[FrankHudson]

I haven't heard the concert you reference, but now for one of those long posts I can't help but make about what I think I've learned from a lot of listening and reading over the years regarding this era. Feel free to roll your eyes.

The Byrds didn't have a rep as a great live band back in the day, and this may also be intensified by the fact that they had a string of very good LPs that were well engineered and recorded for their time. They weren't really a proto-jam band,* nor did they "sound just like the record" as a band playing their hits, missing the targets for two different audiences.

Live sound was extraordinarily primitive in those days. Too much amp volume on stage, to little effectiveness in monitors. Chemical imbalances possible in every part of the signal chain from the musicians through the road crew and house mixers. Tight bands in those days had to almost have ESP for the other members to be effectively tight and properly locked in. The Byrds overall were never that kind of cohesive collective unit, made up as they were not of rock band vets but of various folkies more used to performing as singles or duos in a "folk" context. Again, later on they tried to remedy that, but band turnover means the chemistry never got established.

The main reason a band sounds tight is the rhythm section. There's nothing wrong with Roger McGuinn's comping in a many contexts (I love Roger McGuinn!) but he's never struck me as the kind of groove machine that can takeover a band's groove on his own (like a Keith Richards, Nile Rodgers, type player). Chris Hillman became an inventive bassist in the melodic bass player vein, perhaps because of his mandolin background. I can listen to "Younger than Yesterday" on repeat and never got bored with the parts he comes up with. But like McGuinn he's not the kind of anchor groove that can mitigate a problematic rhythm section. But most importantly, the drum chair was often an issue.

I mentioned this to UK scene vet Silly Moustache a couple of times, and my manner may not communicate well, but though it's a big generalization a huge difference between white bands in the UK and the US in the Sixties was that there were many many more good drummers over there, and many bands with similar drummer issues to the Byrds over here. My working theory was that the prior to the Beatles "Trad Jazz" fad meant a lot of drummers had worked in a jazz band context and/or had been tutored by someone who had--and maybe even some holdover from British Isles regimental and brass band drumming or something. In the US, drummers got picked often enough looking for a "Ringo" for the group. Michael Clarke, the original Byrds drummer was said to have been picked for his Brian Jones visuals not for his chops. The Rolling Stones didn't pick Charlie Watts for his teen appeal. The original Ringo was picked even though the existing Beatles drummer had (maybe too much according to some stories) teen appeal, but his chops didn't pass muster.



*Yes they tried that a bit later on, because the ballroom circuit came to expect it. I happen to like "jam bands" and the Byrds. When I get to the part of the Venn diagram where those things overlap (circa "Untitled") I'm OK with it without that version of the Byrds replacing the more influential proto jam bands like the Dead and the Allmans.