“He was very emotive...tear your heart out. Even if he wasn’t singing in tune, he could still tear your heart out”
– Bernie Leadon

First shown on BBC4 this documentary of the life, tangled times and premature passing of alt.country’s altar boy Gram Parsons is a southern gothic tale of such high lonesome proportions that, not only does it seem barely scriptable but also like something that the producers of Dallas would have turned down as being too far-fetched.

Much more than a hagiography the affection he was held in still clearly lingers. That he wasn’t the ultimate light that combined country and rock – Byrd Chris Hillman can be credited with being just as responsible – every revolution needs a leader. And Gram had the charisma to carry it through after picking up pieces along the way as opposed to being the legendary Christ-like figure who carried all these rock’n’rollers with him on his mission to create Cosmic American Music.

Being the product of a privileged upbringing marred with bad blood and bad money just adds to the story of this young man charmed and cursed with a talent and vision coupled and quadrupled with the drive and determination to succeed that was ultimately scuppered by his wilful disposition for squander.

Any slight distaste at his star-struck nature and possible accusations that he saw which way the wind was blowing and adapted accordingly can be rubbished by the glorious run of music that he left behind, all done at a frighteningly young age.

His squalid death at his beloved Joshua Tree is tenderly told, the (in)famous tale of his road mangler Phil Kaufman stealing the body to burn in the desert in a pact made with the doom-bound singer not so by the garrulous, all too jovial Kaufman.

A perfect partner to Ben Fong-Torres ‘Hickory Wind’ book this loving portrayal is not before. Despite his obvious lust for the oblivion handed down from Byron and De Quincy to Hendrix and Haggard the tale still, happily, doesn’t alter the idea that, far from wondering what would have become, rather rests the case for him actually having done what he was here to do. A trail blazed in heartache, heroin and Harleys by an angel that fell and whose flame burnt a swathe that still scorches today, breaking ground as parched as Death valley itself.
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- Stu Gibson