Gram Parsons was hardly the only worthwhile musician in
the Flying Burrito Brothers, but the group's fusion of a country sound with a rock & roll mentality was largely his brainchild, and though
the Burritos soldiered on for a while after he left for a solo career, their focus was never quite the same. In 1972 the bandmembers announced they were calling it a day, and the live set
Last of the Red Hot Burritos was intended to be their final album. By this point,
Chris Hillman was the band's de facto leader (he was the only member of the group who had appeared on
the Burritos' classic debut album) and
Last of the Red Hot Burritos reflects
Hillman's passion for bluegrass, with a three-song acoustic mini-set appearing alongside tunes from the band's studio albums, as well as including a few songs that the group had never recorded prior to this concert. The tenor of
the Flying Burrito Brothers on
Last of the Red Hot Burritos was very different from the "Cosmic American Music" of
The Gilded Palace of Sin, with more funky groove in the rock and more rural purity in the country, but there's no arguing that
Hillman had put together a first-class band, including
Byron Berline on fiddle,
Al Perkins on guitar and steel, and
Roger Bush on upright bass, and they play this material with impressive taste and feeling along with truly exceptional technique. As it happens,
Last of the Red Hot Burritos was hardly the end of the line for
the Flying Burrito Brothers, as
Sneaky Pete Kleinow and
Chris Ethridge would relaunch the group in 1975 and various editions of the band would record and tour through the end of the '90s, but this album was a belated but heartfelt farewell to the
Chris Hillman era of
the Burritos, and speaks to his quiet strength as a bandleader as well as this great band's legacy. ~ Mark Deming