{"id":2144,"date":"2009-05-03T23:01:38","date_gmt":"2009-05-04T03:01:38","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-08-29T17:01:15","modified_gmt":"2011-08-29T21:01:15","slug":"most-sympathetic-last-ditch-efforts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/most-sympathetic-last-ditch-efforts\/","title":{"rendered":"Most Sympathetic Last-Ditch Efforts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/hZV2Cj0LaeY?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nI know some of you are touched by the simple, open-wound charms of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/the-beach-boys-lemglove-youl-emg-do-you\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Beach Boys&#8217; <em>Love You<\/em> album<\/a>. Isn&#8217;t part of that album&#8217;s appeal the sympathetic vibe you get from a band hanging onto its gifts by a thread?<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s at the root of my soft spot for <strong>The Byrds<\/strong>&#8216; &#8220;Chestnut Mare.&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/stop-look-listen-the-hollies-the-byrds\/\" target=\"_blank\">I&#8217;m a hard ass about The Byrds&#8217; prime-era work<\/a>, as some of you know, but I find &#8220;Chestnut Mare&#8221; most sympathetic. You can tell Roger McGuinn is still trying to catch that elusive sound he&#8217;d been chasing during the ups and downs of The Byrds. He&#8217;s the last of the original Byrds standing, but he&#8217;s not ready to think outside the band structure. Roger&#8217;s got a business suit on &#8211; just in case &#8211; and it&#8217;s not clear that everyone in this version of The Byrds makes sense (conga player???), but it&#8217;s not quite the season for the band to die.<\/p>\n<p>Musically, I think there&#8217;s something to be said for the lack of cohesion and confidence in this performance. I wish the early Byrds could have shown more rough edges and vulnerability. I wish The Byrds had trafficked in more <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/loser-rock\/\" target=\"_blank\">Loser Rock<\/a>. OK, maybe not, but at least this weird, waning performance allows me to feel something wistful.<\/p>\n<p><em>What&#8217;s your most sympathetic last-ditch effort by a band that&#8217;s clearly past its prime?<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I know some of you are touched by the simple, open-wound charms of The Beach Boys&#8217; Love You album. Isn&#8217;t part of that album&#8217;s appeal the sympathetic vibe you get from a band hanging onto its gifts by a thread? That&#8217;s at the root of my soft spot for The Byrds&#8216; &#8220;Chestnut Mare.&#8221; I&#8217;m a <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/most-sympathetic-last-ditch-efforts\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[120,62],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2144"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2144\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}