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Cosmic Cowboy
01-18-2010, 09:15 PM
Are there any Dillards fans around here? They usually don't get the credit they deserve for helping start the country-rock genre. They were featured on the Andy Griffith Show as the Darlin' Family in 1963. I personaly think that role didn't do anything to help them get people to take their later music accomplishments seriously. They started out as a bluegrass band from Missouri in the early sixties, and after releasing three straight ahead bluegrass albums and migrating to California, they helped start the L.A. country-rock sound with the albums Wheatstraw Suite and Copperfields, two influential albums full of early country-rock. They went on to release many more albums, even breaking into the charts with the single, "It's About Time" in 1971. In 1968 Doug Dillard left them and started his own band, along with Gene Clark of the Byrds, Dillard & Clark. Bernie Leadon was a member of Dillard & Clark for a while, before joining the Flying Burrito Brothers, and eventually the Eagles. Don Henley has even said the Dillards were a early influence on him. So I'm not sure if that interested anybody, but what are your thoughts on the Dillards?

Ive always been a dreamer
01-18-2010, 10:00 PM
Well CC - I have to confess that I am not familiar with the Dillards music. However, I am familiar with the role they played in pioneering country rock, and agree that deserve credit. I have read a lot of books about the Eagles and the LA rock scene in the 60's and early 70's, and this band is always mentioned. I also remember Don saying that they were a big influence on him. Maybe I'll go over to YouTube to see if I can find anything to post here. Any suggestions about some of their best work?

ETA: Okay - I was able to find the Andy Griffith appearance ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQtXEb7C30o&feature=related

bernie's bender
01-18-2010, 10:50 PM
Huge Dillards fan! I love the later records too with Doug Dillard and Gene Clark from the Byrds... Clarence and Roland White were also 'Darlin's'... Clarence was a pretty big influence on Bernie....

Cosmic Cowboy, have you ever heard the song by Michael Murphy "Cosmic Cowboy"... he and Boomer Castleman hung out with that crew along with Mike Nesmith (monkees) and a bunch of others...

The Dillards stuff was pretty 'breakthrough' the problem they ran into was that they came at the end of the great "folk scare" and just as the beatles were breaking....

If they tried to innovate and advance and electrify their music, they lost one audience, but weren't guaranteed a newer audience. As it was, they were too bluegrass for some and too rock n roll for others... and not country enough to get airplay.

The Gosdin Brothers had this problem too to a degree... and the Everlys, Ricky Nelson etc... they all wanted a fusion of music... Byron Berline all those guys and they started building it... While all those guys paved the road, Meisner was with Ricky, Bernie was with several different sets of people and Glenn and Don were watching and learning and refining what that sound would be...

I still love the Michael Murphey album "Peaks, Valleys, Honky Tonks, Alleys"... it has a bunch of those guys backing him...

The thing that sunk the Dillards was that the band wasn't united on direction, Douglas had a terrible drinking problem and once he started hanging out with Gene, they just enabled each other... Rodney and the guys kept trying.. but they weren't revolutionaries, they just wanted to play...

Some great stuff... I used to have a bunch of boots from that era... you just don't see that level of playing and that creativity anymore..

Cosmic Cowboy
01-18-2010, 11:08 PM
There are hardly any youtube videos of them, just some Andy Griffith Show stuff and a few videos from a swedish blegrass festival in the 90's. I wish I could find a video of them in the late 60's or 70's when they were doing country-rock. Their best works are Wheatstraw Suite and Copperfields from 1969 and 1970. These are both available on CD either separately or in a three-fer with Pickin' & Fiddlin' from 1965. My other favorites are 1971's Root & Branches which is available on a CD two-fer with 1972's Tribute To The American Duck. I also like 1977's Dillards Vs. The Incredible L.A. Time Machine, which is only on vinyl.

Yes bernie's bender, that song is where I got my screen name from. The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band does a good version of Cosmic Cowboy. Do you mean you have boots of the Dillards?

bernie's bender
01-18-2010, 11:26 PM
very cool!

Here is a little present then! the original song by the original writer in the best live context (The Palomino) and with several Dillards backing him up...

some real good pickin here... and John Inmon too!


cosmic cowboy (http://homepage.mac.com/macmanager/.Music/cc.mp3)

I hope you enjoy it!

I do have some boots of the Dillards, I've got to dig them up.. but they are around here somewhere!

oh and click here! (http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=douglas+dillard&search_type=&aq=f)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9GQDKkhAas&feature=PlayList&p=99F160AF2D97B0CF&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=15

Bernie, Douglas and Gene.. pretty cool.

Ive always been a dreamer
01-19-2010, 12:09 AM
Thanks for the info and feedback. I listened to these, and although I appreciate their talent, unfortunately, they are a bit too bluegrass for my taste.

bernie's bender
01-19-2010, 12:21 AM
I think that was true for a lot folks. One thing that is kind of sad is that the original Eagles really liked that music and wanted to fuse it... but, the sound was 'too country' and 'too bluegrass' and Don and Glenn pretty much decided to do what they could sell...

The result is you end up with a couple of groups of fans: the ones who love the early Eagles and who like the music the original guys did and the folks who just liked the hits, and the folks who like the 'rock' version...

Room for everyone.. but, I sure loved that 'dangerous' sound when the music threatened so many accepted conventions... most folks don't know what it was like to try to have long hair in redneck bar, or to kick on a Buck Owens record with a bunch of rockers...

I remember going to see Murph and the opening band just kinda glared at their clothes and hair... but Murph was all about bringing it all together...

Kind of 'string theory' for music.. bringing the cowboys and the hippies and the rednecks together...

Willie and Waylon followed on the road these guys first cut and made it work in the second and third wave of the movement... some amazing music that most people have never heard... or that would find too foreign now...

Ive always been a dreamer
01-19-2010, 12:39 AM
I think that was true for a lot folks. One thing that is kind of sad is that the original Eagles really liked that music and wanted to fuse it... but, the sound was 'too country' and 'too bluegrass' and Don and Glenn pretty much decided to do what they could sell...

The result is you end up with a couple of groups of fans: the ones who love the early Eagles and who like the music the original guys did and the folks who just liked the hits, and the folks who like the 'rock' version...

... and the ones who liked all of them. That would be me. :thumbsup:

Cosmic Cowboy
01-19-2010, 12:08 PM
I do have some boots of the Dillards, I've got to dig them up.. but they are around here somewhere!


That would be awesome, I have all their albums and singles, except the single "It's About Time". I can't seem to find it anywhere.