Buffalo Springfield – Bluebird

For those in the US and celebrate Memorial Day…Happy Memorial Day!

I had a friend’s dad who owned their 1969 greatest hits album when I was in sixth grade and we wore it out. Broken Arrow, Bluebird, Mr. Soul, For What It’s Worth, and Expecting to Fly were the ones we played over and over and caught something we missed in the previous play.

In 1966 a folk-rock band was formed in Los Angeles from a mix of Canadian and American musicians. It was called Buffalo Springfield. The band consisted of Stephen Stills (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Dewey Martin (drums, vocals), Bruce Palmer (electric bass), Richie Furay (guitar, vocals), and Neil Young (guitar, harmonica, piano, vocals).

Buffalo Springfield is a band that gets lost in the shuffle at times. People know their big hit “For What It’s Worth” but little about the band. They were only active between 1966-68 but had a huge impact on other artists. The band was very talented……with Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Bruce Palmer, Dewey Martin, and Jim Messina who replaced Bruce Palmer. They had some great songs like Mr. Soul, Nowadays Clancy Can’t Even Sing, Burned, Expecting to Fly, Bluebird, Rock and Roll Woman, Broken Arrow, and their big hit For What It’s Worth. Buffalo Springfield is a band that never quite reached its true potential but still made a big impression in the late sixties and after.

Before forming this band, Furay and Stills had played together in the Au Go Go Singers. Palmer and Young had played together in the Mynah Birds. That band featured Rick James on lead vocals and was signed to Motown. Just think about that for a second…Neil Young and Super Freak himself…Rick James was in a band together. They sounded much like the Stones.

Buffalo-Springfield Road Roller - Farm Collector

If Buffalo Springfield would have stayed together… it’s little doubt they would have gotten much bigger than they did with the talented members they had in place. The name of the group was inspired by the Buffalo-Springfield steamroller made by the Buffalo-Springfield Roadroller Company in Springfield, Ohio.

In 1967 they released their second album Buffalo Springfield Again. The album peaked at #44 in the Billboard Album Charts. Bluebird peaked at #58 on the Billboard 100 and #38 in Canada. Three singles in total were pulled off the album.

After various drug-related arrests and line-up changes, Buffalo Springfield decided to break up in 1968. Stephen Stills went on to form the folk-rock supergroup Crosby, Stills & Nash with David Crosby of the Byrds and Graham Nash of the Hollies. Neil Young launched his successful solo career and reunited in 1969 with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.

Neil Young on the breakup: “I just couldn’t handle it towards the end. It wasn’t me scheming on a solo career, it wasn`t anything but my nerves. Everything started to go too fucking fast. I was going crazy, joining and quitting, joining and quitting again. I began to feel like I didn’t have to answer or obey anyone. I needed more space. That was the big problem in my head. So I’d quit, then I`d come back ‘cos it sounded so good. It was a constant problem. I just wasn’t mature enough to deal with it. I was very young. We were getting the shaft from every angle, and it seemed like we were trying to make it so bad and getting nowhere.”

Bluebird

Listen to my bluebird laughShe can’t tell you whyDeep within her heart, you seeShe knows only cryingJust crying

There she sits, aloft at perchStrangest color blueFlying is forgotten nowThinks only of youJust youOh yeah

So, get all those bluesMust be a thousand huesAnd be just differently usedYou just know

You sit there mesmerizedBy the depth of her eyesThat you can’t categorizeShe got soulShe got soulShe got soulShe got soul

Do you think she loves youDo you think at all

Soon she’s going to fly awaySadness is her own.Give herself a bath of tearsAnd go home, and go home

…

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

39 thoughts on “Buffalo Springfield – Bluebird”

  2. I really like Buffalo Springfield, but so far, I only wrote about one of their songs, For What It Is Worth. This is a really good one. The problem with CSN was that they needed Neil Young for his guitar as Crosby and Nash were mostly singers.

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      1. I’m always surprised they are not only in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame but were in there quite early on. Not that they weren’t very good, it just surprises me since they didn’t put out a lot of material and really only had the one hit song. But they’re more worthy than some recent additions there.

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      2. It’s the influence they had Dave…I felt more that way more about the Sex Pistols…one album…but they influenced a lot of people. And….that brings me back to the Monkees. That is a sore spot to me as you know. The Monkees influence so many. I could use both of those bands as arguments.

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      1. You’re welcome and thanks, Max. Going over to older son’s house in a short bit. We’re all meeting up there and headed to the park. Have a wonderful day, my friend.

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  9. I feel like this group was destined to make a few great songs and then move on in their various other directions, just like each of them did. Make that ‘really’ great songs. It’s nice to be reminded of Bluebird. It transports me back to when I was a kid hearing my parents’ radio.

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  11. They are one of those bands that retains its influence I was listening at random on someones Apple playlist- waiting at an appointment, why waste time, so quietly listening- and a cover version of ‘Burned’ by Wilco came on. It took a while for me to put the two together. Speaking of…
    The Rick and Neil All Star Mynah Bird Band????- later the two seemed so far away musically.

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    1. The thought of Young and James in a band…both excites and confuses me at the same time. At this intersection of their lives…I guess they matched.

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  14. I primarily know about Buffalo Springfield because of the two bands that cane out of them, i.e., Crosby, Stills & Nash and Poco. I do know some of their songs as well. I had no idea Neil Young and Rick James once played in the same band – super freaky!

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    1. Neil Young and Rick James….it’s hard to compute!
      Buffalo Springfield were great…Broken Arrow is the one I like best…very odd…like Neil Young’s version of A Day In The Life.

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    1. I thought it would have been bigger also. I really wish they would have stayed together a little longer….Neil just wasn’t made for a permanent band.

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