♫ Eight Miles High ♫

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, History, music

As sometimes happens, one of my music choices a few days ago, Creeque Alley,  started a discussion between Roger and rawgod, and it ultimately led to them talking about this song, Eight Miles High by The Byrds.  Both of them liked it quite well, but I couldn’t really remember it, only the title.  So, I listened, and … I have since apologized to both ears for any possible damage done and am sipping a cuppa wine to calm the heartbeat.  Needless to say, that’s likely the last time I want to listen to this one.  BUT … I aim to please, and since both rg and Roger seem to really … and I mean really … like it, then … why not?  Maybe some of the rest of you will like it too!

Rawgod sent me a link to some interesting trivia on a site called “Louder Sound” about the song …

The Byrds’ Gene Clark spent their first transatlantic flight, in August 1965, looking out of the window, watching as the Californian sunshine gave way to the drizzle of London. As the plane made its slow descent towards the rain-lashed runway of London Airport, Clark’s muse kicked in, and by the time The Byrds returned to America he had written some lyrics about the trip.

When The Byrds’ Eight Miles High was released in December 1965, it took little delving to identify the ‘rain-grey town, known for its sound’ as the London that Clark had observed from the plane. The reference to ‘signs in the street that say where you’re going’ was revealed as a dig at the random placing of street signs around the English capital, while ‘nowhere is there warmth to be found among those losing their ground’ was a nod to the hostility they encountered from The Birds, a British mod group who accused the band of stealing their name. That same flight also prompted the song’s title.

“We started it as Six Miles High,” guitarist Roger McGuinn recalls, “because that’s the approximate altitude that commercial airlines fly. Forty-two thousand feet – or about eight miles high – is the altitude reserved for military aircraft. But Gene said eight miles sounds better than six, and it did sound more poetic. It was also around the time of [The Beatles’] Eight Days A Week, so that was another hook.”

Eight Miles High represented a musical departure for The Byrds. While the verses were still carried by the harmonies of Clark, Roger McGuinn and David Crosby, the psychedelic intro and breakdown showed influences that had been buried on their covers of Bob Dylan songs.

“The bass intro is really borrowed from John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme,” bassist Chris Hillman admits. “And we were listening to a lot of Ravi Shankar.”

If you’re interested, you can read the rest here.

Others obviously liked the song much better than I did, for in 1999, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, an honor reserved for “recordings of lasting qualitative or historical significance that are at least 25 years old.” In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked Eight Miles High at number 151 on their list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, and in March 2005, Q magazine placed the song at number 50 on their list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Tracks.

This one charted at #14 in the U.S. and #24 in the UK, and according to the Louder Sound article, was what led to the downfall of The Byrds when the song was banned in cities across the U.S.

Eight Miles High
The Byrds

Eight miles high, and when you touch down
You’ll find that it’s stranger than known
Signs in the street, that say where you’re going
Are somewhere just being their own

Nowhere is there warmth to be found
Among those afraid of losing their ground
Rain gray town, known for its sound
In places, small faces unbound

Round the squares, huddled in storms
Some laughing, some just shapeless forms
Sidewalk scenes, and black limousines
Some living, some standing alone

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: David Crosby / Gene Clark / Roger Mcguinn

Eight Miles High lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Reservoir Media Management Inc, Warner Chappell Music, Inc

65 thoughts on “♫ Eight Miles High ♫”

  1. Pingback: ♫ Eight Miles High ♫ – Joe Stilez Music

  4. One of their best. I looked it up to see who had covered it as I’d never heard another version. Some big names there, including Golden Earring, who I really like. They didn’t play it when I saw them at uni though. You could always play The Byrds own live version, from their ‘Untitled/Unissued’ album – just the 16 minutes of it!

    Good to know that many US states were as intolerant in the Sixties as they are today 🤣

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  5. Too kind Jill….Too kind. I played my copy of the single over and over and over. The most interesting facet about this being the influences of Ravi Shankar sitar genius and legendary jazz saxophonist John Coltraine.
    There is the Byrds’ own 18 min version on the album ‘Untitled’ (by then only McGuinn remained of the original line up; with Gene Parsons, Clarence White and Skip Battin own unique contributions it was quite different).
    Aside from the original single, I’m with Orca on Golden Earring’s spectacular version…… though Hillman’s original opening bass lines will always be…..magic.
    What’s that we were saying about good songs standing all sorts of variations?

