There Is a Season Review by Richie Unterberger.
As there was a four-CD box set of the Byrds back in 1990, the point of putting out another four-CD Byrds box set about 15 years later wasn't all that clear, unless it was a mercenary exercise to get more mileage of the band's durable catalog. Yet appear this 2006 box set did, with many of the same tracks that had appeared on the 1990 Byrds box set, though there are some appreciable differences. The span of There Is a Season is a little wider, taking in some of the demos they recorded prior to the "Mr. Tambourine Man" single, and also fitting in a couple of Gene Clark songs from their 1973 reunion album. While all the hit singles and most of the group's most popular album tracks are on both sets, the secondary songs filling out the boxes vary, with There Is a Season putting out some material that wasn't officially issued until after the 1990 box set (on expanded CD editions of their albums and Live at the Fillmore West February 1969). Conversely, the earlier box set has some LP cuts and obscurities that failed to make the cut for There Is a Season.
Of course, There Is a Season does contain a lot of significant, and often great, folk-rock music; no package with 99 Byrds songs could fail to do that. As for what it offers the serious Byrds collector -- who's probably at least as apt to consider buying this as a general Byrds fan -- there isn't all that much. There are five previously unissued tracks, none of them extraordinary, including a 1967 Swedish radio version of "He Was a Friend of Mine," a couple live September 1970 Fillmore East performances, and a couple live cuts from February 1970. There are oddities from soundtracks and live compilation albums, including the Candy soundtrack version of "Child of the Universe," "Nothin' to It" (done by the Byrds on the early-'70s album Earl Scruggs: His Family and Friends), and a couple live 1973 performances from the Banjoman movie. It's well-sequenced enough that it does give a solid sense of the band's growth and accomplishment through their folk-rock, psychedelic, and country-rock phases, though there's no getting around the fact that it starts to get steadily less exciting after it passes the halfway point.
The big added attraction on There Is a Season is not on the CDs, but on the bonus DVD disc, which contains ten TV clips of the group from 1965-1967. All of these, mind you, are mimed and not live, but it's still a fun (if brief, lasting just 26 minutes) assortment of glimpses of the band in their most creative era on U.S., U.K., and Swedish programs. Even here, however, there could have been room for improvement, as there's some more interesting footage of the Byrds from this era, including their live set in the mid-'60s movie The Big TNT Show and versions of "Long Tall Sally" and "Not Fade Away" (neither of which they released on record in any form). Is this nitpicking? Probably. But if you're going to lay out more than 50 dollars for an anthology that likely contains some or much material you already own, you have the right to make the point.
CD1
02. Please Let
Me Love You
03. Don't Be
Long
04. The Airport
Song
05. You Movin'
06. You Showed
Me
07. Mr.
Tambourine Man
08. I'll Feel a
Whole Lot Better
09. You Won't
Have to Cry
10. Here Without
You
11. The Bells of
Rhymney
12. All I Really
Want to Do [Single Version]
13. I Knew I'd
Want You
14. Chimes of
Freedom
15. She Has a Way
16. It's All Over
Now, Baby Blue
17. Turn! Turn!
Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season)
18. It Won't Be
Wrong
19. Set You Free
This Time
20. The World
Turns All Around Her
21. The Day Walk
22. If You're
Gone
23. The Times
They Are A-Changin' [Withdrawn Version]
24. She Don't Care About That [Single Version]
25. Stranger in a
Strange Land [Instrumental]
02. Why [Single
Version]
03. 5D (Fifth
Dimension)
04. Wild
Mountain Theme
05. Mr. Spaceman
06. I See You
07. What's
Happening?!?!
08. I Know My
Rider
09. So You Want
to Be a Rock 'N' Roll Star
10. Have You Seen
Her Face
11. Renaissance
Fair
12. Time Between
13. Everybody's
Been Burned
14. My Back Pages
15. It Happens
Each Day
16. He Was a
Friend of Mine [Live][#]
17. Lady Friend
18. Old John
Robertson [Single Version]
19. Goin' Back
20. Draft Morning
21. Wasn't Born
to Follow
22. Tribal
Gathering
23. Dolphin's
Smile
24. Triad
25. Universal
Mind Decoder [Instrumental]
CD3
01. You Ain't Goin' Nowhere
02. I Am a
Pilgrim
03. The
Christian Life [Gram Parsons Vocal Version]
04. You Don't
Miss Your Water [Gram Parsons Vocal Version]
05. Hickory Wind
06. One Hundred
Years from Now [Gram Parsons Vocal Version]
07. Lazy Days
[Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
08. Pretty Polly
[Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
09. This Wheel's
on Fire [Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
10. Drug Store
Truck Drivin' Man
11. Candy
12. Child of the
Universe [Candy Soundtrack Version]
13. Pretty Boy
Floyd [Live]
14. Buckaroo
[Live][Instrumental]
15. King Apathy
III [Live]
16. Sing Me Back
Home [Live]
17. Lay Lady Lay
[Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
18. Oil in My
Lamp [Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
19. Tulsa County
20. Jesus Is Just
Alright
21. Chestnut Mare
22. Just a Season
23. Kathleen's
Song [Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
24. All the
Things [Alternate Version][Alternate Take]
CD4
01. Lover of the Bayou [Live]
02. Positively
4th Street [Live]
03. Old Blue
[Live]
04. It's Alright
Ma (I'm Only Bleeding) [Live]
05. Ballad of
Easy Rider [Live]
06. You All Look
Alike [Live][#]
07. Nashville
West [Live][#][Instrumental]
08. Willin'
[Live]
09. Black
Mountain Rag [Live][Instrumental]
10. Baby What You
Want Me to Do [Live][#]
11. I Trust
[Live][#]
12. Take a Whiff
(On Me) [Live]
13. Glory, Glory
14. Byrdgrass
[Instrumental]
15. Pale Blue
16. I Wanna Grow
Up to Be a Politician
17. Nothin' to It
[Instrumental]
18. Tiffany Queen
19. Farther Along
20. Bugler
21. Mr.
Tambourine Man [Banjoman Soundtrack Version][Live]
22. Roll Over
Beethoven [Banjoman Soundtrack Version][Live]
23. Full Circle
24. Changing
Heart
25. Paths of
Victory
DVD:
1. Mr.Tambourin Man
2. I'll
Feel A Whole Lot Better
3. All I
Really Want To Do
4. Turn!
Turn! Turn!
5. It
Won't Be Wrong
6. Set You
Free
7. So You
Want To Be A Rock'n Roll Star
8. Mr.
Tambourine Man
9. Eight
Miles High
10. Mr.Spaceman
Thanks for the Dvd. The cd's i had already.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Putting this back in my collection after a hard drive crash
ReplyDelete