In no way does it denigrate Gram Parsons’ role in helping define country rock to note that others forged similar trails. Forget the utterly pompous Eagles. The Dillards, New Riders, Linda Ronstadt, Michael Nesmith and Poco all played major roles, as did the shamefully overlooked Commander Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen. Emerging from the Ann Arbor, Michigan, bar scene at roughly the same time as the MC5 and the Stooges, Cody and company forged rockabilly, honky-tonk (Bakersfield and Nashville), trucker tunes, R&B and western swing into an early ’70s Americana mélange. Playing the music honestly, the band (later based in Berkeley, California) could turn any venue into a deep south juke joint without the posturing endemic among later rockabilly-country revivalists.
With George “Cody” Frayne on keyboards and proto-rap vocals, singers Billy C. Farlow and John Tichy, Telecaster wizard Bill Kirchen, west coast pedal steel virtuoso Bobby Black, and fiddler-saxman Andy Stein as the nucleus, the band enjoyed four well-received LPs for Paramount, a 1972 hit rendition of “Hot Rod Lincoln”, and intense popularity around Austin, Texas.
Sustained success, however, proved elusive. Their new label, Warner Bros., aggravated matters by pushing them to record an album embracing the pretentious Los Angeles country-rock they loathed, sessions painfully chronicled in the book Star-Making Machinery. By 1976, the band imploded and scattered.# Assembled from Farlow’s tape stash and enhanced by his warm reminiscences, The Early Years begins with sloppy, stoned acoustic rehearsals. Over time, the focus sharpens as they augment their assimilation of Buddy Holly, Webb Pierce, Hank Williams, etc. with quirky, funky originals. As disc two ends, their 1971 Paramount debut is imminent, and Black is about to replace their original, inept steel guitarist.
The collection of live 1973 and 1975 concerts begins with a disc of often-reissued outtakes from 1973 Austin shows recorded for the Paramount album Live From Deep In The Heart Of Texas. But it’s the second disc, a never-released 1975 show, that serves as summary and valedictory as they rip through 25 songs comprising the heart of their repertoire, minus the flaccid crap Warners forced on them.
Today Cody, Farlow, Kirchen (using the same Tele he used with the Airmen) and Stein continue making their marks in their respective incarnations. These two collections underscore what was always true: Parsons wasn’t the only longhaired guy introducing his peers to the joys of hard-edged, no-frills country long before it became fashionable.
