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

You could argue this is the greatest 'odds and ends' album ever released, although that would be doing the sumptuous completed takes a disservice.

My second favourite Gene Clark album, side 1 in particular is wonderful.

 

I like this much better than White Light. It might be my favorite. I like the band version of "One in a Hundred" the best, even if the vocals sound a little lazy to me sometimes...I love the solo "She Don't Care About Time," but really I love everything on here...even "Here Tonight" has grown on me. Excellent album.

 

This also my favorite Gene Clark album. If only we could hear the final mixes.

And a remix which loses the flute!!

 

It's early spring and a perfect time to explore Gene's masterwork.
The music opens up like the flowers of springtime:

No Other




No Other is the fourth solo studio album by American singer-songwriter Gene Clark. Released in September 1974, it was largely ignored or lambasted by critics and was a commercial failure; the studio time and cost were seen as excessive and indulgent.[1] The record label, Asylum Records, did not promote the album, and by 1976 had deleted it from their catalog. Clark never recovered from the failure of the album.[4]

Just prior to Clark's death in 1991,[5] No Other was reissued in its entirety on CD. In 1998, a double disc compilation, Flying High, was released with three songs from No Other.[6]

Then in the early 2000s, No Other was reissued a second time in its entirety to positive critical reappraisal; publications have referred to it as "a lost masterpiece"[7] and "one of the greatest albums ever made."[8] A highly praised,[9] newly remastered reissue campaign by 4AD was launched on November 8, 2019, with the album reissued as a standard CD, vinyl LP, deluxe double-CD set, and an expansive super deluxe box set with three SACDs, one Blu-ray disc, a silver-colored LP, and commemorative 80-page book.[10]

...................

My most treasured, the original vinyl (NM) complete with poster:



Five out of five stars from AllMusic and just about every other reviewer...well deserved.

AllMusic Review by Thom Jurek [-]

Upon its 1974 release, Gene Clark's No Other was rejected by most critics as an exercise in bloated studio excess. It was also ignored by Asylum, that had invested $100,000 in recording it. A considerable sum at the time, it was intended as a double album, but the label refused to release it as such. Ultimately, it proved a commercial failure that literally devastated Clark; he never recovered.
Though Clark didn't live to see it, No Other has attained cult status as a visionary recording that employs every available studio means to illustrate the power in Clark's mercurial songwriting. He and producer Thomas Jefferson Kaye entered Village Recorders in L.A. with an elite cast that included Michael Utley and Jesse Ed Davis, Butch Trucks, Lee Sklar, Russ Kunkel, Joe Lala, Chris Hillman, Danny "Kooch" Kortchmar, Howard Buzzy Feiten, and Stephen Bruton. Clark's vocalists included: Clydie King, Venetta Fields, Shirley Matthews, the Eagles' Timothy B. Schmidt, and Claudia Lennear among them. These musicians all brought their best to the material. As a whole, No Other is a sprawling, ambitious work that seamlessly melds country, folk, jazz-inflected-gospel, urban blues, and breezy L.A. rock in a song cycle that reflects the mid-'70s better than anything from the time, yet continues to haunt the present with its relevance.

There are no edges on the set, even in the labyrinthine, multi-tracked title track that juxtaposes guitar-driven psychedelia and out jazz saxophones and flutes with lush vocal harmonies. Even its tougher tracks, such as "Strength of Strings," that echoes Neil Young's "Cowgirl in the Sand," melodically, delivers an alluring, modal, Eastern-tinged bridge adorned by slide guitar wizardry. In the textured darkness of "Silver Raven," Clark's falsetto vocal is framed by an alluring synth, and muted bassline and is embraced by a chorus that rivals CSNY's, making for a heartbreaking, yet blissed-out country-folk song. "From a Silver Phial," as haunting and beautiful as it is, is one of the strangest songs Clark ever penned. Its anti-drug references are especially odd as this is one of the more coked-out recordings to come from L.A. during the era.

