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How the Ghost of Gram Parsons haunts Alt-Country

Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, January 2018

GRAM PARSONS didn't care much for the term "country-rock". And he wasn't thrilled by some of the more candy-coated bands who were able to capitalize on a more polished, laid-back variation on what he was up to with the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers. But whether he would have approved or not, Parsons became one of the key figures who helped forge the alliance between country and rock. He didn't leave behind a vast body of work: he didn't live to see his 27th birthday, and his legacy rests on around a half-dozen albums that he played a prominent role on, but two of those albums, the Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo and the Burritos' The Gilded Palace of Sin, have cast a shadow that still lingers over everything that came to be called alt-country and Americana.

Total word count of piece: 4049

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