Gene Clark - With The Gosdin Brothers

What do you do when you’ve left The Byrds...?

If you’re Gene Clark you make an album which showcases how great a songwriter you are, allows you to pay tribute to your influences, points to a new genre – and occasionally gets swamped in the production.

Opener Echoes is a good case in point: it could be a great song but producer Larry Marks let pianist/arranger Leon Russell loose with an orchestra. The result, as Clark’s manager Jim Dickson notes in the excellent sleevenotes, was that “Gene never could really put a vocal on it with all that music overwhelming it”. Don’t let that put you off, because the next track, Think I’m Gonna Feel Better, gets back to basics, before Tried So Hard, one of the standouts of Clark’s whole career. So You Say You Lost Your Baby runs it a close second, while demos and alternative takes add real value.

With Chris Hillman on bass and Michael Clarke on drums there’s a strong Byrds feel, augmented on tracks featuring Clarence White’s guitar. The country/bluegrass atmosphere thickens when Doug Dillard picks his banjo on Keep On Pushing, and it’s not fanciful to see this as a pointer to Sweetheart Of The Rodeo. You can even hear Crosby, Stills & Nash up ahead. Not a masterpiece, but liberally sprinkled with gems.

Sundazed | SC 11188

Reviewed by Tim Holmes
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