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  7. Jill, I like this one. It is not my favorite of theirs, but remains a good tune. I see where folks like others’ cover of it better, but there is something to be said for those who words and notes on a blank sheet of paper and recorded it first. There are a couple of big time songwriters and musicians who helped pen this. McGuinn taught George Harrison how to play the twelve string guitar which is a nice credit. Keith

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    • Yes, I noticed that several people preferred other covers to The Byrds’ version, but you’re right … there is something to be said for the original creator who put heart and soul into a song. Just out of curiosity, which is your favourite Byrds’ song? I didn’t know that McGuinn taught Harrison to play the 12-string!

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      • Fun fact. In an interview a few years back McGuinn said he had the proto-Byrds still on the folk circuit saw the Beatles…McGuinn checked out the guitars and thought basically…… ‘we have to have some of that’ (my words on his thoughts)….George Harrison at the time was playing 6 string Rickenbacker…McGuinn took that to the 12 string, and thus taught George.
        As the saying goes ‘What Goes Around Comes Around’
        (And in my opinion, the very opening chord of Hard Day’s Night, seems to link up with some of McGuinn’s early work when the Byrds went ‘Rock’….. Everyone influences everyone else in wonderful cycles)

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  10. Needless to say, this song and Alex Harvey’s Faith Healer accompanied my first shy forays into the wonderful world of recreational drugs. Don’t look so stern, I was 13, a silly teen and it had to be done or you weren’t cool. You know, peer pressure n stuff. 😉

    It just occurs to me … can it be be that we were a whole lot more free than the kidz of today?

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    • Hey … I wasn’t looking at you stern!!! I was 13 once too, y’know, and while the only drug I did was pot, I got in trouble more than a few times for skipping class and smoking in the boys’ bathroom! Even hot-wired my dad’s car and ‘borrowed’ it a few times!

      More free? In some ways, yeah, probably. In other ways … perhaps not.

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      • More free? Hey, I remember my leaving for school on Friday morning … only to come back home on Monday noon, after school. Me and my parental units found this quite normal.
        “Had a nice weekend, kid?”
        “Yeah, thanks. We were surfing (I spent it on the beach, having sex, doing drugs, not your bizniz).”
        Dunno if kidz, particularly in population-controlled America, can do this nowadays.

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        • Then your parents were unique!!! I knew of no parents like that! Mine would punish if I was 5 minutes later than I said I would be! I have no idea how today’s teens are, what they do … I’d like to think they’re more mature than we were at that age, but that’s probably an empty wish.

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          • I know they are not good people. Totally not independent, spoiled, irresponsible. Because they are under control the whole day and getting told what to do. Something I didn’t know. My parents were rather old when I was born (accidental kid) and never did more than the absolute necessary for me. I was living besides them rather than with them.

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            • To some degree, I’m sure you are right. But, uniquely here in the U.S., I’m seeing that kids who have been exposed to the darker side of humanity via school shootings, are becoming responsible, outspoken (in a good way) adults, and perhaps that’s what is needed. Like you, my parents were somewhat older than average (dad was 36, mom was 26) when I was born, but quite different from your parents, that seemed to make them overprotective, if anything. That, plus the fact that my father, at least, worked in the underbelly of society and knew all too well the dangers that lay out there.

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              • “(dad was 36, mom was 26)”

                Pfff, beginner. 😉

                Mom was 45, dad 43 when it happened. They were typical war survivors, busy building their lives, and they already had a 17 y/o daughter. They were still caught up in the spirit of the early 20s and showed no understanding, nor interest in anything that happened in the cultural and societal developments of the 60s. I realised pretty early on that they tried to shape me into a miniature version of themselves. Ugh!

                And my mother, not just passively but actively hated me all her life. So they didn’t pay much attention to me, and I refused to buy into their unhealthy mindset. That’s how I turned out to be a very mature, self-reliant girl very early. Wise beyond my years. LOL. And they knew they could let me do my own thing, care about my own business.

                Just had a chat with one of my oldest friends and when I was like “Remember when we were young…” she interrupted me rather rudely “You were never young, bitch!” 😦 Also learned just a couple years ago that everyone we knew, was wondering why, as a teen, I never ran away from home. 😮 Because I didn’t know there was anything wrong with our family. Thought we were normal.

                See, so everybody has their pack to bear, to carry that weight.

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                • Ahhhh … something else we have in common … my mother saw me as a burden, as something keeping her from doing the things she wanted to, whatever those things were. I can’t say she actually hated me, but I was … in the way. Just before my 2nd birthday, she got angry and threw me down the stairs, breaking my collarbone. I think in some ways she loved me, but in other ways she didn’t. And yes, it does make you grow up faster.

