byrdsongs lxi

Roger McGuinn’s Peace On You is corporate rock pabulum for the most part, but there’s something interesting going on in The Lady. It sounds like he’s playing his Ricky through a flanger, which is undoubtedly an attempt to make the guitar sound more rock-ish, something I would normally have an aversion to, but in this case I don’t mind the vibe, even if it is very slick ‘n corporate sounding.  But I still find it frustrating that McGuinn embraced the FM radio sound so completely, a move that served him neither commercially nor musically (tonight’s song might be a bit of an exception to the latter, but only a bit). By 1975, ten years gone from Mr. Tambourine Man, McGuinn was relegated to playing small venues like My Father’s Place, a club out on Long Oyland, Roslyn to be exact, one of the Foyve Towns. When I was a kid, maybe 12 or 13, I talked my mom into taking me to hear the Good Rats at My Father’s Place. She was a trooper and talked the club into letting me in when normally they wouldn't have, it being a bar and all. My mom held her ears for the whole show. This and the smell of cheeba in the air made me very uncomfortable. Parents, don’t escort your kids to rock shows, or whatever the equivalent is today. Hire a trustworthy teenage babysitter if they need supervision… Anyway, the Good Rats are the type of band that plays My Father’s place. Roger McGuinn should not be playing at such a hole in the wall, and maybe he wouldn’t have had to if he’d taken a different approach in the 70s - less corporate, more revivalist, more Byrdsy, less Eaglesish, more poppy, yada yada. I know I sound like a broken record, but at least the record’s a single, two minutes and change, and it’s ok that it skips because it’s the kind of music you wanna hear over and over again. Even with the flanged guitar, I don’t need to hear tonight’s song more than once or twice every ten years. As it plods along, mid-tempo, past its fourth minute, I’m restless and distracted, craving a strong cup of coffee and music with more life and conviction...

Click here to hear the Lady.