Blog | Shashké Music and Art

The River is Wide

The River is Wide

Words and Music by: Billy Admire and Gary Knight

Originally recorded in 1967 by the Forum

also recorded in 1969 by the Grass Roots

Lead Guitar: Johnny Echols

Bass, Guitars, Drums, Sound Effects, Vocals: Laurie Larson

The sky was clear on that windy day

Till the clear blue sky began to turn to gray

The lightening flashed, the thunder roared above

Then fell a drop of rain to start our love

Let the river get wide – the river gets long now

The water runs deep as our love gets strong now

So baby, don't you fight, and say you belong now to me

Upon the roof we heard the gentle rain

With the rhythm of our heartbeats, down it came

As it hit, each drop, our hearts could feel the pain

No one on Earth can stop a drop of rain

And the river gets wide – the river gets long now

The water runs deep as our love gets strong now

So baby, don't you fight, and say you belong now to me

Let the river get wide – the river gets long now

The water runs deep as our love gets strong now

So baby, don't you fight, and say you belong now to me, yeah

Let the river get wide – the river gets long now

The water runs deep as our love gets strong now

So baby, don't you fight, and say you belong now to me...

I first heard The River is Wide when Ralph Gilmore first played drums on my music. Ralph has played drums on all of my songs on my second album, Aquila, my third album, A Striking Resemblance, and six songs on Story Road. Ralph is the best dummer in all of Arizona for any genre and is in demand all the time. Here he is with Rob Grill on American Bandstand when he played on their very last studio album:

I played everything on this except lead guitar, which Johnny Echols nailed! One of Johnny's first bands was called "The Grass Roots" but Lou Adler stole the name! Here's Johnny with the full story: We were The Grass Roots, until a serendipitous encounter with Lou Adler. Bryan and I were on a break at The Brave New World, where we were appearing nightly, clearly billed as The Grass Roots. A gentleman whom we had seen at the club a number of times, walked up to Bryan and me and introduced himself as Lou Adler. Accompanied by a stunning young lady, he began complimenting us on our group. He was effusive in his praise, stating that we were going to be huge and that with his help we could become the next Beatles. Truth be told, he was a bit inebriated and all of his over-the-top rhetoric seemed more about impressing the chick with how important he was than signing us. Being that we didn’t know who he was anyway, we didn’t take him very seriously. After several minutes, Bryan interrupted him and said our break is over and he should speak with our manager. As we turned to walk back inside, all hell broke loose. Adler began screaming and cursing, how dare we disrespect him like that, didn’t we know who he was? He then said something that caused us both to start laughing… “You’ll never work in this town again!” A couple of months later, one of the regulars at The Brave New World came up to Arthur and me at Canter’s, a local eatery and musicians “hang-out” and told us how much she loved our new record. Since we didn’t have a record out, I asked her what she was referring to. She told us that she had heard a song on the radio called ‘Mr. Jones’ by The Grass Roots and everyone assumed it was us. As it turned out, Lou Adler had produced and released a record called ‘Ballad of a Thin Man,’ by Bob Dylan. And he had purposely appropriated our name in order to get our substantial fan-base to go out and buy it, thereby giving it a huge bump in sales. His subterfuge worked…and the record quickly moved up the local charts, due to a large number of purchases by our unwitting fans.

We spoke with a couple of attorneys and were told that though we would likely win, it would be a very expensive proposition to fight in court and that we would be better off professionally by simply changing our name. We were advised, in no uncertain terms, that Mr. Adler was a very important, and well-connected figure in the music industry. After serious thought, we began considering several different names, and we decided on Love. Again, on the advice of those very good lawyers, Arthur and I, filed the necessary paperwork to legally trademark our new name. And that’s how The Grass Roots became Love.