                  I did have to chuckle about your friend saying “You were never young, bitch!” And yeah, when we’re young, our family is all we know of life and so naturally that is what we think is ‘normal’. Later in life, we realize that … there is really no such thing as “normal”.

                  Yep, we all have our pack to bear, my friend. Thanks for sharing some of yours.

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                  • “there is really no such thing as “normal”.”
                    No. But in other families, I noticed when I visited friends, there was some kinda atmosphere of mutual love and respect. The talks around the dinner table where intelligent and funny. And they could disagree, having disputes and even fight. No biggie. None of that with my folks. When I dared to have my own opinion – even when based on facts and teached in school – for my parents it was like an apocalyptic event. “Ooooooh! How dare you? How can you say that?” Mom crying, father visibly falling apart in his chair. End of any reasonable discussion. 😮 Maybe growing up with Hitler’s Nazis, doesn’t prepare you for any intellectual exchange. But why did they have it out on their sweet little daughter? :..(

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                    • Sounds like you had it even worse than I did, perhaps because of the then-recent past connections to Hitler, the Nazis and WWII. You’re right … why did they have to take it out on their daughter? That, my friend, is a question that may never be answered and that I’m sure is still being asked by some children even today in every nation around the globe.

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                  • Yeah, they never really liked to talk about those 12 years that interrupted their youth so brutally. Guess that’s why the Americans coined the phrase “silent generation”. But that’s what threats by the nazis on the ground and “Bomber Harris” in the sky does to one I guess.

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                    • I think that unless you actually lived through it, you really cannot understand what that kind of war does to a person. Thankfully, our generation has not had that level of brutality … yes, we’ve had our problems, but … ours likely pale in comparison to those of our parents, and especially yours. My father fought in the war, but even that isn’t the same as living there in Germany where it all started and where the worst of it happened.

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    • I had a completely different introduction to recreational drugs. I had been hanging around with friends who smoked weed regularly, but there was no peer pressure involved. The rule was, “If you don’t want it, pass it along”. After about a year or so of passing it along, I finally tried it, and smoked occasionally until I was diagnosed with athsma and quit.

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      • I meant peer pressure not in a bullying way. Was more like “What will they think of me if I don’t try it?” You know the mind of a 13 y/o teenager is mostly not very self-assured but full of doubts.

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  11. Of course your frenemy Orca likes this song, too. The wild cascading guitars, the drugged up sound. It’s just all sorts of cool.The version by the the Byrds is still the most harmless and poppy of all the interpretations I know of.

    Nice live version with much better guitars by Golden Earring, ca 1975:

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    • Ha ha … I’m not in the least surprised by that! I listened to the Golden Earring version and admittedly liked it somewhat better, but it’s not destined to make it to my playlist either. Gimme some Stevie Wonder!!!

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        • Hey, he cannot help that he was born blind, Orca. You’re a better person than that …

          I’ve always loved Sir Duke, but I love almost all of Stevie’s music, and Lionel Richie’s as well. I’m betting you’re not a fan of either? 😉

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          • I know he was born blind. Hence I called him a blindo. And according to Stevie he’s not blind, he just can’t see. 😉

            No, not a fan of neither of them. Old black American guys are a bit too overgroundish and mainstream for my rather eclectic heavy taste.

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      • Yes, they were no slouches, still aren’t. They are still rockin’ today. In smallest venues, more like a pub band, often playing unplugged and for smallest crowds, like their friends n stuff.

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        • Not bad for a band that started out in 1961.
          ‘Wall of Dolls’ was for me a stand-out album…..Although to confuse everything the previous album ‘Golden Earring’ is actually titled ‘Eight Miles High’ and that second album is called ‘Golden Earring’ .
          There some impressive European Bands back then….fellow Dutch Band ‘Super Sister’ (although more ethereal); very little known ‘Amsterdam’, rocking ‘Earth and Fire’….Netherlands did produce some good bands.
          The Danish Band …’Day of Phoenix’ ; eclipsed by Burning Red Ivanhoe….
          And of course Amon Duul (mostly politics not much music) followed by Amon Duul II.
          Those were inventive days.

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            • I found Amon Duul very soothing, which might not have been the intention, but music affects us in different ways.
              To my regret Tago Mago by Can was lost in a carelessness.
              Tangerine Dream were another innovative band, which a friend of mine was tuned into.
              Dutch and German bands were producing some exceptionally interesting work in that era.
              It was, still is, my opinion that they took the music more seriously and immersed themselves in the art.
              Some British bands, in my opinion cultivated Ego and their brand name, and lived off of that.

