Fact #118530
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Short story:
The Byrds arrive in London, UK, on Flight 770 from Chicago, Illinois, USA. Paul McCartney of The Beatles and his girlfriend Jane Asher spend the evening with members of The Byrds in The Scotch of St. James nightclub. The visit will inspire their 1966 hit single Eight Miles High, which includes lines such as "Eight Miles High and when you touch down, You'll find that it's stranger than known", and "Rain grey town, known for its sound, in places Small Faces unbound."Full article:
Bobby Hamilton (UK tour roadie, The Byrds] : They floated out of the hotel, floated into the car, floated on stage, floated off stage, floated back to the hotel, shut the bedroom door and that was it. It was reefers from day one. You could never socialise with them. They were away. Smoke was everywhere.
Roger McGuinn (The Byrds] : We did have a little cannabis, and some purple hearts to help us along. I'd actually done acid in San Francisco in 1961, but we didn't have any with us.
Derek Taylor (PR man, The Byrds] : The dope smoking was chronic. And we were taking purple hearts, which I bought from some bloke who came up from W10. He said, 'What do you want buddy?' I said, 'I don't know. What have you got?' He said, 'These are fifteen quid a hundred.' So I said, 'Give us them.' I distributed the purple hearts and generally behaved irresponsibly, I would say.
David Crosby (The Byrds] : Derek hyped us, but the thing was, see, if you're out hyping .... Hyping is like, you know when your dealer says to you, "Man, say, man, I have some weed that is so rightgeous that you might as well bang your head against the wall as smoke it. I mean now that's a hype. But whatever he says, if he delivers, that's a good hype! You go back to that cat, right? And, well, Derek Taylor used to say that it got magical and weird and shit at The Byrds, and that's a hype. Only thing as it did, sometimes.
Roger McGuinn : The press crucified us but the fans liked it. I came away with mixed feelings about the whole thing because basically our British fan base at that point was teenage girls, who scream hysterically like they did for The Beatles, and that was a thrill. That didn't happen to quite the same extent in America. The fact was that we were not a polished band. We'd only been together eight or nine months, so the press was being more analytical and noticing little things like we were out of tune, or the drummer missed a beat. Michael, our drummer, had literally no experience of the music business before we brought him in as our drummer. He was literally off the street. The story that we invited him to join the band because he looked good is absolutely true.
Donovan was kind to us. The musicians liked us. We had great respect from The Beatles, they came along to see us and the camaraderie was wonderful. I remember being at a fantastic party in Brian Jones' house with The Beatles, Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Donovan – so the musicians were great to us. It was just the press that didn't like us.
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Roger McGuinn (The Byrds] : We did have a little cannabis, and some purple hearts to help us along. I'd actually done acid in San Francisco in 1961, but we didn't have any with us.
Derek Taylor (PR man, The Byrds] : The dope smoking was chronic. And we were taking purple hearts, which I bought from some bloke who came up from W10. He said, 'What do you want buddy?' I said, 'I don't know. What have you got?' He said, 'These are fifteen quid a hundred.' So I said, 'Give us them.' I distributed the purple hearts and generally behaved irresponsibly, I would say.
David Crosby (The Byrds] : Derek hyped us, but the thing was, see, if you're out hyping .... Hyping is like, you know when your dealer says to you, "Man, say, man, I have some weed that is so rightgeous that you might as well bang your head against the wall as smoke it. I mean now that's a hype. But whatever he says, if he delivers, that's a good hype! You go back to that cat, right? And, well, Derek Taylor used to say that it got magical and weird and shit at The Byrds, and that's a hype. Only thing as it did, sometimes.
Roger McGuinn : The press crucified us but the fans liked it. I came away with mixed feelings about the whole thing because basically our British fan base at that point was teenage girls, who scream hysterically like they did for The Beatles, and that was a thrill. That didn't happen to quite the same extent in America. The fact was that we were not a polished band. We'd only been together eight or nine months, so the press was being more analytical and noticing little things like we were out of tune, or the drummer missed a beat. Michael, our drummer, had literally no experience of the music business before we brought him in as our drummer. He was literally off the street. The story that we invited him to join the band because he looked good is absolutely true.
Donovan was kind to us. The musicians liked us. We had great respect from The Beatles, they came along to see us and the camaraderie was wonderful. I remember being at a fantastic party in Brian Jones' house with The Beatles, Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Donovan – so the musicians were great to us. It was just the press that didn't like us.