The single flopped, and Elektra dropped them.
McGuinn named them the Jet Set, and when Elektra Records signed them, it released their first single under the name the Beefeaters, trying to appeal to the craze for all things English. The Byrds." The fledgling group hadn't yet hit on that name, however. He recalled the sound of that tape in Crosby's autobiography, Long Time Gone: "Because of the British Invasion thing that was happening, they're singing with these English accents. Crosby had also become friends with a recording engineer named Jim Dickson, a jazz buff who had become interested in folk music and made private tapes of folksingers in his spare time.ĭickson took McGuinn, Clark, and Crosby into the studio to make an audition tape. In the intervening years Crosby had played the coffeehouse circuit, sung with Les Baxter's Balladeers, and become part of a group of musicians who would create the California folk- and acid-rock scenes in the following few years. "He was looking for somebody else to go with him in direction, and I just happened to be going that way," McGuinn recounted in Rolling Stone.Ĭrosby, a Los Angeles native, had met McGuinn in 1960. He had spent two years with the very commercial folk group the New Christy Minstrels and in 1964 was frequenting folk clubs, writing Beatleseque songs, and looking for a partner. Then David Crosby came in and started singing harmony."Ĭlark, like McGuinn, was a midwestern folkie who had relocated to Los Angeles. He asked if I wanted to write some songs with him. He was one of the few people who understood it.
Later on I ran into Gene Clark at the Troubador. I used to get mad at 'em because I thought it was good. As he told Rolling Stone in 1990, "I came out and started blending Beatles stuff with the folk stuff, and the audience hated it. He began playing Beatles songs during his sets at the Los Angeles folk club the Troubador, but-though still using an acoustic 12-string guitar-he added a rock-like beat to the folk material. "I started with Elvis, and I was heavily into Carl Perkins, Gene Vincent, the Everly Brothers, and Johnny Cash-that whole rockabilly, Memphis sound." The Beatles showed McGuinn the way back to rock and roll. "I started with rock," he told Guitar Player. But it was obvious it was dying."Īctually, McGuinn had never been a folk purist. He recalled of those days in Mike Jahn's book Rock, "I knew folk music was on its last legs. In 1964 McGuinn was playing coffeehouses in Los Angeles. He had also played with Bobby Darin, the Chad Mitchell Trio, and the Limeliters. Byrds founder Roger McGuinn was a moderately successful folksinger who had backed up his then-more-famous colleague Judy Collins, playing 12-string guitar and banjo on her recordings of the classic Pete Seeger compositions "Turn! Turn! Turn!" and "The Bells of Rhymney," among others.
The Byrds were formed in 1964-when the British Invasion was at its height and the early 1960s folk scene that had built an intellectual wing onto American popular music was fading. The Byrds reclaimed rock and roll as an American music form in the wake of the Beatles-led British Invasion of English bands and brought a previously unimagined level of lyricism and artistic experimentation to pop music. They left their mark on the sounds of the Eagles, Tom Petty, R.E.M., and hundreds of less well-known artists. Originators of folk-rock and pioneers of acid- and country-rock, the Byrds were one of the most influential bands in rock history. Original members included Gene Clark (born November 17, 1941, in Tipton, MO died May 24, 1991, in Los Angeles, CA left group, 1966), vocals Michael Clarke (born June 3, 1944, in New York, NY left group, 1968), drums David Crosby (born August 14, 1941, in Los Angeles left group, 1967), guitar Chris Hillman (born December 4, 1942, in Los Angeles left group, 1968), bass and Roger McGuinn (born Jim McGuinn, July 13, 1942, in Chicago, IL, ), guitar. If you would like to share Byrds, The lyrics with other users of this site, please see the bottom of this page on how to submit Byrds, The lyrics.
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