Wednesday, August 20, 2014

#33 I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better -- The Byrds (1965)



Unbelievably, one of the Byrds’ best songs ever – Rolling Stone put it at #237 on their list of the 500 greatest songs of all time – didn’t even break into the top 100 when it came out, “bubbling under” at #103. Naturally, there’s a story to that. Like “Ain’t No Way”, “I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better” was released as a B-side, in this case paired with Bob Dylan’s “All I Really Want To Do”, which was expected to be a sure-shot follow-up to their chart-topping version of Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man”. Ironically enough, a version of “All I Really Want To Do” by Cher was released as a single at the same time, and had a lot more success than the Byrds’ rendition. “I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better”, despite its lack of initial chart success, became a classic of 12-string-guitar jangle-pop, spawning cover versions by Tom Petty and countless others.

 

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