Bob Lind - 1968 - Elusive Butterfly @320

 Elusive Butterfly/Cheryl's Going Home/It Wasn't Just The Morning/I Can't Walk Roads of Anger



"Elusive Butterfly" is a popular song written by Bob Lind, released as a single in December 1965, which reached #5 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the adult contemporary chart in the spring of 1966. In Australia, Lind's "Elusive Butterfly" entered the charts on April 10, 1966 and spent three weeks at #2 during July 1966. In the song the narrator sees himself as a butterfly hunter. He is looking for romance, but he finds it as elusive as a butterfly.


Lind was born in Baltimore, Maryland. His parents divorced when he was five, and his mother remarried; his stepfather was in the air force, and the family travelled for some years before settling in Denver, Colorado. He became interested in folk music while a student at Western State College in Gunnison, Colorado, and abandoned his studies to become a musician.

 In 1965, Lind signed a recording contract with Liberty Records' subsidiary, World Pacific Records, and it was on that label that he recorded "Elusive Butterfly." The single might have done even better on the UK Singles Chart had there not been competition from established Irish recording artist Val Doonican, who released a cover version of the song at the same time. In the end, both versions of "Elusive Butterfly" made number 5 in the UK in 1966. Lind also wrote "Cheryl's Goin' Home," which was covered by Adam Faith, the Blues Project, Sonny & Cher, John Otway, the Cascades and others. Lind compositions were eventually covered by more than 200 artists including Cher, Glen Campbell, Aretha Franklin, Dolly Parton, Eric Clapton, Nancy Sinatra, The Four Tops, Richie Havens, Hoyt Axton, The Kingston Trio, Johnny Mathis, The Rokes (with the Italian cover "Ma che colpa abbiamo noi") and Petula Clark.

Plagued by drug and alcohol problems, Lind gained a reputation in the business for being "hard to work with." In 1969, Lind severed ties with World Pacific. Three years later, Capitol Records released Since There Were Circles, an album that was well received by critics but not commercially successful. Lind dropped out of the music industry for a number of years. He was a friend of the writer Charles Bukowski, who turned him into the character "Dinky Summers" in his 1978 novel Women and other writings He has been clean and sober since July 1977.

In 1988, he moved to Florida. He wrote five novels, an award winning play, and a screenplay, Refuge, which won the Florida Screenwriters' Competition in 1991. For eight years he was a staff writer at the supermarket tabloids Weekly World News and Sun. He's been credited as co-creator (with photo artist Dick Kulpa) of the famous "Bat Boy" Weekly World News cover story. Lind returned to music in 2004 when, at the urging of his friend Arlo Guthrie, he played the Guthrie Center in Becket, Mass. Since then Lind has been touring.
 

Lind established an official website in 2006. That same year, RPM Records re-issued the album Since There Were Circles, and Lind self-released the Live at Luna Star album featuring performances of new material. In 2007, Ace Records (UK) released Elusive Butterfly: The Complete 1966 Jack Nitzsche Sessions.


In October 2012, 41 years after the release of his last studio album, Lind issued a critically acclaimed CD of new music: Finding You Again, produced by veteran rock guitarist Jamie Hoover of the Spongetones and released by Ace Records. In November 2013, Lind was inducted into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame, along with Judy Collins, the Serendipity Singers and Chris Daniels. In July 2016, Ace Records released a new album of new songs, entitled Magellan Was Wrong. Jamie Hoover was once again involved in the production; other producers were Frank “Rat” Falestra, jazz master Greg Foat and Lind himself. All songs are originals, with the exception of a folk style cover of the Tom Paxton classic "Bottle Of Wine".