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EXPLAINED: The byrds | Rare Historical Photos

“He heard us playing his song electric. You could see the gears grinding in his head. It was like watching a slow-motion lightning bolt”: How The Byrds reinvented a great Bob Dylan song and inspired Dylan to revolutionise his music

It was the first Dylan track to land at No 1 despite him not playing on it

MusicRadar

"We were only a small spark on the Sunset Strip at first, but we became a wildfire." How an unlikely rock star led the psychedelic revolution that swept 60s California

Arthur Lee inspired Jimi Hendrix, formed Love, gave Elektra Records their first hit and blew John Densmore's mind

Louder

"Jim Morrison was standing on the balcony shouting: ‘You guys suck! I got more talent in my big toe than your entire group!'" How Poco invented a brand-new sound - only to have it stolen by the Eagles

While everyone else was getting laid at the Tropicana, "squeaky-clean" Poco created a country-rock template others were quick to borrow

Louder

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"Of course it was a drug song. We were stoned when we wrote it!" The story of the psychedelic masterpiece inspired by John Coltrane, Ravi Shankar and a trans-Atlantic aeroplane flight

Eight Miles High was the single that should have launched The Byrds into the stratosphere. So why did it instead mark the precise moment when it all came crashing down?

Louder

“The atmosphere was intense. Manson said hello and I froze. There was a feeling of extreme evil in the room”: Jon Keliehor went from an unknown psychedelic group to playing with The Doors, turning down The Byrds and rubbing shoulders with Charles Manson

Jon Keliehor was on the frontlines of the West Coast rock scene in the late 60s

Louder

"Those teenage kids could be kind of wild. It could be downright frightening at times." The story of the tongue-in-cheek classic that slammed manufactured pop music, aided by a pair of South African legends

A light-hearted pop at the superficial workings of the pop industry in the 60s, it remains a minor classic. And if you saw the band live in Bournemouth in 1965, you might actually be on it!

Louder

Master the 12-string guitar: restringing, tuning and strumming made simple

Jimmy Page, Pete Townshend, the Eagles, and Richie Sambora swear by 12-string guitars for sonic sparkle – after this guide, you will too

Guitar World

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“Morrison was very clever. He was a regular guy but he really played that image of his well. He was an actor”: The Byrds’ Roger McGuinn on John Lennon’s dangerous side, the myth of Jim Morrison and the forgotten guitar player who was as good as Hendrix

Bob Dylan, Brian Wilson, The Beatles –Roger McGuinn has crossed paths with the them all

Louder

"The place was full of chickens, pigs and goats. The whole thing was fascinating": How an acid-tinged account of a North African adventure became the sound of the counterculture

With 60s pop music going psychedelic, Morocco's hippie trail inspired a song that took three years to come to fruition

Louder

"I saw The Beatles and it all made sense. From that point I needed music like I needed air! There was no other choice for me”: The singer who scored two No.1 hits in the '80s with the band that had fired him a decade earlier

“Music is an ever-evolving art form," he says

MusicRadar

“I don’t think LSD had a real big impact on the songwriting or guitar playing… it was just that we saw brighter colors and got high!” Roger McGuinn on The Byrds’ influential guitar style, and why they didn’t follow The Kinks and The Who into distortion

The banjo-inspired Rickenbacker guitar icon recalls how Miles Davis got them signed and weighs up the merits of David Crosby and Clarence White

Guitar World

“He mostly played bass. I had a ’64 Strat that I got for $200. Tom didn’t really have a good electric, so I let him use that one”: How Mike Campbell and Tom Petty developed their Heartbreakers sound – with the help of some choice early gear picks

Though Petty was in need of a decent electric, the two Heartbreakers quickly landed on a sound that would define their guitar partnership

Guitar World

“The 80s? A lot of hard drugs, cocaine, heroin, people dying. And disco. I mean, how bad can it get?”: the epic life and times of David Crosby

In 2007, Classic Rock challenged the legendary David Crosby to an epic game of word association. Cue tales of women, drugs, prison, liver transplants and ex-bandmates

Louder

David Crosby: celebrating the life of a quick-witted, acid-tongued raconteur and troublemaker with the voice of an angel

A look back at the life and times of the man who, with The Byrds, CSN, CSN&Y and solo, wrote and recorded a soundtrack to a golden era

Louder

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"I jammed with Hendrix and Clapton in a loft in New York": Roger McGuinn's stories of John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison and more

The Byrds' Roger McGuinn played with Jim Morrison, was part of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder revue, gave John Lennon granny glasses and Brian Wilson speed, and he's got some tales to tell

Guitar World

Marty Stuart: “It started with my Clarence White Telecaster. That old guitar is kinda like an invisible band member. It has a tone of its own”

The country legend on channeling the Byrds’ guitar tones, how YouTube helps him cope with the loss of Johnny Cash and finding the amp he’d been searching for all his life

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