The final two cuts, "The True One" and "Lady of the North" (the latter co-written with Doug Dillard), are the only two pieces on the disc that mirror where Clark had come from musically, but as they wind around the listener, even these are far bigger than mere country-rock tunes, offering glissando passages of pedal steel and piano ostinatos that actually create narrative movement for the lyrics to turn on. No Other's songs lend themselves to open-ended performances in the studio. Because of his spacious, yet always beautifully centered compositional style, they are well-suited to Kaye's use of the multi-tracked instruments and vocals, ambient sonic echoes, and textures that surround them. Clark's unlikely classic, No Other is continually continued rediscovered by succeeding generations.

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User Reviews



Mark Lager
May 29, 2018
Back at the turn of the 20th century (the so-called "American Century"), there was talk of the end of the American frontier, the wild blue yonder that set America apart and impelled everyone to seek their home there. Ever since that moment, there has been a search for the artistic experience which will bring back that cosmic consciousness of the land which h… Read

 

track 1) Life's Greatest Fool

A brilliant opener that draws the listener in, and we are enthralled from then on,
track by track, tart to finish.



Some walk out winners of those who've lost
Can it be said at any price this is the cost
Hard is perception, easier is blame
Is this the only life for everyone
Isn't it the same

Children laugh and run away
While others look into the darkness of the day
Some streets are easy while some are cruel
Could these be reasons why man
Is life's greatest fool

Do you believe when you're all alone
You held the key to your destiny gone
Do you believe in your soul
That too much loneliness makes you grow old

Words can be empty though filled with sound
Stoned numb and drifting, hard to be profound
Formed out of pleasure, chiseled by pain
Never the highest and not the last one to gain

 

Legacy

"Gram Parsons dreamt of creating a kind of Cosmic American Music, which would seamlessly incorporate the country songs he so adored with the sounds and styles that abounded from sea to shining sea. But Gene Clark actually went and did it. From start to finish, No Other consists of godlike pop songs assembled with the lyricism and poignancy of the very best country music, the evergreen freshness of late-Sixties/early-Seventies soul, the untrammelled reach of the masters of beyond-MOR (Spector, Webb, Bacharach/David), the power and exuberance of gospel."
—Music critic David Bennun on the album's championing of country rock through its mixture of different genres.[33]​

​

British dream pop collective This Mortal Coil performed a cover of "Strength of Strings" on their 1986 album Filigree & Shadow, with vocals by Breathless frontman Dominic Appleton. Regarding 4AD's 2019 reissue of No Other, Chris Norris of Variety wrote, "In terms of its present release, the most important No Other enthusiast and Gene Clark fan is undoubtedly Ivo Watts-Russell, the co-founder of England's 4AD. As musical director of This Mortal Coil, the label's atmospheric act of the late '80s and early '90s, he included a couple of Clark compositions, including the No Other number 'Strength of Strings', on the band's albums. Though Watts-Russell is no longer partnered in the company, Clark's record plainly remains part of 4AD's DNA, and that status led to the firm's in-depth, madly indulgent and frankly wonderful reintroduction of the '74 album in nearly every configuration imaginable".[15]

In 2009, British duo Soulsavers and vocalist Mark Lanegan performed a cover of "Some Misunderstanding", which appears on their album Broken.[34]
No Other was voted #178 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums (third edition, 2000).[35] Online publication Yardbarker included No Other on their list of "20 awesome albums that critics initially hated" in January 2019.[36] The album was listed at #133 on Treble Zine's August 2019 list of "The Best 150 Albums of the '70s"; the review called No Other "a lushly arranged, soulful and occasionally psychedelic set of country rock" and quipped, "Knowing that [the album] was unappreciated by both critics and the record-buying public in 1974 seems a bit baffling 45 years later."[37]

In 2014, Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally of Beach House put together a band, named the Gene Clark No Other Band, for a four-concert tour where they performed the entire album to bring it to a new audience. The band consisted of fellow Baltimore musicians including members of Lower Dens, Wye Oak, Celebration, Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear and The Walkmen, along with Iain Matthews of Fairport Convention and Plainsong fame.[38][39]

