GRAM PARSONS grievous angel

Once again listening to a current album made me seek out some old ones in my collection and upon closer inspection the two were really much closer than I even imagined at first sight. This time it was “What comes after the blues” by Magnolia Electric Company, Jason Molina’s new outfit after stepping from lonely singer/songwriter with an emo-touch under the moniker of Songs:Ohia to a fully fledged and arranged band-setting. And this made me think of Little Feat at first, and then next: Gram Parsons. And finding those old records really great, here we are now. It could have been a record by Wilco as easily or even the Rolling Stones, come to think of it, that would have set me off.

Chosing the best Gram Parsons record seems not so hard on first sight. Obviously it should be one of his solo-albums on which he tried to bring life to his vision of “Cosmic American Music” – a true forerunner of the last critical and “artistical” rise of Country-Music before alt.country set upon us – and due to his untimely death in September 1973 there are only two of those anyway. Of course, he made some important musical statements when still playing with the Byrds and then later on with the very remarkable Flying Burrito Brothers, but still his two solo-records leave you to wonder what could have been if he had lived a little longer. I guess he could be up there with Willie, Kris and Waylon and in my own book he definitely is. His country-music is ripe and rich with allusions to both the future and the past, like using old time fiddles and chord-progressions and melodies that sound as if he dug them up in some old well and washed them off. But all of it infused and enriched by (back then) modern influences and new things, like Emmylou Harris’ vocal style (who had her recording debut with Gram Parsons) and sentiments expressed that are way beyond what was customary received as country; and still is. Gram Parsons invited a large band, a full ensemble into the studio with all kinds of electric guitars and organs, using rock-instruments together with traditional instruments[1], and that alone made the waves ripple in country-music, where Charlie Rich and Donna Fargo still dominated the airwaves (which is not saying anything against them). Especially when using soul and blues influences on songs. This kind of crossover was unheard of and deeply antagonizing to many country-listeners. Merle Haggard for instance refused to produce Parsons’ first record because he thought he was a “hippie”[2]. Back then his style was regarded as irritating, overwrought, and essentially not at all country. Nowadays things have obviously changed quite a lot, and some of the songs seem like pure country-classics, but that’s the way it goes.

Now what is it that makes “Grievious Angel” so special: At first there is the great songwriting and diverse styles of songs featured on it. Beginning with the “Return of the grievous angels” we are “out with the truckers the kickers and the country angels” and those are a diverse bunch of individuals who are bound by their combined love of freedom and liberty and the will to die standing up fighting for what they believe in. This song has a very unusual structure for a country song, indeed, with a lot of words, no obviously discernible chorus except for the line quoted above and the duetting of Parsons and Harris, that makes it fit more for being played live in a seedy salon or tavern late at night to a lonesome crowd of strangers than being played on the radio. But it ends on a loving note of “twenty thousand roads I went down down down, and they all led me straight back home to you”. Again the mixture of old time sentiments and new ideas mixed together in Parson’s unique arrangements and visions of country-music makes his music so unique. With songs like “$1000 wedding” or “Hickory Wind” there is more traditional country songs to come, which are still regularly used stock for a lot of musicians. And other kinds of music as well, because as Thelonius Monk said: All music is one. So it is no wonder that Eighties-hardrockers Nazareth took Parsons’ “Love Hurts” as a return trip to the charts – and I’d guess most people know this song in its hardrock-ballad version only anyway.

The bitter-sweet duet of Harris and Parson on “Hearts on Fire” of course is such a stock song that he used for his own good; without any kind of irony – I don’t think that there is a lot of penance for irony with Gram Parsons as there isn’t in country music in general – just like the grand great father of all trucker music’s Tom T. Hall who is covered here as well with “I can’t dance, but in a version that spends its guitar lines more to Keith Richards than any guitar picker and makes this a pre-era southern rocker.

Another outstanding track is “Brass Buttons”, a simple love song describing the apparel of a girl with a slightly jazzy twing. This song was once covered by The Lemonheads, who I had pegged as a favourite punkrock-band of mine back then, but with the “Favorite Spanish Dishes”-EP they changed to a Pop-band with a slight little country-twist and this was the main track on that EP. The Lemonhead did a lot of covers but before this one it was all the take a pop-song and punkify it-kind, which is funny when you are young for about a half a dozen times (a full dozen if you are drunk)[3]. Looking back it seems as if I changed along with The Lemonheads, though I didn’t turn heroin addict like Evan Dando did.

To go through the record chronologically there is the great fake-concert outtake called “Medley live from Northern Quebec” that was recorded in a studio somewhere with all kinds of friends and onlookers cheering on. It features the nice country-picker “Cash on the barrelhead” and the forever beautiful and desperately melancholic “Hickory Wind” – a song so beautiful I have to sit still and listen to it for the whole length whenever it comes on. Especially in this version, as opposed to some recorded earlier on, e.g. with the Byrds.

After some more songs that you might check out for yourself because I am running out of time and space slowly, the record ends with another beauty of a song. An unbelievable sad but enriching song called “In my hour of darkness”, especially for its country-goes-gospel chorus and structure as well as for the parts sung by Linda Ronstad.

Some people say that Gram Parsons started the fusion of country and rock music[4]. I am not so sure. There were a lot of other important artists who tried this in their own way before it came standard with e.g. The Eagles. I could spend a silent day thinking about what Neil Young would have been without Gram Parsons, or if Gram Parsons still lived today, but the survivors always have an easier say on history than the dead. On the other hand the first mover tribute might go to Parsons for being the first country-musician to act like a rockstar in the Seventies, including drugs, alcohol and partying with Keith Richards and Mick Jagger.[5] “GP” and “Grievous Angels” are both monumental albums, influential long beyond their conception and – as is the case a lot of times – sadly overlooked still by the majority of music listeners.

[1] This band was essentially the core band of Elvis Presley in the early Seventies as well – so I guess they had enough time off to pursue other things as well.

[2] Remember that Merle was the man who wrote “Okie from Muskoggee” while stoned on weed and driving through the hicks.

[3] Maybe you have also remarked upon the current trend to countrify or rather honky-tonk all kinds of rap and pop-songs? Again, I think that trend is but a mere joke.T

[4] This could either be a blessing, e.g. for the rebirth of country in an alternative manner these last ten years, or a curse, as in Kid Rock. But that is a matter of taste, I guess.

[5] Not to speak of this episode: Gram was once overheard saying, that when he died, he would like to be taken out to The Joshua Tree desert of southern California and burned instead of being buried. After Gram died, Gram's road manager Phil Kaufman and another friend got very drunk, borrowed a hearse and drove to retrieve the body using faked paperwork. They allegedly were almost arrested for driving the hearse into a wall, but managed to get more beer and a can of gasoline and drove on to Joshua Tree, where they burnt the coffin and Gram’s remains. As an afterthought, they were arrested and fined for stealing and burning the coffin, because there is no law against stealing a body. Gram has now found his rest in a cemetery near New Orleans, LA.