Eve of Destruction

 

A Close Encounter with Barry McGuire

The religious studies department at our grammar school occasionally arranged ‘entertainments’ for morning assembly. On one occasion, a Christian music group called Rosetta Stone played in the school hall (‘Big School’ as we called it). I wasn’t into their message, but it was a change from routine, and the extended assembly meant we missed the first lesson of the day. I’ve no idea whatever happened to Rosetta Stone; the name was later appropriated by a goth rock band with no apparent connection to the folkies who visited our school. But another such guest appearance was from a considerably more eminent musician. 

Barry McGuire had scored an international hit in 1965 with his recording of P.F. Sloan’s ‘Eve of Destruction’, earning himself a gold disc in the process. The record had become a hit quite by accident: intended as the B-side to another Sloan composition, it was played on air in error by a DJ and quickly became a surprise hit. McGuire’s growly vocal was only intended a guide track, but the disc took off so quickly it was never re-recorded.

Depending on your point of view, ‘Eve of Destruction’ was either a symbol of everything that was wrong with contemporary youth culture or a crass cash-in on the folk rock/protest boom. Its elevation to number one on the Billboard Hot One Hundred and number three in the UK charts does however, seem to have signalled the end of the folkie protest movement whose initiator, Bob Dylan, had already consigned protest songs to his ‘back pages’.

Back in 1975, I knew none of this, and had never even heard the song ‘Eve of Destruction’. How Barry McGuire came to be playing solo to a hall full of grammar school boys I have no idea. He’d become a born again Christian four years earlier and must have been in Britain spreading the word. I remember the event quite clearly: McGuire, huge and bearded, came on stage weilding a big acoustic 12-string guitar. He seemed to be struggling to tune it, and in the course of his performance managed to break a couple of strings. He was still playing ‘Eve of Destruction’, although many of its lyrical references were now somwhat out of date. 

I doubt if many of us had much idea who McGuire was. ‘Eve of Destruction’ had been subjected to a partial airplay ban by the BBC, who decreed it could not be played on ‘general entertainment programmes’ (although it clocked up a single appearance on Top of the Pops during its time in the top ten). I’d have been more impressed if McGuire had announced that he’d sung the lead vocal on the New Christy Minstrels’ novelty hit ‘Three Wheels on my Wagon’, but unsurprisingly this did not figure in his set of evangelical folk songs.

Clearly, we knew he was famous, because afterwards a crowd of us went up to the stage to get his autograph. I handed him my school fountain pen which he couldn’t get to work, and he signed some random piece of paper I’d found in my pocket, now sadly lost.

I was keeping a diary at the time, but neglected to mention McGuire’s visit. I know we were in the third year at the time, which places it somewhere between autumn ‘74 and summer ‘75, and at a guess I’d say it was more or less exactly fifty years ago almost to the day. I know it to have been before the summer of 1975, because that was when I finally got to hear the original ‘Eve of Destruction’ single, courtesy of Jimmy Savile’s Double Top Ten Show.

Looking back, it seems slightly bizarre to think of this pop icon of the 1960s standing on stage in ‘Big School’ strumming his 12-string guitar. This was a guy who was a contemporary of acts like the Byrds. Members of the legendary ‘Wrecking Crew’, Hal Blaine and Larry Knetchel had played on the single. McGuire got a namecheck in the chorus of the Mamas and the Papas’ single ‘Creeque Alley’ (the band sang backing vocals on his cover of their own hit, ‘California Dreamin’’), and Frank Zappa even cited him as an influence on his Freak Out! album sleeve (was he being sarcastic?)

In the US, ‘Eve of Destruction’ had caused no little controversy. Although decried in hip circles as a sell-out, the song’s lyrics were contentious, with lines like ‘you’re old enough to kill, but not for votin’’ (a reference to the draft registration age of 18). Sloan’s record company had told him the song was unpublishable, hence its demotion to a B-side. Perhaps its problem was that it was too full-on, too determined to cause offence, where other ‘protest singers’ adopted a more subtle approach in getting their message across, through poetry and allegory. Some of Sloan’s lyrics veer very close to parody: 

Yeah, my blood's so mad, feels like coagulatin'/ I'm sittin' here just contemplatin'

In production terms, the arrangement ticked all the required folk/protest boxes. The backing is so thin as to be almost inaudible, carried along principally by acoustic guitar, and there are occasional snatches of the obligatory harmonica, lending the whole piece a ‘Dylan-by-nunbers’ vibe. But as an anti-war song released during the Vietnam era, it most definitely touched a nerve. Its references may have dated, but the sentiment isn’t altogether irrelevant today as the governments of the world fulminate over another conflict that shows no signs of ending.

As for Barry McGuire, following the single’s success, he never again made Billboard’s top 40, although he remained active as a singer and performer and is still going today at the age of 89.

Wikipedia’s picture of him (above) coincidentally captures his 1970s appearance and is exactly the way he looked the day he stepped out on stage in Bishop Vesey’s grammar school fifty years ago. I bet it’s even the same 12-string guitar he’s playing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_38SWIIKITE