The Christian Life with Parsons on vocals, too. I do like this album a lot, with Parsons’ Hickory Wind and Dylan’s You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere among my favorite tracks. I’ve yet to understand what is “cosmic” about it, other than the fact it was performed by country music outsiders who were folk and rock musicians by trade and had experimented with psychedelic drugs. And his labeling of his brand of country as “Cosmic American Music” was just that: marketing his brand. He was a trust fund Harvard dropout – albeit a very talented one – and had only come into country around this same time having been more interested in folk music before. However, despite Gram’s sincere love for the genre, his status as a countrified avatar sent to Earth to enlighten the music world is, in my mind, rather dubious. The Christian Life is almost embarrassing. McGuinn’s attempt to sound country on the Louvin Bros. Thankfully, subsequent re-releases of the album have included the tracks with Gram Parsons’ original vocals. All of these releases, including Sweetheart, became very influential on groups right around the bend including Poco and the Eagles. And, of course, the aforementioned Band had just released Music from Big Pink. Bob would also return to Nashville for the following year’s Nashville Skyline, another highly influential country album by a Nashville outsider. Dylan had already released John Wesley Harding and was then currently hidden away in upstate New York recording some rather strange-sounding music with the Band. Little did rock fans know that this was part of a larger shift away from the psychedelic sounds of the previous couple of years. Sweetheart of the Rodeo was a commercial failure upon its release and was seen as a betrayal by much of the Byrds’ fan base. Gram had joined the group in February, and he had moved on by the time the album was released with an eye toward his next project, the Flying Burrito Brothers. However, since he didn’t do this with all of Gram’s songs, it’s been suggested McGuinn was also also trying to lessen the newcomer’s stamp on the group. This resulted in Roger McGuinn recording his own vocals over Parsons’ on a few songs in order to avoid legal issues. Further adding to the strain was the concern that Parsons was still under contract from his ISB days. Tensions arose over Parsons stepping on toes regarding the band’s direction, including genre and personnel recruitment, as well as demanding more money. It was all over with Gram Parsons about as quickly as it came together. The Byrds performing at the Grand Ole Opry ![]() The band was in for a rude awakening as the Nashville establishment, including disc jockeys and the Grand Ole Opry audience, was not kind to a “hippie band” supposedly undermining true country music. Much of the album, including the two Dylan songs, was recorded in Nashville. ![]() With guitarist Clarence White on board for the sessions they were already leaning in a country/bluegrass direction, but Gram Parsons was obsessed with country music, and his enthusiasm for it rubbed off on the others enough that Sweetheart became a purely country record – the first major country rock album by an established band. ![]() The album was originally intended by McGuinn to be a review of American music featuring bluegrass, Appalachian, country, jazz, R&B, rock, and even futuristic/electronic sounds. What Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman didn’t realize was that Parsons had an agenda of sorts: to bring country and western music into the rock ‘n’ roll world, to make it hip. They auditioned Parsons, fresh out of the International Submarine Band, on piano, but he quickly showed that his place was up front with a guitar. Interested in taking their sound a little more toward country they hired Gram Parsons, whom Chris Hillman happened to meet while standing in line in a Beverly Hills bank. More significantly, David Crosby had been fired from the group during its recording, and original drummer Michael Clarke was gone as well and replaced by Hillman’s cousin, Kevin Kelley. The shift had already begun with January’s The Notorious Byrd Brothers and its mellower, more pastoral sound. The winds of change in the music world were really picking up speed by the second half of 1968, and nowhere was it any more evident than with the Byrds on their second release from that year and sixth overall, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, released 50 years ago today.
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