Both Rob Grill and Ralph Gilmore were not part of Lou Adler's "Grass Roots" at the time, although the only top 40 hits the "Grass Roots" ever had was when Rob sang lead. With Rob the Grass Roots was in the Top 10 - three times, the top 20 - six times and the Top 40 - 14 times! The Grass Roots are not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame but Love is. Love also was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The River is Wide reached #31 on the Top 40, and #4 in Canada for the Grass Roots. I turned it into blues, and sang a ton of harmony parts including my lowest attempted notes ever. My free range chickens jumped up on my window sill to sing along it was so funny. Hope you sing along too:

Limitless

When I write a song, I have done it many different ways, the title first, the melody first, the lyrics first, the bass first, the drums first, the chord structure first, nature sounds first.. with Limitless I went a step further, trying to write from a vantage point as if I was someone else. Who are some of my favorite musicians? How would they write this song? I wanted to write a song for my friend Heather who is a fantastic singer to maybe inspire her to do her own album. She would deserve my favorite musicians writing and even playing on a song for her. What if it was played by musicians I love who also played music with her dad? What about the guy who wrote a song about her dad called "My Friend"?

ree — Heather's Dad - photo by Henry Diltz

Unfortunately, this dream would be impossible as both Rusty Young and Paul Cotton are no longer with us. Wait... but I did ask Rusty and Paul to play on my stuff over ten years ago, but all I have is a chord progression. So there it is! I will start with the chord progression they played with George Grantham. Then came the title, which borrows part of a word in Heather's dad's song Take it to the Limit. Then the lyrics and the melody came to me. I added bass and a little guitar and Johnny Echols who was also a friend of her dad, played amazing lead guitar! Seriously a kick ass part, thanks Johnny! So I had the demo now I mixed and recorded myself. I wasn't sure how it would be received by anyone. I was so excited to finally have played with members of Poco and Johnny Echols. I started to really like it. There was a drummer who wanted to hear it and perhaps play on it. His reaction crushed me. He told me I need to quantize things and put it on a grid so people can play on it. He asked me if I knew how to loop things. He kept asking me if Leland Sklar was going to be on it, and if so then he'd be interested. Leland rocks and played on my last album, but I just can't afford it this time. He also criticized the drums "Oh I deleted that track right away" and the guitars he said were off and that I need to learn to play better. "Is this even a song?" Was another comment. I didn't know how to respond, and I just lied to him, "Yeah, I don't know how to loop or really record, yeah I played those tracks I will try and redo, sorry." I just could bear him criticizing my heroes, I'd rather him think I'm an idiot - which I am a lot of the time ha ha. Plus, now I was worried if I showed Heather would she have the same reaction?

I scraped up money and had Leland play on it and removed my bass part. After I showed this version with Leland to the drummer, he asked "Do you have any different songs I could play on?". I was so upset, I just spent all that money and I wanted to play bass with my heroes, especially since they were no longer here. However, it was the right thing and feel blessed the drummer pushed me to get Leland. Leland's part is so perfect! What ended up on the album is the original instrumental demo with my guitar, Poco and Johnny Echols and Leland's part added. I added a violin part at the end and the vocals. Now for the scary part what would everyone else think of the song, especially Heather?

.... GULP! .... Heather was so kind, she said she loved it and so did her mom! It is also the second most played song on college radio from my album Pegasus and Equuleus! It charted on several college stations Folk playlists and is my most "Shazamed" song.

Limitless

Words by: Laurie Larson Music by: Laurie Larson & Rusty Young

Lead Guitar: Johnny Echols

Bass: Leland Sklar

Guitars: Rusty Young & Paul Cotton

Drums: George Grantham

Guitars, Violin, Vocals: Laurie Larson

Facing challenge after challenge

Looking for any trace of hope I can scavenge

What’s their meaning

as the sun's rays break through beaming.

Finding what you want

Is anyone’s guess

All I know is… You are Limitless, You are Limitless

I could never love you any less

And I know you are Limitless you are Limitless

More good things accumulating

More truth is illuminating

It soon takes hold and your soul is never, never growing old

You’re all I want

I must confess

And I know you are Limitless, You are Limitless

I can't wait to hear the version with Heather's vocals someday... stay tuned!

Color of Your Ideas Run Together

It is often said that music is a painting on a canvas of silence. This song I wrote as a musical description of a painting, this time with painting becoming a palette of sound. Voices become a paintbrush, the bass ebbs and flows like paint out of the tube. Will my next creative stroke be at the center, or should the center really be the top? The song slows down and speeds up just like how inspiration does. The song shares the hope that art would heal no matter what form it takes.