Artist:   The Beau Brummels
Song:   "Love Can Fall a Long Way Down"
Album: Bradley’s Barn
Label:   Collectors’ Choice
Year:    1968

The Bay Area-based Beau Brummels jumped on the British Invasion for a fast ride to the top in the mid-‘60s. Hit singles like “Just a Little” and “Laugh Laugh” knew no bounds, and with their fancy name and sharp-dressed style, the group played up the English edge for all it was worth. Once they signed to Warner Bros. Records, though, they dropped most of the outward trappings and went in search of themselves. Their sophomore set for the label found them taking that Nashville trip, without going quite as far as the Byrds’ Sweetheart Of The Rodeo release. In fact, Bradley’s Barn, named after the Music City studio where it was recorded, really isn’t a country-rock album at all. Sure, there are plenty of rural influences, but it’s the Beau Brummels all the way. Members Ron Elliot and Sal Valentino were supported by session stalwarts like Jerry Reed, Kenneth Buttrey, Norbert Putnam and David Briggs, but it was the California duo who stretched their abilities towards a searing sharpness, rather than the other way around. What the band ended up with was a totally unique mashup of several different styles, which is probably why the public ran for the hills when the album was released. “Love Can Fall a Long Way Down” isn’t so much a highlight, because all the songs are like short mini-operas of brilliance, but more a warning of an era--and the band--coming to an end. Elliot and Valentino kept performing and recording, and even reunited once, but this intriguing slice of American ingenuity was really the Beau Brummels’ swan song, and thankfully they went out singing.