BCB 130 - The Everly Brothers

[Matt Wilson]

I'd say the keepers on In Our Image are "Why Am I Chained to a Memory," "I'll Never Get Over You," "Glitter and Gold," "The Price of Love," "I Used to Love You" and "It Only Costs a Dime," which is six songs. I'm gonna say Two Yanks in England has eight cuts I enjoy: "So Lonely," "Kiss Your Man Goodbye," "Signs That Will Never Change," "Like Every Time Before," "I've Been Wrong Before," "Have You Ever Loved Somebody," "Don't Ride and Hide," and "Hard Hard Year." I don't know if that makes it a better album, but them's my thoughts.

[Matt Wilson]

There are also really good singles which didn't make the albums in the sixties like "Carolina in My Mind," "Don't Ask Me to Be Friends"/"No One Can Make My Sunshine Smile," "The Girl Sang the Blues"/"Love Her," "I'm on My Way Home Again"/"Cuckoo Bird," "It's Been Nice"/"I'm Afraid," "Milk Train," "So It Always Will Be"/"Nancy's Minuet," "You're My Girl" and "You're the One I Love."

This is why I recommend the Bear Family boxes or some sort of comprehensive compilation instead of just getting the LPs.

[Guy E]

At this juncture I can't imagine buying the Bear Family boxes, but stranger things have happened.

I didn't develop a taste for the rare WB fruit of the mid-60's as quickly as some of you here, and as we all know, the rare hidden fruit always tastes the sweetest. But I still like their Cadence and early WB stuff the best.

[Charlie O.]

I'm with Guy on In Our Image - it's long been my favorite of their post-1960 LPs. Only "(You Got) The Power Of Love" and the ghastly "Lovey Kravezit" leave me cold.

Two Yanks is a fine album, but a number of those songs were done better by the Manchester chaps what wrote 'em...

[Guy E]

I'm with Guy on In Our Image - it's long been my favorite of their post-1960 LPs. Only "(You Got) The Power Of Love" and the ghastly "Lovey Kravezit" leave me cold.

Two Yanks is a fine album, but a number of those songs were done better by the Manchester chaps what wrote 'em...

Yes, Lovey Kravezit is ghastly.

[Muskrat]

Thanks Guy E, for reviving this wonderful (particularly Rayge's intro, of course) thread. It's surprising to me, and not in a bad way, how people pick favorite albums that barely register with me. I'm a big fan, but always fonud "Roots" pretentious when others, probably rightly, look at it as a real groundbreaker.

With the exception of Sounds Our Daddy Taught Us (I also love the original versions of the material, by the Blue Sky Boys, Karl & Harty, and so on), they never really cut an album for Cadence, which may be why theirs from that brief era are so brilliantly consistent

If I were to recommend a single Everlys project to a total (or near-) virgin, it would be the Royal Albert Hall reunion DVD.

Favorite recordings

Fast: Temptation. I really did have to pull over to the side of the street (Loma Vista Avenue) the first time I heard it on the radio
Slow: Love Hurts. How do you improve on one of Roy Orbison's most intense performances?

McCartney did pretty well by them too. As did Mark Knopfler (clip posted in the original run of this thread).

Best cut on the Hollies album is Kiss Your Man Goodbye,

[Charlie O.]

Best cut on the Hollies album is Kiss Your Man Goodbye,

Agreed - and, coincidentally or not, it's one of the ones cut in Hollywood rather than in London...

[Matt Wilson]

I'm a big fan, but always found "Roots" pretentious when others, probably rightly, look at it as a real ground breaker.

Me too. There are better Everlys albums than Roots.

[Guy E]

I bought Roots when the Edsel label reissued it on LP, early-80's I think.

Any "concept album" is going to be pretentious, or at least flirt with pretension. I'd probably be just as happy if it was a solid late-60's Everly Brothers album with no archival family hi-jinks, no segues, etc. But I like the material they recorded and I've never held the "concept" against them because it's a pretty distinctive spin on the ambitious late-60's album thing.

There were other artists approaching middle-age who could have knit-in radio recordings with contemporary recordings, but The Everly Brothers had kept abreast of contemporary developments so they were in a unique position to make that album... it's not as if Elvis would have done it. And it would have sounded very pretentious coming from someone like Lefty Frizzell or any other straight country artist.

[Matt Wilson]

The thing is, Guy - I don't think the versions of those songs are even near definitive.

I have much the same issues with Otis Blue. But at least that has "I've Been Loving You Too Long."

[Muskrat]

I'd probably be just as happy if it was a solid late-60's Everly Brothers album with no archival family hi-jinks, no segues, etc. But I like the material they recorded and I've never held the "concept" against them because it's a pretty distinctive spin on the ambitious late-60's album thing.

I'd be thrilled. With the radio stuff on an added EP, maybe, like Dave and Nick did with their Everly tribute.

