The Girl Who Had No Name

Album: Younger Than Yesterday (1967)
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Songfacts®:

  • Bass guitarist Chris Hillman contributed two country-rock-flavored songs to The Byrds' fourth album, Younger Than Yesterday, anticipating The Byrds' future experimentation with the country rock genre. Whilst "Time Between" was a Paul McCartney-influenced pop song, "The Girl with No Name" was inspired by a young lady with the unusual moniker of Girl Freiberg.
  • Girl Freiberg was a friend of David Crosby. Her parents gave Girl her nickname as she was the only female out of their six children. A follower of the San Francisco '60s folk scene, she ran away from home at the age of 16 and married fellow scenester and Quicksilver Messenger Service bassist David Freiberg in order to avoid juvenile hall.

    David Freiberg would later play with Crosby on his first solo album in 1971 and joined the Jefferson Airplane in 1972. He stayed with that band after it morphed into the Jefferson Starship in 1974, remaining with them until 1984 when he quit the group following the departure of Paul Kantner.

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