Song of the Day 11/22: The Byrds, “He Was a Friend of Mine”

The assassination of John F. Kennedy was arguably the defining moment of the Boomer generation, and musicians responded with songs. Roger McGuinn — still Jim at the time — rewrote the lyrics to an old folk song that Bob Dylan had altered and recorded for his first album but did not use. It didn’t appear on vinyl until 1965’s “Turn! Turn! Turn!” LP, but became a fixture in the band’s live set. This clip is from the Monterey Pop Festival, where David Crosby introduced the song by alleging that Kennedy has been shot “from a number of different directions by different guns,” illustrating that by 1967 people were refusing to accept the conclusions of the Warren Commission. That little outburst also pissed off McGuinn (as did Crosby joining Buffalo Springfield on stage during their set the next day), and Crosby was booted from the band.

The Dylan recording, though unreleased, was widely circulated by bootleggers, and it’s clear this is the version McGuinn took as a jumping-off point because he used the chords that Dylan changed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOdSYbAsKag

The first version of the song, dubbed “Shorty George,” was played and sung by a Texas convict named Smith Casey, recorded by John Lomax in 1939 and released by the Library of Congress in 1942. Nobody knows anything about Casey, not even if that was his name.

In 1961, during the Great Folk Music Scare, is was recorded by Rolf Cahn, who changed the title to “He Was a Friend of Mine.”

Eight years ago on Nov. 22, McGuinn was taping a live TV show in Los Angeles. Someone asked him about that day, and he responded with the song. If you doubt the effect of JFK’s assassination on Boomers, notice he still seems to get a little choked up singing it.