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Part Two of John Nork's Interview With The Byrds's Chris Hillman

Chris Hillman (The Tracking Angle web reprint)

TA: You probably don't remember this, Chris, but when I interviewed you and Roger in 1977, way back when you were in Miami, I asked you guys why you didn't call yourselves The Byrds when you were in McGuinn, Clark and Hillman, and you said that you promised you wouldn't unless David were there, and I said, "What did he do? Threaten to write more 'Mind Gardens'?" and everyone got a good yuk out of that.

CH: (laughs).

TA: What about "Hey Joe?"

CH: Well, that's okay. I think that David did it really good, but I don't remember. I think that I don't take it as seriously because the Lees, kind of this Byrds-clone, put it out.

TA: They had a fairly big hit with that, in fact.

CH: I think they heard us do it live. It was one of David's songs he always did. David probably did that when he was a folk singer when he was solo, before The Byrds. I'm sure he did. I'd guarantee it.

TA: Way before Hendrix or the Lees or any of those guys.

CH: I think David did it as a soloist and brought it in and we worked it out electrically, then Hendrix did it. Hendrix did it great. Really, really, interesting.

TA: Well you know, another two atypical songs on here, for you anyway, were "Captain Soul" and "The Lear Jet Song." Those were not your standard Byrds songs.

CH: I don't even remember the words to "The Lear Jet Song." Let's file that under "novelty." "Captain Soul ..." God knows what they had on their minds ... how embarrassing. This album, I think there are two or three really good, interesting tunes, led by "8 Miles High" and "5d." The rest were just scattered. I don't think we knew what we were doing. I think we were just about either in a management change or something with Gene leaving.

TA: Let me ask you about some of the bonus tracks. You talked about "Why," which I think is really a tremendous song. Do you have a preference as far as versions go?

CH: I can't remember. I think the RCA is better -- I think it flows better. Once again, Mike was really interesting on this song. We were coming off of a road trip listening to John Coltrane and Ravi Shankar, and John Coltrane comes out through the "8 Miles High" situation. "Why" comes out through a lot of Ravi Shankar, and it's great. I love it. It's a neat song. Since we were doing "Why" in the Victor thing too, it might stand that the "8 Miles High" from RCA is better, along with that track.

TA: What about the song, "I Know My Rider." Where did that come from?

CH: That's an old folk song that we were just kicking around. Everybody used to sing that in the old folk days.

TA: How about this "John Riley" instrumental? It's sort of an extended jam ...

CH: Oh, God, yeah. It's just a song that Roger wanted to put on and I didn't care for it too much.

TA: You'd never know it was "John Riley." I guess the chords are the same and that's about all.

CH: He's into that kind of material to this day. He does it really well -- just a different style of stuff than I'm used to doing.

TA: Let's move into the big guy: Younger Than Yesterday . You clearly emerged in terms of writing and singing on that record. Could you talk about what that experience was like? "Time Between" was your first song.

CH: That was the thing where we'd made the management changeover, and the guy that was managing us was managing Hugh Masakela, and he was just starting out, and we knew him, and he was doing demo session with this gal from South Africa, and for some odd reason he asked me and Crosby to play on the demo, me on bass and David on rhythm guitar, so we went in there and it was all South African musicians. I remember the piano player's name was Cecil something ... and I think Big Black was playing congas. And I was on bass, and it was so much fun, and such an easy, free feeling and they enjoyed what we were doing, and she enjoyed what we were doing ... I have no idea what we did but it worked. And I got so excited coming out of these sessions that I wrote "Time Between" which had nothing to do, groovewise, with what I'd been doing all day, but it's really like a bluegrass tune. In fact, we recut it with the Desert Rose Band and did it better. But, initially, that's one of the songs I had Clarence come in and play guitar on. Then, Vern Gosdin did the tenor part originally and then David came in and redid it. I wasn't really the singer -- I didn't know how to sing and it was in the wrong key for me, but it's a good little song. It's interesting. It was about the gal I was with. She was English and she went home to England and it was my little ode to her. And then, " Have You Seen Her Face" really is an outcropping directly from those Masakela sessions. It's those changes and that feel. Cecil played piano on it, and it was that choppy rhythm and those changes. I just came up with it. "Rock and Roll Star" same thing. We all lived in Laurel Canyon in Hollywood then, and I had that beginning riff: (sings) da da da dah dah and Roger lived across the canyon and I had him come over and he added the bridge. Really, that was sort of off some Miriam Makeba changes, from her earlier albums. And so, it had that South African wink, along with Masakela playing on it. But, it's a fun song. It was sort of about the contrived putting together of the Monkees. It was just fun. It was a great track. Tom Petty did a great cut of that song. Yeah, and "Renaissance Fair" is a real good song, I really enjoyed playing that. "Everybody's Been Burned" is one of Roger's great songs.