The Byrd Who Flew Alone

Gene Clark tributes from Tom Petty, Richard Thompson, Fairport, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, Long Ryders, Carla Olson and more.

Greg Mitchell is the author of a dozen books and now writer/director of award-winning films. He was also a longtime editor of the legendary Crawdaddy.

As some may know from previous postings, Gene Clark, who co-founded, then prematurely quit, the Byrds (but went on to a stellar solo career before succumbing to drink and drugs) is a particular favorite here. Now comes word that his final album, a collaboration with Carla Olson, is getting a March re-issue/vinyl, along with a bonus 45 (see down below). So here’s a collection of swell Geno songs mainly covered by others. Of course, then the usual political cartoons.

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A Few Bars of Clark

This Tom Petty gift to Gene, a cover of his early Byrds’ classic “Feel a Whole Lot Better,” brought him unexpected riches, which at that point turned out to be kind of a bad thing as it allowed him to hit the booze and coke again after he had seemed to be kicking. He would not survive it.

Richard Thompson, live, with another very early Gene/Byrds tune, “Here Without You.”

Fairport Convention, with Sandy Denny, with their live version of another early (but post-Byrds) one from Gene, “Tried So Hard.”

Gene wrote one of the greatest songs of the rock era, “Eight Mile High,” which I featured here recently in numerous takes. For his first solo album, White Light, Gene penned “For a Spanish Guitar,” reputedly a favorite of that supplier of early Byrds hits, Mr. Bob Dylan.

Robert Plant and Alison Krauss brought Gene back into the limelight a bit by doing two of his songs on their Grammy-winning and best-selling first duo record a few years back. But even they could not touch his originals of “Polly” and “Through the Morning, Through the Night” from the second Dillard & Clark lp.

Gene’s No Other album from the mid-70s gained a box set and a much wider audience in recent years—tremendous songs if a bit over-produced. Here’s an alternate, more stripped down track, for one of its best songs, “From a Silver Phial.”

The Long Ryders were super fans of Gene and he appeared with them live sometimes and sang backup on this great Clark-like song.

At the opposite end of the fame scale, I love this live cover of one of Gene’s many obscure early songs, “Why Not Your Baby,” by a Baltic band.

Here’s a live version of that “bonus” cut that will be included with the new re-issue, a Carla Olson song that Gene also sings on.

Gene, live, during his final comeback attempt, in 1986, with the wonderful Carla. He would be gone about four years later.

Marissa Nadler’s tribute, with Sharon Van Etten, “I Can’t Listen to Gene Clark Anymore Without You.”

And how it all began:

Cartoons of the Day

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Greg Mitchell is the author of a dozen books, including the bestseller The Tunnels (on escapes under the Berlin Wall), The Beginning or the End (on MGM’s atomic bomb movie twisted by the White House and Pentagon), and The Campaign of the Century (on Upton Sinclair’s left-wing race for governor of California), which was recently picked by the Wall St. Journal as one of five greatest books ever about an election. His 2021 film, Atomic Cover-up, won four awards, and his current one, The First Attack Ads, aired over hundreds of PBS stations this past fall. For nearly all of the 1970s he was the #2 editor at the legendary Crawdaddy. Later he served as longtime editor of Editor & Publisher. He recently co-produced a film about Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.