Americana Vinyl Treasures: American Flyer “American Flyer”

I thought I’d say something about an Americana Vinyl Treasure that I only recently unearthed, though I’ve been looking for it for a while. American Flyer are a very interesting band and their debut, self-titled album can be hard to find. The album came out in 1976 and this was the age of the ‘supergroup’. We’d already had the likes of Cream, Crosby Stills & Nash (and Young), Blind Faith, Traffic, Humble Pie and many more by this time, but American Flyer were big news in their native America. The band consisted of Craig Fuller, Eric Kaz, Steve Katz and Doug Yule and, between them, they boasted quite a pedigree. Craig Fuller had been a founder member of Pure Prairie League, one of the leading lights of American country-rock, Eric Kaz came from the Blues Magoos, a psychedelic rock band based out of New York and a significant presence on the American alternative scene in the late 60s and early 70s. Steve Katz had an extensive pedigree of his own by the time he joined American Flyer. Katz had been in the now almost legendary Even Dozen Jug Band, with Dave Grissman, Maria Muldaur and John Sebastian. He was also a member of the Blues Project, alongside Al Kooper and was the original guitarist for Blood Sweat and Tears, staying with them for five years, during which time they produced a number of successful recordings and received three Grammy awards. Finally, Doug Yule started out in Boston band Grass Menagerie but, in 1968, was recruited into Velvet Underground as the replacement for the departing John Cale. Two years later he would move across to lead guitar and lead vocals to replace Lou Reed, following his departure from the band.

This was a band, obviously, loaded with great talent and much was expected of them. In keeping with those expectations their record company, United Artists, wanted a top record producer for the Flyers’ debut album and they went for, and got, probably the biggest name in record production at that time, George Martin. And that’s where it started to go wrong.

American Flyer were, to all intents and purposes, a soft, country-rock band. The main writers were Fuller and Kaz and they leant towards country-rock with folk influences. You can argue that, to some extent, so did The Beatles in their early days, so it should’ve worked. Unfortunately, American Flyer were a very American band and George Martin was a very British producer. In fairness to George Martin, he was producing albums for the band America around this same time and they were certainly cut from the same cloth but, while the combination produced some successful albums for America it would not prove as successful for American Flyer. While the album has some very good moments, there’s a great deal of it which is just an obvious mismatch. This is a band where all four members are singers and guitarists (they used session bass players and drummers for recordings and live shows, with Alvin Taylor and Scott Edwards being bass and drums on this album) and the recording should’ve reflected that, but the guitar sound is frequently poor and Martin has a tendency to drop in strings and orchestral arrangements at oddly chosen moments. It’s the orchestration that seems most at odds with the album, and since the cover proudly proclaims “Orchestrated, Arranged and Conducted by George Martin” he really has no place to hide.

Overall, it’s not a bad album but it is a relatively unexciting one, considering the wealth of talent on the recording. In addition to the band members, guest musicians include Larry Carlton, the excellent Rusty Young, legendary fiddle player Byron Berline and a young(ish) Leland Sklar.  The album should’ve rocked but it barely managed a rather polite shuffle. So why was I so pleased to pick it up?! Well, as I said earlier, it does have some very good moments. The one successful single from the album, the Kaz/Fuller composition, ‘Let Me Down Easy’ is a sublime piece of Californian country-rock that is up there with anything produced by the likes of Jackson Browne and other luminaries of the genre. It also boasts the band’s version of ‘Love Has No Pride’, the song that Bonnie Raitt claimed as her own. The song was written by Eric Kaz with Libby Titus (aka Elizabeth Jurist, mother of Amy Helm) and originally recorded and released by Bonnie Raitt in 1972, so Kaz himself didn’t record it until 4 years later for this album. It’s a song that has been covered by so many major artists, so it’s interesting to hear the writer’s own take on it. It doesn’t depart hugely from the Raitt version, though it’s slightly more up tempo and it has some fine vocal harmony work, plus Berline’s fiddle playing is superb. It is, quite simply, a very good song and the band do a more than good job with it. Steve Katz’ ‘Back in ’57’ is a good song that demonstrates the rather lacklustre production. With a bit more punch, taken at a faster pace and with the guitar with a bit more bite it could’ve been a very different track.

The other reason for wanting to find this album is about completing the group. I already had the band’s self-produced second (and final) album, “Spirit of a Woman”, which I consider to be the better of the two recordings, along with the Fuller/Kaz album that came out after the band split, and which is a wonderful piece of early americana. I find the band, and Fuller and Kaz in particular, one of those fascinating footnotes in the history of this genre; a bunch of musicians that had everything going for them on paper but who never quite gelled as a unit, despite having great songwriters, good voices, and real musical chops; it just goes to show how difficult the business can be.

Following the demise of American Flyer, Craig Fuller and Eric Kaz made one album together before Fuller went on to join Little Feat in the late 80s, staying with them until 1993, after which he reformed Pure Prairie League for a short time. He’s still active, though his last recording, with Doug Prescott, was 2011’s “The Journey and the Deep Blue Sea”. Eric Kaz has also continued to be active in the industry and is best known for his songwriting, with a number of major artists covering a variety of his songs, including ‘(I Am) Blowing Away’ (Linda Ronstadt, Cher), ‘Cry Like a Rainstorm’ (Bonnie Raitt) and ‘All I Have’ (Beth Nielsen Chapman). Steve Katz moved into A&R, eventually becoming Vice President of Mercury Records. He then became a professional photographer. Doug Yule retired from the music business after American Flyer folded and became a cabinet maker and violin luthier. He now gives occasional talks about Velvet Underground and his time on the New York scene of the 60s and 70s.

Availability.

As I said at the start of the article, this album can be hard to find, though it’s not particularly rare. This is probably down to the fact that few people know of the band now and it’s not on the radar for most collectors, so dealers tend not to carry it. The original is only available on vinyl and there are quite a few copies to be found in the US as is to be expected. The record itself can be bought relatively cheaply but the shipping and duty will make it an expensive purchase. In Europe, there are also a handful around and, again, at reasonable prices. Including shipping costs, you should be able to pick up a good copy for around £25, which is a little more than I paid for mine, a mint copy, from a very good music store in Limoges. Being able to pick these things up in person, rather than from online sellers, is usually a plus. The album got its first CD release in 1996, on Vivid Sound, with a reissue in 2003 on the same label. Interestingly, the CDs command a similar price to the vinyl edition. For students of that California country-rock sound, it is worth seeking out – a band that could’ve been a contender but couldn’t quite find the magical combination that would make good songs great.