EIGHT MILES HIGH (The Golden Earring)
“Eight Miles High” is a song by the American rock band the Byrds, written by Gene Clark, Jim McGuinn (a.k.a. Roger McGuinn), and David Crosby and first released as a single on March 14, 1966. The song was covered in 1969 by Golden Earring, who put a nineteen-minute version on their Eight Miles High album. (More from Wikipedia)
There are two covers on the Index album: “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” (more the Vanilla Fudge version than the Supremes version) and the Byrds’ “Eight Miles High” (speaking of great psychedelic songs). If there was ever a song that cried out for a really extended treatment, it was “Eight Miles High”; and I still remember well the first time I heard a long version of “Eight Miles High” at a party while I was in college. The artist turned out to be Golden Earring, a Dutch band that has been around about as long as the Rolling Stones; they went on to have two giant hits – both of which I still love – “Radar Love” and “Twilight Zone”.
(March 2011)
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Golden Earring (originally known as the Golden Earrings or the Golden Ear-Rings) formed in 1961 and are still together. The band had numerous hits in their native Netherlands throughout the 1960’s. The first time I heard Golden Earring was at a party while I was in college (around 1970), where someone was playing their cover of the Byrds’ “Eight Miles High”, a song that simply screamed out to be given a side-long extended jam like the one that this band put together.
(January 2013)
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I am a big fan of “Eight Miles High”; besides the original by the Byrds (the song was written by bandmembers Gene Clark, Jim McGuinn and David Crosby), Golden Earring recorded a side-long extended treatment of “Eight Miles High” that I simply love, and past UARB Index covered “Eight Miles High” on their first album.
(July 2015)
