The roots of the genre now referred to as Americana are varied and deep, but one band is often cited heavily in that long list of originators – The Flying Burrito Brothers. Or more specifically, one member is cited more often, that member being Gram Parsons.
But the band never really was that successful (“We’re more popular now than we ever were in our time,” co-founder Chris Hillman says in the book), and never really had a consistent line-up. More myths about the band, and, again, specifically Gram Parsons, seem to spring up each year. This is one of the reasons Hillman felt it was time to set the record straight.
The story of the Byrds and their contributions to what became country-rock have been told many times and in several books. Gram Parsons himself has been subject of a few books. But not until now has the story of the Flying Burrito Brothers as a band been told in full.
Author John Einarson has authored twelve books, many of them associated with the California country-rock scene of the 1960s and ’70s, including Desperados: The Roots Of Country-Rock and books on Buffalo Springfield, ex-Byrd Gene Clark, Neil Young and others. He is an acknowledged expert on country-rock and its origins and influence, but to tell the Burritos story he enlisted the help of co-founder Chris Hillman.
While many people think strictly of Parsons when they think of the Burritos, Hillman was an equal partner in the forming of the group and in fact had a much deeper pedigree when it came to country and roots music.
Born in 1944 in Los Angles, Hillman grew up listening to folk and rock ‘n’ roll until he came across records by The New Lost City Ramblers and Flatt & Scruggs. He quickly fell in love with the sound of the mandolin and began to study instrument. In 1962 he joined the regional bluegrass group The Scottsville Squirrel Barkers, based in San Diego. Around a year later the group began to break apart and Hillman was asked to join the Golden State Boys with Don Parmley on banjo and Rex and Vern Gosdin on bass and guitar, respectively.
In late 1964 Hillman was invited to try out for a new group called the Jet Set and included Jim McGuinn, David Crosby, Michael Clarke and Gene Clark. After he joined the group they changed their name to the Byrds and their popularity soared with songs “Turn! Turn! Turn!” “Eight Miles High” and “Mr. Tambourine Man” and the band was labeled the American answer to the Beatles.
After some member turnover, the group was stripped down to McGuinn (now called Roger, following a religious conversion) and Hillman in 1967 and they released the country-tinged The Notorious Byrd Brothers. Just after the albums’ release Hillman had a chance meeting with Gram Parsons. Months later Parsons showed up at an audition for Byrds band members and Hillman found he has met a musical kindred spirit.
The group went on to record Sweetheart of the Rodeo, an album now considered a masterpiece, but was at the time the poorest selling Byrds album to have been released. During the recording and promoting of the album, Parsons ego and selfishness began to show through in little ways. After he had sung several tracks on the album, the record label was informed that Parsons was under contract to a small label owned by Lee Hazelwood, something Parsons failed to tell the group. As a result all of his vocals had to be taken from the album and hastily replaced. At an appearance at the Grand Ole Opry, a rare opportunity for a band still considered by most to be a rock band, Parsons changed the song they were to sing after Tompall Glaser had already announced the scheduled selection. Hillman notes in the book that this was very insulting to Glaser and very poor etiquette on Parsons’ part.
But those flashes of self-involvement would pale in comparison to Parsons next stunt. After meeting and opening for the Rolling Stones, the group went to visit them in England before the Byrds were to tour South Africa. On the day they were to embark, Parsons decided he was not going, citing apartheid as the reason and claiming that he was opposed to it after growing up in the South. Hillman calls that argument “ridiculous” and claims, “He wanted to stay with the Rolling Stones.” And with that, Parsons was out of the Byrds.
Einarson and Hillman take the reader through the good times and the bad leading up to the founding of the Burritos. Like the excellent researcher that he is, Einarson doesn’t rely simply on Hillman’s voice but interviews many other people, from label staff to band members to critics, to round out the story.
The story continues as Hillman and Parsons cross paths again and slowly begin to get together to play music and write songs. It seems that all is forgiven, but maybe not completely forgotten. The duo begins to slowly assemble a band and is signed to a label. Even in this early stage, history has been tainted to tell that it was Parsons vision of melding country and rock that got them their break, but as Einarson tells us, Parson was at that time a virtual unknown and it was Hillmans name that opened the doors.
The book reminds us that Hillman had been playing country and bluegrass for years before he met Parsons, who had only discovered country music in the past few years of his life. Perhaps it was because Parsons had the zeal of a new convert that he is remembered as being such a passionate catalyst.
As the story unfolds, it is easy to see that Parsons was often times more interested in being the “rock star” than with being part of a group. After their first album, Gilded Palace of Sin, was released and didn’t meet with huge sales numbers, Parsons began to drift, losing interest in what they were doing. He began to drift away from his bandmates and further into drugs and alcohol. Hillman admits that he was no angel, (indeed the book doesn’t paint Hillman as a saint or hide any warts) only that he knew where to draw the line and was always able to maintain a level of professionalism, two things Parson couldn’t always do.
During the recording of the second Burritos album, Burrito Deluxe, Parsons sank even further, eventually missing practices and recording sessions. The story goes that Parsons outgrew the band and left them behind to spread his wings and create his “Cosmic American Music.” But Hillman tells the story of a Parsons that was so wasted that he would sing a ballad after the band had started an up-tempo number. One night it came to a head and Hillman fired his partner. And with that, Parsons was out of the Burritos.
From there Gram went on to a brief solo career and is credited with discovering Emmylou Harris, but Hillman recounts the real story of Rick Roberts and Kenny Wertz, both playing with the Burritos at that time, seeing Harris sing and bringing Hillman in to see her. Later Hillman told Parsons about her (they had made amends by then, but were not working together) because he knew Parsons was looking for a girl singer to join him.
But the story of the Burritos doesn’t end with the departure of Parsons. Hillman soldiered on and with new ensembles released two more Burritos album, The Flying Burrito Brothers in 1971 and the live set Last Of The Red Hot Burritos in1972. Hillman then joined Stephen Stills in the country-rock forerunner Manassas.
Hillman’s side of the story differs at many points with the popular myth that has become fact in many circles. Hillman says that is because certain people in those circles stand to make money off of the “Parsons as originator” story. Bernie Leadon, who played guitar in the second incarnation of the band and would go on to co-found The Eagles, puts it bluntly: “How can you compete with a dead guy? You just can’t. It’s a martyr thing.”
But Hot Burritos isn’t a book slamming Parsons or looking to diminish the contributions he might have made to the music. Hillman and Einarson, give plenty of credit where it is due. What this book sets out to do, and does wonderfully, is give a balanced account of a band that stood at the forefront of a new movement in music. A movement that still has repercussions today be it in the Americana genre and even the mainstream country genre.
Einarsons well-researched approach gives a fantastic overview of the music the band made and of the scene from which it came from and to which it eventually contributed. He was able to speak with nearly all of the principles involved with the obvious exception of Parsons. The book stands as a cornerstone in the written history of the country-rock movement and the eventual Americana genre.
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