Eight Miles High

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"Eight Miles High" is a song by Gene Clark, Jim McGuinn, and David Crosby, first appearing as a single from 1966 by the rock band The Byrds. The single peaked at #14 on the Billboard Hot 100, and was included as well on their album Fifth Dimension, released on July 18, 1966. In tandem with its b-side, "Why," written by McGuinn and Crosby, the song was instrumental in fomenting a new strain of rock and roll in the mid-1960s, that of psychedelic rock.

The obscure lyrics, penned by Clark and about the group's plane trip to and tour in England in 1965. "Eight miles high, and when you touch down, you'll find that it's stranger than known." Airliners fly at an altitude of six to seven miles high; but it was felt that "eight miles high" sounded better, perhaps influenced by the Beatles' "Eight Days A Week" single.

According to Clark, the lyrics were primarily of his doing, with the only contribution coming from David Crosby's line "Rain grey town, knowing for its sound". Since Clark's death, however, McGuinn has chosen to paint a rather different portrait of the song's writing. While Clark is still acknowledged as the song's main author, McGuinn contends that it was he who conceived the idea for the song being about a plane ride, and that he and Crosby both contributed lyrics to Clark's unfinished draft. John Einarson's book, Mr. Tambourine Man, questions this claim and wonders if McGuinn's story would be the same had Clark lived.

McGuinn's twelve string guitar playing--especially the famed introductory solo--was heavily inspired by Coltrane's saxophone on "India" from his Live at the Village Vanguard album of 1961, McGuinn very guarded of the effort that went into his approximation of Coltrane's technique to guitar. Chris Hillman's bass line drives the song, while the rhythm guitar work by Crosby and fast drumming of Michael Clarke add dramatic turbulence. On a 1966 taped interview added to the 1996 re-issue of the album, Crosby said that the catastrophic ending made him "feel like a plane landing."

The B-side, "Why", equally pushed the envelope, its incorporation of raga aspects from Indian classical music even more pronounced than on the A-side. The lyric, unusual for the developing rock and roll groupie haven of Los Angeles, argues a very feminist viewpoint considering that it was written by two men, or one man, Crosby oft claiming sole authorship of the song.Zimmer and Diltz, p. 37 A great performance, superior to the one later released on Younger Than Yesterday, the song benefited from the more pronounced bass lines and vocal punch of the radio mix given a single side in the mid-sixties.

Almost immediately after "Eight Miles High," the Byrds suffered the loss of Clark, their main songwriter. His fear of flying was the official reason for his departure, although other pressures were at work. After Clark's departure, the Byrds would never visit the top 20 with a single again.

An earlier version of the song, along with "Why," had been recorded in RCA Studios in Los Angeles in December of 1965; those tracks saw release on the 1996 expanded reissue of Fifth Dimension on Legacy Recordings. The song has been covered many times, notably by Golden Earring in 1969, Leo Kottke on his Mudlark album of 1971, Roxy Music on Flesh And Blood in 1980, and Hüsker Dü as a bonus single released with their Zen Arcade LP of 1984. Robyn Hitchcock's version includes a seemingly offhand comment not included in the original version: "In July, 1965, The Byrds first visited Great Britain. I was twelve. You weren't even born yet. That situation continued." Chris Hillman revisited the song on his The Other Side album of 2005.

External Links

• [plays the guitar break on the 12-String]
• Eight Miles High Tablature [link]

References

Notes

 

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