Independent filmmaker Allison Anders, who maintains a Tumblr account, Greta's Records, about how she acquired the late actress Greta Garbo's vinyl record collection, devoted a blog entry to how she found a copy of No Other among them.[40] Anders waxes hypothetically about how and why Garbo had a copy of the album in her collection, along with personal recollections and reflections on the album as well.[40] -wiki

 

Oh yeah, the track list:

All songs written by Gene Clark, with additional songwriters as noted. All songs arranged by Gene Clark and Thomas Jefferson Kaye.

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."Life's Greatest Fool"4:44
2."Silver Raven"4:53
3."No Other"5:08
4."Strength of Strings"6:32

Side two
No.TitleAdditional songwriterLength
1."From a Silver Phial"3:40
2."Some Misunderstanding"8:09
3."The True One"3:59
4."Lady of the North" Gene Clark & Doug Dillard 6:04​

Personnel[edit]

Credits adapted from Discogs.[23]
Musicians
​

• Gene Clark – lead vocals, guitar
• Jerry McGee – guitar
• Jesse Ed Davis – guitar on tracks 1, 2 and 5
• Buzz Feiten – guitar on tracks 4 and 6
• Stephen Bruton – guitar on tracks 1 and 6
• Danny Kortchmar – guitar on track 2
• Ben Keith – pedal steel guitar on track 7
• Leland Sklar – bass
• Chris Hillman – mandolin on track 5
• Michael Utley – keyboards
• Craig Doerge – keyboards on tracks 4 and 8
• Bill Cuomo – Rheem organ on track 6
• Russ Kunkel – drums on tracks 1, 2, 4, 5, 6 and 8
• Butch Trucks – drums on tracks 3 and 7
• Joe Lala – percussion on tracks 1, 3, 5 and 7
• Ted Machell – cello on track 8
• Richard Greene – violin on tracks 4, 6 and 8
• Ronnie Barron – background vocals on tracks 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6
• Cindy Bullens – background vocals on tracks 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6
• Venetta Fields – background vocals on tracks 1 and 6
• Clydie King – background vocals on tracks 1 and 6
• Claudia Lennear – background vocals on tracks 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6
• Sherlie Matthews – background vocals on tracks 1 and 6
• Timothy B. Schmit – background vocals on tracks 2, 3, 4 and 5
• Carlena Williams – background vocals on tracks 1 and 6

Technical
​

• Thomas Jefferson Kaye – producer
• Tony Reale – recording engineer
• Joe Tuzen – assistant recording engineer
• Mallory Earl – mixing engineer
• Steve Malcolm – assistant mixing engineer

Visual
​

• Linda Dietrich – photography
• John Dietrich – art direction and design
• Ea O'Leno – cover artwork

 

So I am going to post No Other, one track a day...this is too great to just knock off every track in one sitting.

Some additional reading:
https://www.uncut.co.uk/reviews/album/gene-clark-no-other-122342/

Enjoy!

 

Q. Did Glen Campbell ever comment on working with gene Clark ?

 

As a teenager in the 80s, it was those This Mortal Coil albums that introduced me to some of Gene's solo tunes.

 

Campbell was such a prolific and in-demand session player, that commenting on one individual session was unlikely... I haven't personally seen any comments anywhere, anyway. But I am not an authority on Glen Campbell, great great musician that he was.

 

On Gene Clark's lyrics:

I highly recommend listening to the songs from No Other while reading the lyrics. Brilliant multilayered instrumentation, gorgeous music, and deeply inspired and philosophical lyrics from the Zen Master. From a songwriter who is purported to not have been a reader at all, his lyrics filled with the wisdom of the ages are mind blowing. So don't let my efforts of including the lyrics to each song go unnoticed, please.

 

Loved this performance... too bad it's only available on youtube and not on Bluray.

 

track 2) Silver Raven

So fine...beautiful. Gene's lyrics are stunning.



