Desperados: The Roots of Country Rock

by John Einarson

As told by the musicians who made it happen, Desperados: The Roots of Country Rock revisits country rock's rise to the top of the charts. Music scholar John Einarson delves into the years from 1963, when Buck Owens and his Buckaroos brought an electric edge to their Texas honky-tonk tunes, to 1973, when The Eagles released their album "Desperado" on David Geffen's label. Einarson examines how folk, rockabilly, blues, Nashville country, Tejano, bluegrass, and other musical idioms influenced a generation of journeyman musicians. He traces the paths taken by the songsmiths, the bands in which they served their apprenticeships, and the songs they wrote together, as they steadily shaped the country rock sound. The protagonists of this story include talented but troubled Gram Parsons, a virtuoso determined to burn out before he faded away; the versatile and appealing Linda Ronstadt; Mike Nesmith, the Monkee from Texas who returned to his musical roots with a trilogy of country-rock albums; TV heartthrob turned country rocker Rick Nelson; folkie songbird Emmylou Harris before she made it in Nashville; and many others.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction

Paperback

First published December 1, 1991

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Einarson takes a colonoscope to the family tree that spawned the intermarriage between country western and rock and roll to become country rock or alt-country. From Buck Owens to the various groupings of the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield and onto Poco and regrettably the Eagles it's all covered in painful detail here sans index.

[Jeff Tucker · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book covers the efforts by some musicians to introduce country music elements into rock music starting with The Byrds “Sweetheart of the Rodeo” and up to the hit records by the Eagles. The author limits his discussion to a few bands, mostly from the LA area, and the musicians who rotated in and out of these groups over a period of years. Even though there’s a lot of good biographical information on many of the musicians, the book reads like a simple list of who was in which band when they wrote and recorded which songs. Almost every page of the book talks about another musician leaving one band for another band and who replaced him and how that affected the groups sound. The author jumps around so much that I found myself confused about which musician he was talking about and what band they were in now. But I love to read about the song writers and musicians of the 60’s and 70’s so I enjoyed the wealth of information contained here, along with some stories I hadn’t heard before.

[Erik · Rating 1 out of 5]

From a historical and "trivial" perspective, this was a good book. I learned quite a bit about the roots of country rock. Unfortunately, Einarson tended to repeat himself from one page to the next, and his writing style was not to my liking. (This was almost like reading a text book).

[Don · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a history of the origins and development of the musical genre known as country rock. Einarson traces this from Buck Owens and the Bakersfield sound up to and slightly beyond the Eagles.The author describes quite a few albums and identifies many, many of the musicians who contributed to the development of this sound. Most of the individuals were familiar names to me and in most of those cases I was generally aware of their place in the music, but the author provides a lot of information about them. The same is true with the album he describes; most of these I was aware of and have even listened to (in some cases frequently). His descriptions are often reasonably detailed and induced me to go to Spotify and listen to some of them, in some cases for the first time.

The virtue of the book is that the author has done extensive interviews with many of the musicians involved, so there's quite a bit of first hand testimony, if you will. It's fascinating to hear what various members of Poco, for example, talk abouttheir experience in the band and the details of their pre-Poco history and of the formation of the band. There are some significant oral history aspects to this book and that is, for me, the best part of it.

Some Einarson's aesthetic judgments are, in my view, quesionable, but that's inevitable with subjective opinions. Einason also spends a good deal of energy in attempting to categorize albums--rock with country and/or bluegrass elements, country or bluegrass with rock elements, and ultimately "country rock". I found the obsession, if you will, with distinguishing the albums that he believes to be truly country rock from those which aren't, to be annoying.

[Dave Maxwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very detailed history of the beginnings of the country rock phenomenon and its antecedents, featuring lots of information from the people directly involved. I highly recommend for fans of the music genre. Complaints are limited primarily to editing, as this volume would have benefited greatly from the use of section headings (or even physical breaks). The author covers the activities of many different artists for each year, often switching from one to another in rather jarring fashion. A few minor inaccuracies here and there, probably of little consequence, but such issues always worry me; if the minor stuff is wrong, is the bigger stuff correct? I suspect the vast majority is on the money.

[Dave McElfresh · Rating 5 out of 5]

very informatve

I thought I knew most everything about the artists covered in this book since I have most of the albums discussed - as well as having read plenty of books about country rock in general back when I wrote for music magazines. I not only learned far more than expected, the author seamlessly presented the cast of musicians as a very distinct geographical phenomenon considerably different from what was simultaneously evolving in Texas.

[Mark K.Astley · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a bit of a dry read!

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

via NYPL - While it's interesting to see how the musicians in all these bands knew one another and collaborated in various combinations, the book is flat in its delivery/prose and Einarson largely overlooks musicians who had tremendous success (Dylan, Stills, Young) on the borders of rock and country in order to support his notion that the (dreadful, dreadful) Eagles first put it all together commercially.

I did enjoy reading various musicians' thoughts on the influence Gram Parsons, whose work I love but is probably overrated due to his tragic death. Other musicians were working similar veins of music before and during Parsons' career. Still, his music was damn good and that's what really counts.

[Roman Sonnleitner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting infos about the history of country rock - unfortunately, it is not a very well written book, too repetitive in structure...
I'd still recommend it to anybody interested in country rock; and a must-read for fans of contemporary alt.country, too, after all, that's where it all started...

[Bliss · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a wealth of great information here, and the basic concept of the book is a worthy one. But I came away from this feeling that it was a sadly missed opportunity, with too many valuable voices left out of a conversation that needs to be continued. And what is the deal with Einarsen's books needing stronger copy editing?! Some of the mistakes in here were downright embarrassing.

[Donna Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

John Einarson gives a detailed description and road map tracing the evolution of country rock by stringing together comments from the folks who lived, wrote, and played this music. While the writing isn't the greatest and certainly could use some editing, the stories and photos in the book more than make up for it. Fascinating read.

[Donald · Rating 3 out of 5]

A surprisingly good book My preconceptions got me believing that the was going to be a general praise for The Eagles though in my opinion they are overly praised anY praise is for me overly praised a general overview is shown.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not particularly well written, but interesting.

[Haylee · Rating 1 out of 5]

Painfully boring!