The Long Ryders
Two Fisted Tales

For those who don't know, the Byrds reformed in the eighties and decided to call themselves the Long Ryders... just kidding, of course! But it is true that Sid Griffin's group can proudly claim the title of the new Byrds, even though our hero started as an angry "garage rocker" playing no less than at the court of Shelley Ganz in the Unclaimed. And you must know that Ganz was downright paranoid, convinced that music stopped in 1966 with Count Five and the Chocolate Watchband! Clearly, a free spirit like Sid, who lit a candle every night to the saint of Gram Parsons, couldn’t remain long with such a character and thus formed a quartet, naming it after his passions, the twilight western cinema of "The Long Riders" (known to us as "I cavalieri dalle lunghe ombre") by director Walter Hill, but changing the "i" to "y" in homage to his favorite band: the Byrds. And over the years, the group managed to increasingly refine their sound, from the raw but captivating psychedelia of the beginning to a modern country that remains tied to the byrdsian flavors, legitimately becoming part of the so-called Paisley Underground movement, which rekindles the myth of the West Coast.

"Two Twisted Tales" from 1987 is their swan song and the proof of this modernity faithful to the past: full-throttle rock in the harder tracks like "Gunslinger Man" or the cutting guitars of "Prairie Fire" or the gritty garage of "Long Story Short", spiced with lead guitar solos as they were done in the past.

But the rest of the album is the realm of byrdsian-flavored ballads. Starting from the shameless jingle jangle and choruses of "I Want You Bad", continuing with the beautiful "Man of Misery" and the storytelling accompanied by a twelve-string and mandolin on "Rest of My Days", pure west coast in the slide attacks of Steve McCarthy. But there's still room for the electric tension of an enveloping ballad like "A Switch in Time" and for the psychedelic jingle of "Babes in Toyland", or the Mexican fiesta of "The Lights Gets in the Way" adorned with David Hidalgo's accordion from Los Lobos, veiled in melancholy because Sunday is ending and tomorrow begins a long week of trabajo.

If there weren’t music like this, life would be much, much harder...