Have you seen the silver raven
she has wings and she can fly
Far above the the darkened waters
far above the troubled sky

Have you seen the changing rivers
now they wait their turn to die
But they turn their tide upon you
when the sea begins to cry

Have you seen the changing windows
Of the sea beyond the stars
And the sky beyond the sunbeams
and the world beyond your dreams

Have you seen the old world dying
Which was once what new worlds seem
Have you seen the silver raven
she has wings that barely gleam

They barely gleam they barely glimmer
As she circles past the sun
And she tries to tell her sister
that her trials have just begun

Have you seen the silver raven
she has wings and she can fly
Far above the the darkened waters
far above the troubled sky

Have you seen the changing rivers
now they wait their turn to die
But they turn their tide upon you
when the sea begins to cry

 

version 2) Silver Raven from the new box...

 

track 3) No Other

...the power of perfection.



All alone you say
That you don't want no other
So the lord is love
and love is like no other
If the falling tide
can turn and then recover
All alone we must
be part of one another


All alone you say
The power is perfection
Is the power of peace
or merely the connection
To the God of love
that powers the protection
From the tide of life
that flows in each direction

When the stream of changing days
Turns around in so many ways
Then the pilot of the mind
must find the right direction


All alone you say
That you don't want no other
So the lord is love
and love is like no other
If the falling tide
can turn and then recover
All alone we must
be part of one another

When the stream of changing days
Turns around in so many ways
Then the pilot of the mind
must find the right direction

 

The Byrds frontman’s deliriously opulent solo work
was misunderstood upon release,
but this lavish repackaging restores
a spiritual singer-songwriter classic.

Alex Abramovich wrote in London Review of Books about Clark,
these songs “carve their own, canyon-sized niche.”




...His solo career always seemed snakebit; his albums under-performed while covers of his songs sent the Eagles and Linda Ronstadt towards superstardom. Yes, the Byrds’s 1973 reunion album on David Geffen’s Asylum Records was an all-out critical and commercial disaster, but it was Gene who emerged from the wreckage with the album’s strongest songs and performances, to the point where Geffen gave him a recording budget of $100,000 to realize his masterpiece in 1974.

For one glorious moment, it seemed that Clark’s solo fortunes had finally turned, and you can hear almost every single one of those dollars poured into No Other, a deliriously opulent, rococo work in a decade filled with them. But when it was time to play the album for Geffen, he took one look at the eight songs on the vinyl and yelled at Clark: “Make a proper ****ing album!”, throwing the test pressing in the garbage without even listening to it. No money would go to promote the album and No Other tanked, all but ending Clark’s career. One of the most exquisite spiritual seekers in song, Clark was dead by the age of 46, ravaged by alcohol and heroin...

Read on...
Gene Clark: No Other

.................................................................

The album cover art is as much arcane as it is iconic, and yet I always felt a portrait would have been more powerful -- like the rugged deeply thoughtful persona revealed in the Gene portrait used for the 4AD poster below.

Gene was never glitter and "glam". But changing it now would be nothing short of blasphemous...it is part of the lore and myth of one of the greatest albums ever created.

 

track 4) Strength Of Strings



In my life the piano sings
Brings me words that are not the strength of strings
Fiery rain and rubies cooling in the sun
Now I see that my world has only begun
Notes that roll on winds with swirling wings
Brings me words that are not the strength of strings
When I'm feeling high or I'm feeling low
Or there is no change
Somehow days keep melting into the night
And there's always light on the cosmic range
I am always high I am always low
There is always change

Hear the strings are bending in harmony
Not so far from the breaking on the cosmic range

In my life the piano sings
Brings me words that are not the strength of strings
Fiery rain and rubies cooling in the sun
Now I see that my world has only begun
Notes that roll on winds with swirling wings
Brings me words that are not the strength of strings

 

From clarkophile.blogspot.com (if you'd rather I didn't post your beautifully written piece, please let me know)

The Clarkophile: Songwriting 101: 'Strength of Strings' from No Other

Tuesday, 26 January 2010
...an excerpt:

Songwriting 101: 'Strength of Strings' from No Other




Audacious and ambitious in its breadth and scope, ‘Strength of Strings’ epitomizes the cursorily vague philosophical core of No Other, and provides best evidence of the heights to which Gene’s muse might have taken him, had he not been emotionally eviscerated by the failure of his Grand Artistic Statement.

