Album Reviews

If any Byrds music deserves to be heard stripped of its vocals, it's the exploratory jazz and raga influenced instrumental tracks produced for the Fifth Dimension sessions. Having fallen under the influence of Ravi Shankar and John Coltrane, the band spent long nights in the studio jamming, finally producing its epic “Eight Miles High” along with the rest of the album, some of which was not quite as accomplished.

This double 10 incher opens with a stupendous sounding “Eight Miles High,” and while stripped of vocals —no big surprise—it confirms McGuinn's 12 string brilliance on the track, it allows David Crosby's aggressive, slashing, hair-raising rhythm playing to jump from the mix and it will force Michael Clarke detractors to think again, for his drumming, while not in the Elvin Jones category (nice try, liner note writer!) is not to be so easily dismissed. As for newly minted bass player Chris Hillman, wow! He got the hang.

There's a great instrumental take of “Why” that you might try busting a Karaoke move on. Good luck! The side ends with “Ryder (I Know My Rider), and it too bristles with an energy seemingly long gone from rock, aided by a supercharged recording.

If side one leaves you somewhat dazed and confused, side two's opener, a jazzy “John Riley,” will set you straight about what kind of funky groove The Byrds were trying to lay down. Here, the late Clarke's limitations are laid bare: while he can hold the beat (he's been accused of not even being able to keep that going), he can't begin to open up and swing the way McGuinn and Crosby manage. Hillman's bass lines are kind of pedestrian as well, but the overall effect is sensational. There's no way Columbia would allow anything as free-form as this to be released. The final “John Riley” was more akin to a misty Simon and Garfunkel track. Even the long instrumental jam of “2-4-2 Fox Trot (The Lear Jet Song)” sans-sound effects becomes interesting with McGuinn's overdubbed 12-string flights playing against each other and Crosby's jagged rhythm fills cutting across the beat.

“Psychodrama City,” also gains some heat as a jammed instrumental compared to the vocal version Sundazed issued as part of its Cancelled Flights 45rpm singles box.

Not all of the tracks are without vocals: an early version of the “John Riley” master is here with the vocals intact, but dramatically spread across the soundstage instead of huddled dead center as was usually the case on Byrds LPs. This version gains grit without the overdubbed strings. Ditto “Wild Mountain Thyme,” though it's one of the album's less inspired tracks with or without strings.

The compilation includes a Swedish radio broadcast of a live “Hey Joe,” featuring an uninhibited Crosby lead vocal and an interview in which he discusses the song's origins.

The fourth side consists of a long version of the “I See You” master without overdubs, a long version of “What's Happening?!?!” with partial alternate vocals and a longer “Captain Soul (30 Minute Break),” without overdubs.

For whatever reasons, all of these versions offer a clarity and resolution of inner detail missing from the final album takes and so allow the listener to hear further into the workings of the arrangements. Some of it is just plain fun if your brain's been wired with the originals for 40 years, but much of it is revelatory. It will change your thinking about the songs, the band and the individual members.

Add great sound, neat gatefold packaging, a transcription of a Byrds' NYC press conference from March, 1966 and this is one limited edition bonus pack that needs to be on the shelves of all Byrdmaniax. Nice job, Sundazed. A rockin' package!