Songs I 've Liked #1: Eight Miles High

It was 1965 and things were still pretty subdued in the popular music scene. Along came this crazy Rickenbacker 12-string from outer space, spazz-jamming to the unmistakable harmonies of the Byrds. Those vocals just seemed to glide out there over those staccato stabs, melody-over-harmony, vaguely referencing the band's good and bad experiences playing England.

Commercial airliners do not reach an altitude of eight miles, but the Byrds achieved that lofty height. And yeah, the alleged (ok; they eventually admitted it) drug reference yielded a ban from the AM radio world, back in those innocent days. I admit I was a naive kid back then, or maybe more accurately, blissfully oblivious. I liked the song for what it was.

What it was - was unconventional. It was longish by AM "hit" standards. Its purported influences have ranged from Coltrane to Shankar. It reached #14 in the USA and Britain. It was also Gene Clark's swan song with the Byrds, and the band would never chart top twenty again.

I kept following the Byrds as they morphed through their spaceman, cowboy, and simultaneous spaceman/cowboy phases, Roger McGuinn's Rickenbacker weaving a common thread through their long descent from the lofty eight-mile altitude, culminating with "Chestnut Mare", a long ditty about a horse.

1965 was the dawn of an era of experimentation, stretching the bounds of music. Later would come the likes of Sergeant Pepper, Pink Floyd echoes and animals, concept albums and rock operas. But when I heard the those high-altitude harmonies wafting out of that transistor radio back in March 1965, it felt like some musical doors were being opened.