It also refutes any compulsion to pigeonhole Gene as just another sensitive, laid-back 70’s singer-songwriter. Yes, it is true, the stark, acoustic-based love songs on White Light certainly leaned in this direction. As a result, it is often lumped in with the 1971's graduating class from the James Taylor School for Sensitive Denim-Wearing Balladeers. While the often esoteric nature of the lyrics does not always support this categorization, the relative harmlessness of the music does.

What I mean to say is that the lyrics on White Light easily outshine any of its sometimes meandering, often innocuous, melodies. To anyone who did not read the lyrics of 'Spanish Guitar', it might seem like a pleasant little ditty. The title track features a loping melody over a non-stop barrage of largely impenetrable lyrics. Obviously a great deal of work went into the symbolism and complexity of White Light's words, but the blandness of their presentation does not reflect this intensity(cf. the anemic White Light version of 'One in a Hundred' with the definitive, simply glorious take on Roadmaster featuring the original five Byrds).

I sometimes wonder if Gene, as on earlier songs written during his cerebral Sings for You period (''66/'67), concentrated on honing his lyrics to the detriment of his melodies. (It is my theory it was for this reason that the Sings for You demos were permanently shelved.) But ‘Strength of Strings’ obliterates any conception of Gene as just another Dylan-worshipping, acoustic guitar-toting words guy. Consider this: it is a full two minutes into this six-and-a-half-minute epic until a single word is sung. Two full minutes. To my knowledge, no other Clark song from his officially released canon features a comparable interlude that is wholly dependent upon what its writer sought to communicate through pure, wordless music...

Continued...
The Clarkophile: Songwriting 101: 'Strength of Strings' from No Other
​

 

I had a dream last night that there was a documentary film coming out about David Geffen and one of the main teasers was that he was going to finally talk about Gene and No Other and give his version of events.

 

track 5) From A Silver Phial

I love this track so much...it still gives me chills. Beautiful.



Stunningly beautiful lyrics...

A refuse from a silver phial
Put her faith into the moons and stars
She said she had a mind that slept inside tomorrow
And time could only heal it's scars

She was fire on the borderline
The lion in the fall of roles
Said she saw the sword of sorrow sunken
In the sand of searching souls

Sleeping in the master's room
Seeing through his eye for gain
Keeping by his side not to be a victim
Falling in the darkened rain

She was taken from a cruel storm
The refuse from a silver phial
Took her magic master's words and sung
And made his lower self worth while


Sleeping in the master's room
Seeing through his eye for gain
Keeping by his side not to be a victim
Falling in the darkened rain

 

Who knows what he's talking about, but it's one of my favorite songs...

 

Grizzly Bear's Daniel Rossen on Gene Clark's forgotten masterpiece

Tuesday 17 February 2015 4:17pm

Grizzly Bear's Daniel Rossen on Gene Clark's forgotten masterpiece - Music Reads - Double J

No Other was ignored 30 years ago, but is finally getting its due.

It's a tale of grand musical ideas, commercial failure and an embittered, dispirited musician. Singer-songwriter Gene Clark's 1974 album No Other and the story behind it is as revealing about the music industry as it is tragic for artists seeking to follow a unique vision. Now as a result of recent Gene Clark reissues and tributes by contemporary musicians, this cult album has finally found new love.

As a founding member and guitarist/tambourinist of The Byrds, Gene Clark wrote many of the band's most loved and successful songs between 1964 and 1966. He brought a mix of folk, psychedelic rock, alt-country and pop to enduring classics like 'She Don't Care', 'About Time' and 'I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better'.

