Generally speaking, having comparable lifestyles can help make things go smoothly while on the road. (And that’s strictly from an interpersonal standpoint, considering “comparable lifestyles” can also mean “wreaking absolute havoc á la Ozzy Osbourne and Mötley Crüe.”) But not every road crew is fortunate enough to have similar habits, interests, and hobbies throughout the whole team. There will be night owls and early risers, partiers and teetotallers, and so on. Sometimes, these conflicting interests end in disaster. Other times, the musicians and roadies find a way to make it work.
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Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons, fortunately, were in the latter category. Harris joined Parsons on the road in the early 1970s—a gig that her babysitter helped her land. The future “Two More Bottles of Wine” singer had already tried and failed in the Greenwich Village Scene; she was living at home with her parents, and she was raising a young daughter on her own after a divorce from her first husband.
Needless to say, Harris was coming at this professional opportunity like a working mother. She not only wanted it to work for her own artistic sake. But she needed it to work for her family. So, she and Parsons spent their time on the road in very different ways.
The Differing Personalities of Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris
Gram Parsons is among the ranks of highly influential, highly self-destructive musicians who came and went from the world like a flash of lightning. He was only 26 years old when he died of a morphine overdose, leaving behind a short but prolific musical legacy that included being in The Byrds, The Flying Burrito Brothers, and a fleeting but well-received solo career. Parsons also had a reputation for a partying lifestyle that ultimately led to his demise. Notorious partier Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones once said Parsons “could get better coke than the mafia.”
Meanwhile, Harris was what she described to The Guardian as “a Girl Scout.” Her go-to activities on the tour bus included crocheting and knitting. “I had that wonderful yarn that they made the fishermen’s sweaters from, with the nice oil. And I would just sit there amid all the craziness, and knit away.”
Despite their different post-show lifestyles, Harris and Parsons made it work because they always put the performance first. “When we were working together, he was on,” Harris said. “He was so focused. So, I guess I thought whatever trouble he might have been getting into, he was now on the right road. And I was completely wrong.”
Harris and Parsons worked together in 1973 and 1974, touring the U.S. and working on two albums, GP and Grievous Angel, the latter of which was a posthumous release. Parsons died on September 19, 1973, in Joshua Tree, California. And like any artist with such a wild, eccentric past, Parsons’ story didn’t end there.
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