the exception of Michael Clarke, the other four must have had between them, so much original material they could have drawn on.

However, I can’t agree with the theory that Michael Clarke might have been unaware of Neil’s “See The Sky About To Rain” back in late 1972 when the “Byrds” album was recorded. I personally, had been very much aware of the song since February 1971 when I saw Neil perform it at the Royal Festival Hall in London, which was the last show, (and the only one in the UK) of the “Journey Through The Past” solo acoustic tour, which ran through January and February that year, in which the bulk of the then unreleased “Harvest” was débuted, along with others new songs such as “Love In Mind”, “Journey” “Dance Dance Dance” “The Bridge” and “Rain” that didn’t make “Harvest”.

In fact, “Rain” was first performed live by Neil on 30 November 1970, and on the other seven solo gigs of that short tour, in Washington and New York over the next week or so, and was then played most nights of the “Journey Through The Past Tour”. If I, (a 17 year old from London) was familiar with the song, I’m pretty sure that the drummer with one of the biggest bands in the Universe would have come across it some time over the next couple of years. If nothing else, David Crosby would certainly have known of its existence.

 

Wow, I thought it was "always on staircases" and I was knocked out by it.

 

"hallways and staircases"!!!

 

I think they just didn't want 4 Gene Clark songs on there...

 

Just to catch up, I'm very fond of Two Sides.
I love the album cover, reminds me of chilly October or November weather here in Southern Illinois, so that's when I'm really inspired to play it. Course I like it anytime.
I'm glad that it was given a high-class professional release from High Moon Records, and would like to thank everyone responsible.

 

Indigo, I think you're right in that assumption, but what struck me at the time, and still does today, is what a strange choice of Neil Young, (and Joni Mitchell) songs to choose. If you go back to 1972, and were to select a couple of Young covers for your next album., would you really choose "Cowgirl" and "Rain". I appreciate one could argue about this for ever, but even then Neil had quite a substantial body of work over 4 solo albums, plus The Springfield and CSN &Y, and I just can't imagine how anybody connected with that forthcoming record would pick those 2.

 

I have a soft spot for it myself. It was a hit right when I was first discovering the Byrds. I obviously knew it was no Mr. Tambourine Man, but I liked Roger's voice on it. The one good thing I can say about the first MCH album is that it features the welcome return of McGuinn's singing voice. He sounds consistently awful on all of his solo albums, apparently because of his heavy cocaine use. The MCH album was his first set of recordings after cleaning up and becoming born again, and the difference is his voice is notable.

 

I'm sure Crosby knew of its existence, since I think he's the one who pitched it to the Byrds. Perhaps Mike was aware of the song, but I wouldn't assume he was just because Neil was playing the song live sometimes. Mike probably wasn't attending Neil Young shows, so unless they shared a bill sometime, he probably didn't know about the song.

 

Supposedly (according to Gene) Neil and Graham Nash were at some of the sessions.