Listen to their signature druggy pop anthem 'Eight Miles High', with its spine-tingling harmonies and sitar like guitar solo from Roger McGuinn.​

After leaving The Byrds in 1966, Gene Clark released a series of solo albums and collaborations with leading country and folk musicians of the time, finally landing a plumb deal with Asylum records in 1974. The label was home to many leading singer-songwriters of the time; Joni Mitchell, John Fogerty, Bob Dylan, Tom Waits and Linda Ronstadt. Head honcho David Geffen had high expectations for their new signing.

But Clark didn't deliver the album Asylum were hoping for. After a period of reflective songwriting, he penned a collection of deeply personal, poetic and often mystic songs which became No Other. The production was lavish, an answer to Brian Wilson and Phil Spector's sound of the times, with a vast array of top session musicians and backing singers on a musical backdrop of jazzy gospel, country, folk and psychedelic rock.

No Other proved outrageously expensive to make and, despite Clark's ambitious artistic vision, contained no commercial radio hits. Asylum deemed it indulgent, were confused by the cover art and failed to promote the album. It sank without a trace when the label deleted it from their catalogue in 1976.

Although Gene Clark went onto record many other fine albums, he never really recovered from the disappointment over his masterpiece, his marriage ended and for the rest of his life, Clark battled drug and alcohol dependency.

After his death, at 46 in 1991, a renewed interest in Gene Clark's back catalogue led to the reissue of No Other, with critical acclaim following and a new generation of artists discovering his work.

Last year members of US group Beach House assembled an indie rock supergroup to pay loving tribute to the album. Titled The Gene Clark No Other Band, it featured members of Beach House, Fleet Foxes, The Walkmen, Wye Oak, Lower Dens and Grizzly Bear's Daniel Rossen, who spoke to me about the performances.

"No Other was a record which was very formative for Beach House," he says. "It's a forgotten classic and they wanted to publicise the record by staging shows. It is not exactly a tribute, we recreated the album note for note, every solo is the same, every drum fill.

What do you love about the album?

It is a beautiful and expansive album and there are a lot of aspects to it that seem like they shouldn't work. Like the grandiose overblown lyrics. It is so over the top, but there is something about his presence as a songwriter that holds it together. Gene Clark was very charismatic but also dark. You get a really great portrait of his personality and experience. It feels true. You know that he is not making that record for the sake of it, he definitely means it. You can keep peeling the layers back; you can get excited about the production, or the individual players, or the songs and the story around it.


Video: YouTube

'Some Misunderstanding' is my favourite tune on the album. It's kind of loaded with his own conflict over his own failures as a songwriter and as a person. There are some references to his drinking in the song and on what it takes to survive or communicate. There's a lot of conflict on that album which probably comes from being a bit of tortured artist.

On that record there are really funny fantastical lyrics, you get the sense that he was almost having a laugh but it doesn't matter because there is this great spirit in the music.

He was labelled the Hillbilly Shakespeare, he was a very brusque, masculine character. He had a country influence in his music but then he would come out with lyrics like "Said she saw the sword of sorrow sunken / In the sand of searching souls" (from 'A Silver Phial'). I mean, what is he really talking about there? But it doesn't really matter. There are Bob Dylan songs a bit like that too where you feel he is just ********ting. But it is still brilliant.

What do you make of Gene Clark's downward spiral after that album was released?
It was very sad and it happens to tons of artists but at least he made a really great record and that is the one consolation that if you make great work people are eventually going to find it. Perhaps it happened at a time where there wasn't room for him in the climate of the music industry at that time. I don't think Gene Clark was very intentional in his career and in his music, he just burned his way through life and made what he wanted to make and was a bit of tragic character. I think he expected a great deal from that record and it didn't happen the way he imagined it might.

As an artist making records you never know what is going to come of making music, you can only hope you love it and you believe in it.​

 

As I approach any piece of art or music: Picasso said when asked what one of his paintings meant..."Whatever you want it to."