[Guy E]

The thing is, Guy - I don't think the versions of those songs are even near definitive.

That doesn't honestly matter to me, I like the album as a whole. I enjoy hearing them do a couple of Merle Haggard songs the same way I enjoy hearing the Grateful Dead do them... Merle's versions will always be definitive. They don't necessarily reinvent the material to the degree that The Byrds recast Dylan songs or whatever, but the Everly Brothers certainly put their stamp on whatever they touched. Being a fan of theirs in the 60's would have been an excellent musical education the way the Stones, Byrds and J. Geils were for me. But they weren't on my radar at that age.

I'm not saying Roots is a must-have ground-breaking classic for every collection and it's not my favorite EB's album, but I like it and have enjoyed it since that first reissue in 1986. It landed at the right time; Edsel had reissued part of Gene Clark's catalog and baroque-folk country rock was pressing the right buttons.

The segues made it difficult to include songs on mixed cassettes though.

[Matt Wilson]

I don't mind covers of songs I don't know, but when you do songs which have been done better elsewhere - you need to bring something new to the table. I guess I just don't think their versions of the Haggard, Rodgers or Beau Brummels songs are all that. Hell, I don't even recall what else was on that LP.

[Guy E]

I don't mind covers of songs I don't know, but when you do songs which have been done better elsewhere - you need to bring something new to the table. I guess I just don't think their versions of the Haggard, Rodgers or Beau Brummels songs are all that. Hell, I don't even recall what else was on that LP.

I'm playing the album now.

I guess I listen with time-warp ears; the material wouldn't have been familiar to me in 1968 and I didn't have much of it in my collection when I bought the album in 1986 either. It's a nice mix and I don't find myself dismissing it as an album of covers; they did songs by George Jones, Randy Newman, Glen Campbell, Don wrote (or exhumed) a couple, Ron Elliot co-arranged the album and got a couple of his songs on there... Turn Around is great. I love the elegiac atmosphere on Sing Me Back Home. The wah-wah guitar on Jimmie Rodgers' T For Texas doesn't make it a definitive reading, but it's cool by me and I like the circus-comes-to-town arrangement on You Done Me Wrong even if it makes absolutely no sense.

I haven't played Roots in a while and it sounds very good to me. Lenny Waronker deserves some props, no doubt. I'll take it over concept albums by Vanilla Fudge and the Four Seasons.

[Matt Wilson]

I'll take it over concept albums by Vanilla Fudge and the Four Seasons.

Do you have all the Beau Brummels stuff? You should rethink Bradley's Barn then. I like that one better than Roots, and they're all group compositions with one Randy Newman song.

But no, I'm sure Todd and I are in the minority. Everyone seems to think Roots is the best late '60s Everlys record.

[Guy E]

Okay Muskrat, here's an edited/expanded iTunes Playlist version that gets rid of the family radio hi-jinks. Tracks 11 & 12 from The New Album and 13-15 from Walk Right Back: The Everly Brothers on WB 1960-1969. The rest are from the Warner Archives version of Roots.

Right click on adjusted tracks >>> Get Info >>> Options to adjust start and stop times.

01 Mama Tried (start @ 0:00.195)
02 Less Of Me
03 T For Texas
04 I Wonder If I Care As Much
05 Ventura Boulevard
06 Illinois
07 Living Too Close To The Ground
08 You Done Me Wrong (start @ 0:14.71)
09 Turn Around
10 Sing Me Back Home (start @ 1:21.42)
11 Omaha (from The New Album)
12 Empty Boxes (from The New Album)
13 Lord Of The Manor (from Walk Right Back:)
14 Cuckoo Bird (from Walk Right Back:)
15 I'm On My Way Home Again (from Walk Right Back:)
16 Shady Grove (stop @ 1:28.05)
17 Montage: The Everly Family (1952)/ Shady Grove/Kentucky (start @ 0:38.195)

Alternately, drop 16 & 17 at the end (with Kentucky) and insert the Walk Right Back single version of Shady Grove as track 06 after Ventura Boulevard.

[Guy E]

I'll take it over concept albums by Vanilla Fudge and the Four Seasons.

Do you have all the Beau Brummels stuff? You should rethink Bradley's Barn then. I like that one better than Roots, and they're all group compositions with one Randy Newman song.

But no, I'm sure Todd and I are in the minority. Everyone seems to think Roots is the best late '60s Everlys record.

I have Bradley's Barn. I loved the Beau Brummels when Laugh Laugh and a couple of other singles were storming the charts, but I've never spent too much time with the later albums. They'll be there when the mood strikes.

[Guy E]

I'm bumping this because I changed the edited/expanded album two posts up to include Omaha from The New Album.

I still like the concept album as it was conceived, but hearing this material without the conceptual family radio show bits is a nice change-of-pace. And there were some good non-LP tracks from this period.

[pcqgod]

bump