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              • “they took the music more seriously and immersed themselves in the art.”
                Yesyes. Typical German. The most unstylish muesli eco hippies but many of them studied classical shit in conservatories n stuff. I guess 2 of the Kratfwerkers studied music under Prof Stockhausen, who was a pioneer of electronic music.

                Of course they never had the sex appeal and hit potential of the British glamrockers of the same time frame. 😦

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                • Now that 50 years have passed I can reveal my deepest secret on Word Press..
                  I never rated T. Rex other than just another fashionable trend in glam rock, and not really deserving of legendary status.
                  As for the rest….freak shows.
                  Europe was far ahead of a British scene still relying on ‘The Swinging Sixties’ to carry it along.

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                  • But still, as a normal teen in Germany of the 70s, most of the music we got to hear was British. And Marc Bolan brought us some undying evergreens. Then there was Sweet, Slade, and some old timey faves like Yes, Who, Led Zep. And every week a new cool band, cool or silly or both. Ever heard of the Bay City Rollers? They happened a bit before my time but were all the rage for a short while.

                    My time really began with the Sex Pistols and the following punk aera, then postpunk, new wave, synths and the 80s, which were also dominated by Brits. Until the Neue Deutsche Welle Germany had nothing of its own but almost nostalgic old men’s Krautrock.

                    What I just notice is how small the role of American music was for us. Most of us prolly didn’t know and didn’t care if our music was English or American but as we know now it was 95% British.

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                    • By the time the Bay City Rollers were a success I was in my mid-twenties and learning about the hard facts of adulthood and helping rear a family in the self-absorbed 1970s, which would grow worse when Margaret Thatcher appeared.
                      To look back at manufactured commercial outfits and the growing remote excesses of the Prog-Rock bands it was not surprising that punk and ska came to prominence, although punk soon became exploited and bands with all the depths of The Bay City Rollers only in ragged shirts and swearing were selling records.
                      I felt more at home with synth.
                      Of course the USA was suffering from the crime of Disco, while the bands which were fresh and innovative in the late 1960s had grown older and less interesting. The US had its own punk scene, and also Stadium Rock which had its own charm, more importantly was the Riot Grrlll bands, young women with voices and guts who had to face misogyny hostility caused by them not being willing to be well behaved sex toys. There was another wave of excess this time from The Hair Metal bands who were only along for the Sex and Drugs.
                      Whichever way you looked someone who couldn’t play two notes was making money out of images and trends.
                      There was good music, but as always you had to look for it.
                      Until the time we married in 1973 over 6 years I had acquired 222 albums, mostly lost now. Yesterday I sat down and tried to remember them all, I have written down 192, so far.

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  12. Thank you for this, Jill. I know it cost you.
    The music is actually quite subdued for being psychedelic, its energy is very controlled, unlike what psychedelua would become in the hands of people like Jimi Hendrix, and Eric Clapton in his Cream incarnation. .
    When it came out I too thought it was a drug song, because I could not make hide nor hair of the lyrics. Knowing now that it is about a trip to London I cannot find one drug reference in those lyrics.
    But, the drug effects of LSD are all over the presentation, (similar to the presentation of MacArthur Park, which I decided not to write this about the other day.) Under the influence words can be differently arranged while still not promoting or condoning drug use. The fools who banned the Byrds’ song keyed on one word, “high,” which is the word we used to describe our mental experience on LSD, our minds were reaching for a “higher level of consciousness.”
    You mentioned this song reached #14 on the charts, but that doesn’t tell the real story. Eight Miles High was flying up the charts when it was released, until the ban happened. The correct description is that it stalled when banned, and its quick rise stopped dead. Without the ban it would have reached #1 with no problem, which is why in Creeque Alley John Phillips thought McGuinn (symbolizing the Byrds) “couldn’t get much higher, and that what they were aiming at,” being #1 as Barry MacGhire had done with “Eve of Destruction.”
    How’s that for tying together a number of your recent posts? Gotta love it when a good “experience” comes together.

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    • I guess you had to be a Brit and familiar with our weather and those London references to get Clark was writing about the jarring effect of a Californian arriving in the seriously mis-named Swinging London.

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      • I knew the Brit side, but never thought about the coming from the contrasting Californian side. Having grown up in Winnipeg, which gets almost every kind of weather it is possible to get, it was impossible to imagine a place where the weather was good 364 days a year. Vancouver is so like London in wintertime, and that was where I spent my early hippie days. When I finally made it down to California in 1970, the weather was boring, because every day was exactly the same as the day before. And being as Haight-Ashbury was dying, I did not stay long

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  13. Pingback: ♫ Eight Miles High ♫ — Filosofa’s Word | Ned Hamson's Second Line View of the News

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