James K. Williamson

Published in the 2016 Jan-Feb print issue of American Songwriter.

Blaze Foley’s brown ponytail shimmered on top of a white scarf. A green and gold hair tie held it taut and “C” shaped. Sybil Rosen, who received the ponytail from Blaze in 1977, sat on her couch to my left. We were at “Waller,” a drafty, spacious home hidden by tall pines on the Chattahoochee River, just outside of Whitesburg, Georgia. During the ’70s and ’80s, long before it belonged to Rosen, Waller was a hot-spot for musicians, artists, and hippies. I set the scarf and ponytail on my lap. It felt fresh despite being cut off for 38 years.

Published in the 2014 May-April print issue of American Songwriter.

It’s fair to say Tim Hardin’s surge of creativity between ’66 and ’67 produced some of the decade’s best songwriting. While his debut album, Tim Hardin 1, feels rushed – most songs clock in at two minutes with splatters of orchestral strings over simple lyricism – Tim Hardin 2 paints a more complete picture.

Fred Neil’s cavernous baritone and wayward backing group were recorded directly to stereo for his ’66 self-titled solo album. Conservatively dressed, his curly head nodded over the microphone inside a Capitol studio webbed with shadows. “Everybody’s Talkin’” was finished in one take. Three years later Harry Nilsson covered it for the award-winning film Midnight Cowboy. The song burned the charts and Fred cashed it all in.

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I watched The Rutles’ film, All You Need is Cash, while eating a sausage biscuit for lunch. It seems I just stumbled upon them at random, although I recall hearing about them during a loose round of Trivial Pursuit. I watched these men poke fun at the musically revered Beatles. It was initially unsettling. The whole parody punctured my brain. Had I been a sucker my whole life, believing that The Beatles were lyrically “untouchable?” Have I taken them too seriously for too long? And I sat there, stoned by The Rutles, and ate a sausage biscuit.

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