Playing Your Top 10 Byrdsongs

[jimk]

Now, how many of you can play your Top Ten Byrdsongs? And I mean intro, solo, and outro, if any. Singing all the verses gets you 50 bonus points. Singing all the verses and being able to sing all three parts gets you 1,000 bonus points.
Mine were:

The Obvious
1. MTM
2. TTT
3. 8 Mi. Hi
4. I'll Probably Feel A Whole Lot Better When You're Gone
5. The World Turns All Around Her
6. She Don't Care About Time
7. Positively 4th St.
8. You Ain't Goin' Nowhere
9. My Back Pages
10. Sing Me Back Home

The only ones I can't do so far are Positively 4th St. and Sing Me Back Home.

JimK

[kennyhowes]

Where's "Lady Friend?" That's my fave, I can do that one.

[vynesmusic]

LADY FRIEND!....thank you......thank you.....the coolest Byrdsong ever, tho Bells of Rhymney defines the Rick 12 with it's haunting evocation of the sound of bells....Lady Friend has that bell sound too, in the riff......I played bass on that song a lifetime ago in another, better galaxy.....

[Scastles]

My Back Pages and a Whole Lot Better...and You Ain't Goin' Nowhere (all 3 chords). The rest in bits and pieces. I'm no lead player.

[fatcat]

370-12RM need I say more?

[vynesmusic]

HOLY SCHNIKIES....A FIREGLOW RICK DOUBLE NECK.... I am new to this forum, relatively, and havent seen this pic of Kenny's guitar.......mither of gud.......the Holy Grail......I swoon.....where is there a bigger pic of this ax?

I, vynesmusic, have ToddRundgrened a version of "8 Miles High" and would love to have Forum members listen and comment, but it IS copywrited....i have done the same with "Gunga Din".....

Have plans for "Dolphin's Smile", "I See You" and "Bells of Rhymney".....yessss.......BEEG plans.....

[Folkie]

Jim K.,

Wow, you must have some serious chops to be able to do "Eight Miles of High" in its entirety! Can you do it note for note at regular speed?

Robert

[jimk]

Wow, you must have some serious chops to be able to do "Eight Miles of High" in its entirety! Can you do it note for note at regular speed?

Robert

That's actually several questions.
1. Yes, I can do it in its entirety. (I make a lot of it up, based on the scale McGuinn uses, and throw in a bunch of my ideas. His DVD helped out a lot with that.)
2. Yes, I can play it at regular speed.
3. Rarely, if ever do I play anything note for note. I'm neither that good, nor am I that patient. Matter of fact, I can just about say that I never play any solo note for note. But you'd recognize my take on it, because it's close. Take a look at the solo I posted here. It's recognizable as "Feel A Whole Lot Better" certainly. But it isn't note for note what McGuinn played on the 1965 recording. But it's close. It will work. And audiences would be satisfied that they'd heard it done right.
I take the same approach to George Harrison's "If I Needed Someone." I get the general idea of that opening lick over the A7 played at the 8th and 9th frets, and go from there.

[Folkie]

Jim K.,

It does take a certain patience and discipline to learn a song (or a solo) note for note, but even if I were gigging with a Byrds cover band, I would try to capture the spirit of the original without copying it verbatim. So I applaud your efforts to make a nod to the original "Eight Miles High" solo while putting your own spin on it. (When you say you improvise using the same scale as McGuinn, are we talking the blues scale?) I've had some problems with Harrison's "If I Needed Someone." Once I capo up to the seventh fret, I find the fret spacing so narrow that I can barely play that pseudo-Byrds lick. (Many Rick 12 owners complain about the narrow neck, but the smaller fret-spacing is more of an issue for me.) Anyway, I hope someday to develop your level of technical facility on the electric 12. Let's hope the Roger McGuinn DVD will give me a good starting point.

Robert

[kennyhowes]

HOLY SCHNIKIES....A FIREGLOW RICK DOUBLE NECK.... I am new to this forum, relatively, and havent seen this pic of Kenny's guitar.......mither of gud.......the Holy Grail......I swoon.....where is there a bigger pic of this ax?

Right here:
http://www.rickenbacker.me.uk/www.ricke ... es.html#15

Not mine, unfortunately, it's Graham's. Would LOVE to find one.

[kennyhowes]

Bigger pics here too:
http://www.rickenbacker.me.uk/www.ricke ... eries.html

[iamthebassman]

We play Mr.Tambourine Man, Feel a Whole Lot Better, and Eight Miles High. I sing lead and play bass on all.

[jimk]

(When you say you improvise using the same scale as McGuinn, are we talking the blues scale?)

Yes.

I've had some problems with Harrison's "If I Needed Someone." Once I capo up to the seventh fret, I find the fret spacing so narrow that I can barely play that pseudo-Byrds lick.

This is where I change up Harrison's original a little. Instead of using a capo, I go ahead and form a D7 shape chord, leave the 5th (A strings) pair open and let 'em ring throughout. This sets up a pedal-point, I guess you'd call it for the verses. Being a finger-style player who has converted over to hybrid picking, it gets real jangly and rather McGuinn-esque.

Anyway, I hope someday to develop your level of technical facility on the electric 12. Let's hope the Roger McGuinn DVD will give me a good starting point.

Robert

Thanks. Yeah, by all means, if you aspire to that style of playing, get the McGuinn DVD. Go slowly and work through the exercises he illustrates and I'm sure you'll get it. It's worth the money. And he's a pretty good teacher, actually.

[JakeK]

The only two songs in my top 10 Byrds songs I can play are "So You Want to Be a Rock & Roll Star" and "Feel a Whole Lot Better", and that's only the chords!

I really want to learn "Eight Miles High" (all of it), and whenever I hear "Mr Spaceman," I usually know how to play it, but I don't know it by heart.

[Folkie]

Jim K.,

I just learned "My Back Pages" at breakneck speed and it sounds pretty good! Now I'll have to embellish the solo to make it my own. It's nice to learn a Byrds song that (as far as I can tell) doesn't have a very complicated fingerstyle pattern. As you know, I am new to fingerstyle guitar.

Robert