Gram Parsons’ second and final studio album, Grievous Angel, turned 50 this January.
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While Parsons never enjoyed commercial success, he influenced everyone from The Rolling Stones to Wilco with an outsider’s approach to country music. He was alternative country (or alt-country) before such a thing existed.
There’s a good chance Uncle Tupelo never happens, or Ryan Adams doesn’t record Heartbreaker, without Parsons’ vision. Moreover, he created the road map for Jason Isbell’s outstanding Southeastern and many more. The fusion of country music with rock ‘n’ roll—from Beck to Lucinda Williams—began with a Harvard dropout.
Like a Rolling Stone
In his memoir Life, Keith Richards said Parsons “taught me country music.” Parsons explained to Richards the difference between the raw Bakersfield (California) sound and the rounded edges of the Nashville sound. They shared a similar attitude toward music, something Richards also shared with John Lennon.
Parsons recorded “Wild Horses” with The Flying Burrito Brothers and released it on Burrito Deluxe a year before the Stones’ Sticky Fingers’ release in 1971. “Wild Horses” isn’t quite the country-rock Big Bang, but it’s an early evolution of the aesthetic distilled in one recording.
Released posthumously in 1974, “Return of the Grievous Angel” is one of Parsons’s defining songs, and his young death cemented his myth and legacy.
The Traveler
A young poet named Tom Brown had written a set of lyrics with Parsons in mind and gave them to Parsons at a show in Boston. Parsons adapted the lyrics to his weary “Return of the Grievous Angel,” which features a meeting with the king (Elvis). The king talked about unbuckling that old Bible belt and lighted out for some desert town (Las Vegas).
We flew straight across that river bridge
Last night, a half past two
The switchman waved his lantern goodbye and good day
As we went rolling through
Billboards and truck stops pass by the grievous angel
And now I know just what I have to do
Though Parsons’s voice is clear, there’s a woozy unpredictability to it, turning the poetry into a psychedelic honky-tonk about the road.
Oh, but I remembered something you once told me
And I’ll be damned if it did not come true
Twenty thousand roads I went down, down, down
And they all led me straight back home to you
The TCB Band
Before the guitar break, Parsons sings, “Take it for me, James,” referring to guitarist James Burton. Burton, alongside former members of Elvis Presley’s TCB Band, joined Parsons in the studio for the Grievous Angel sessions.
Burton’s Telecaster and Glenn D. Hardin’s piano drive the track while Parsons narrates his long journey home. Following the guitar solo, Byron Berline (fiddle) and steel guitarist Al Perkins add a wobbly California country break to the dusty tale.
One can’t talk about Parsons without mentioning Emmylou Harris, whose vocal harmonies became central to his sound.
Emmylou Harris
The Flying Burrito Brothers, Parsons’ former group, invited him to perform their final two shows together. Bandmate and co-founder Chris Hillman had fired the singer due to his erratic behavior and addiction. During this period, Parsons hung around The Rolling Stones and (thanks to a family trust) infamously arrived at The Flying Burrito Brothers’ shows in a limousine.
Following Hillman’s invitation, he mentioned a singer the band saw performing in Washington, D.C., named Emmylou Harris. He told Parsons, “She’s nothing but a folk singer, but she can probably be developed into a really good country singer.”
However, Harris is from Birmingham, Alabama, and Parsons said, “She probably knew more about country music” than he and Hillman. After several phone conversations, Harris and Parsons eventually met in person, and the first song they played together was the George Jones and Gene Pitney duet, “That’s All It Took,” which they ultimately recorded for Parsons’s debut album.
Nudie Suit
Harris called Parsons a “true poet of his generation” and credited him with bringing country music to a rock ‘n’ roll audience. She told the BBC, “The country community would have nothing to do with him. They didn’t know what to make with these long-hair hippies wearing Nudie suits.” Parsons decorated his suits with marijuana leaves and a naked woman, as opposed to the roses and music notes typically embroidered on the traditional suits.
The Nudie suits worn by The Flying Burrito Brothers on their debut album cover are displayed at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville. Born in Kyiv, Ukraine, Los Angeles-based tailor Nudie Cohn had designed suits for Hank Williams, Roy Rogers, and many others.
However, when Parsons’ band wore the flashy suits in 1969, they were long out of fashion. But Parsons admired the old look and unwittingly created a cultural moment on The Flying Burrito Brothers’ The Gilded Palace of Sin, similar to The Beatles “putting on the Sgt. Pepper suits,” as Wilco’s Pat Sansone once explained to Rolling Stone.
He Had to Move On
“Return of the Grievous Angel” is a trucker’s tale of discovery and destination. Parsons had traveled and toured a lot, and the transience that occupied his road meditation matched his short life.
A pioneer must settle somewhere.
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Photo by Jim McCrary/Redferns
