The jackknife is in my sweaty hands as I listen to and review the album I was sent,
Sweetheart of the Rodeo by THE BYRDS.
I will forever see this in my library and read it as
Sweetheart of the Radio. And now you will, too.
I know precisely two things about country music: that Johnny Cash was a
G and that
modern country makes me want to commit ritualistic suicide by devouring my own intestines and then feeding the leftovers to my dog.
So when offered the opportunity to listen to what is considered a landmark album in country music - recorded during the greatest musical era of all time -
I happily accepted the chance. Every country song I've ever even remotely enjoyed seemed to have been made a long time ago, so I was happy about Bulldog's choice.
The album begins with "You Ain't Going Nowhere", which features a slick pop hook and an infectious chorus. It has a nice harmony, a slick pop hook and an infectious chorus. Then things went down hill.
"I Am A Pilgrim" has finger pluckin' banjo and a fiddle. Overall it's a bit too southern for me - because I don't enjoy the kind of sound it has, it's not catchy, and there's nothing memorable otherwise. It's hollow and boring.
I'm not one for overtly religious messages in my music (certain abstract stuff is OK) so "The Christian Life" nearly lost me at the title. While the lyrics are pretty frank in meaning, that's not why I didn't enjoy the song: it was the singing. It's drenched in....southern. I have no other way to describe it. The music itself is pretty good, though: it all flows together and has some cool qualities about it.
"You Don't Miss Your Water" is a very slow moving song with a neat little piano part going on in the background. Similar to the song preceding, the vocals are lame and make it less-than-enjoyable. They're not annoying, but they're totally uninteresting. They sound incredibly emotionless which doesn't fit the song at all, and the harmonies fall flat because of this. There's a couple of spots where the background vocals shine through for a second or two and those times are nice. The piano is easily my favorite part of this song, and the bass and drums do some good rhythm playing.
"You're Still On My Mind" has some more great piano happenings, and the percussion blend with the bass for a more interesting rhythm section. It's definitely an upgrade from "Water" and I enjoyed this quite. The vocals, though, aren't terrible. They're not to my liking but they don't ruin the song. The piano is easily the most interesting thing here.
"Pretty Boy Floyd" starts off with some ultra-southern banjo and then kicks in with a vocals part that's more storytelling than song. The rhythm is generously supplied by the drums and bass again, and it's as good as ever. There's more fiddle here, and I'm actually quite fond of it. The first time it popped up it was pretty mediocre, but here I enjoy it. The song is more of an audio novel than a song, especially due to a complete lack of rhyme in certain spots; there's not even slant rhyme. So the scheme there is pitiful, but it picks up near the end. Other than that, the song is well-off. There's a nice banjo thing going on all the way through in the background, sounding incredibly similar to the first time it showed up. There's a cool fiddle-let outro that, unfortunately, is a fadeout.
"Hickory Wind" is back to the shuffling pace with a fiddle. Not a bad song but not really catchy or anything that will stick with me. There's some decent banjo stuff about two-and-a-half minutes in that's cool. The vocals aren't all that memorably but I love the harmonies. If there's one thing I had to say was best about this album it's the harmonies, because it's rare they're ever a weak spot in the song. 95% of the time they are absolutely brilliant.
"One Hundred Years From Now" is pretty good. The drums are as fast as they'll ever get on the record and do some cool stuff tying in with the vocal harmonies as well as some surprisingly rocky
rolls, and there's some terrific banjo stuff. Everything but the lead vocals is tremendous, but there' boring again. Good song, though.
Then there's "Blue Canadian Rockies" which is the musical equivalent of an overdose of Nyquil mixed with about 4 Valium tablets. This one nearly put me to sleep.
"Life In Prison" is a pretty good song: there's great guitar lines going on and I dig the rhythm (again). The lyrics are surprisingly dark: "With trembling hands I killed my darling wife/Because I loved her more than life/My love for her will last a long, long time/But I'd rather die than live to lose my mind/And I'll do life in prison for the wrongs I've done/And I pray every night for death to come/My life will be a burden every day/If I could die my pain might go away." They're in humongously stark contrast to the upbeat tone of the music itself, and there's more dark stuff earlier in the song. The only things I know about The Byrds is that Gram Parsons was in them and so was David Crosby (I think) and the only things I know about either of them is that Crosby was the Crosby in Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (sometimes without the Young) and that Gram Parsons had some issues. I think it said he wrote this one, so there's that.
"Noting Was Delivered" is OK. The vocals are decent and the instruments are pretty standard for whats on the album. There's cool rock and roll sections in the middle of this song that are great, including a section where the bass and drums (always in unison on this album) really go off in the middle of an ultra-country guitar solo.
"You Got a Reputation" starts off really, really cool, with some awesome guitar stuff going down. The vocals start and they're, for once, FITTINGLY DEADPAN. Dude's singing about a whore and the tone is perfect, both the singing and the instrumental aspect. Overall I really enjoyed this song, there's quite a bit of cool stuff going on and it's all bold and angry and taunting. Probably my favorite song here.
"Lazy Days" starts off pretty fast with some sliding guitar and the vocals are good, too. It's actually a pretty boss track, I really love the guitar here. The heaviest song on the album and just as good as any of the best.
The album ends with "Pretty Polly" which has really fast guitar in the intro. It's similar to "Pretty Boy Floyd" in that it's more of a storytelling than an "actual song" except it's way better and more interesting. This is another dark one, detailing the exploits of a pretty girl named Polly and the conclusion detailing her murder: "He stabbed her in her heart till her heart's blood did flow/Down into the grave Pretty Polly did go/Now a debt to the devil that Willy must pay/For killing Pretty Polly and running away." I mean, is that surprising that Gram Parsons
unloved and alone in a dirty hole like an animal?
Overall, this album really just fails to capture my attention. It has some things going for it - like that it doesn't just fade into the background but actually manages to keep me listening - and I really enjoyed a few of the songs here, but it's really boring a lot of the time. It drags on, especially because the middling eight tracks or so are dreadfully dull and though it ends strong I can't say I'm going to be eager to listen to this again. It will, however, remain in my memory, and one day I will revisit the songs here to come to a new conclusion, perhaps one where the songs I didn't like transform into the ones I did as the ones I did enjoy try to cement their position as some of my favorites ever.