Getting through that first album is a chore. Something about these guys grates my nerves. On the plus side they remind me how much I like Dylan's voice. I'm wondering if I should continue or leave well enough alone.

The recording sessions for the Byrds' fifth album, The Notorious Byrd Brothers, were conducted in the midst of internal turmoil that found them reduced to a duo by the time the record was completed. That wasn't evident from listening to the results, which showed the group continuing to expand the parameters of their eclecticism while retaining their hallmark guitar jangle and harmonies. With assistance from producer Gary Usher, they took more chances in the studio, enhancing the spacy quality of tracks like "Natural Harmony" and Goffin & King's "Wasn't Born to Follow" with electronic phasing. Washes of Moog synthesizer formed the eerie backdrop for "Space Odyssey," and the songs were craftily and unobtrusively linked with segues and fades. But the Byrds did not bury the essential strengths of their tunes in effects: "Goin' Back" (also written by Goffin & King) was a magnificent and melodic cover with the expected tasteful 12-string guitar runs that should have been a big hit. "Tribal Gathering" has some of the band's most effervescent harmonies; "Draft Morning" is a subtle and effective reflection of the horrors of the Vietnam War; and "Old John Robertson" looks forward to the country-rock that would soon dominate their repertoire. [The CD reissue adds six bonus tracks, including different versions of "Goin' Back" and "Draft Morning," a few instrumentals, and David Crosby's controversial "Triad"; unlisted on the sleeve is a rehearsal outtake which captures comically vitriolic arguments among the band.]

The Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo was not the first important country-rock album (Gram Parsons managed that feat with the International Submarine Band's debut Safe at Home), and the Byrds were hardly strangers to country music, dipping their toes in the twangy stuff as early as their second album. But no major band had gone so deep into the sound and feeling of classic country (without parody or condescension) as the Byrds did on Sweetheart; at a time when most rock fans viewed country as a musical "L'il Abner" routine, the Byrds dared to declare that C&W could be hip, cool, and heartfelt. Though Gram Parsons had joined the band as a pianist and lead guitarist, his deep love of C&W soon took hold, and Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman followed his lead; significantly, the only two original songs on the album were both written by Parsons (the achingly beautiful "Hickory Wind" and "One Hundred Years from Now"), while on the rest of the set classic tunes by Merle Haggard, the Louvin Brothers, and Woody Guthrie were sandwiched between a pair of twanged-up Bob Dylan compositions. While many cite this as more of a Gram Parsons album than a Byrds set, given the strong country influence of McGuinn's and Hillman's later work, it's obvious Parsons didn't impose a style upon this band so much as he tapped into a sound that was already there, waiting to be released. If the Byrds didn't do country-rock first, they did it brilliantly, and few albums in the style are as beautiful and emotionally affecting as this. [Columbia's 1997 CD reissue of the album improves on the masterpiece by adding eight strong bonus tracks, including four cuts with Gram Parsons singing lead trimmed from the original release for legal reasons.]

i didn't mind the notorious as much as the first one. I still can't really get into most of their vocals, but the music had some really cool parts. I think I might be ruined by 90s documentaries where Roger McGuinn is a huge tool talking about how important he was while holding his stupid 12 string. I always picture the dad, and not the 20 something breaking new ground.

I'm behind, but I didn't realize how quick the jump was to Sweetheart. I'm real surprised there hasn't been a cash-in reissue with Gram's vocals added back in.

Untitled/Unissued might be their best after all this.

I was gonna post that overkill Legacy reissue, but clearly we're not really down with that.

Chris Hillman, Gram Parsons, and Kevin Kelley all left the Byrds in wake of the release of Sweetheart of the Rodeo, leaving Roger McGuinn to assemble a new band from scratch. Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde, the first album with McGuinn as unquestioned leader (and sole founding member), was an interesting but uneven set that saw him attempting to bring together the psych-tinged rock of the group's early period with the pure country that Parsons had brought to Sweetheart. The new lineup on this album was as strong as any the band would ever have, with guitarist Clarence White sounding revelatory whenever he opens up, and Gene Parsons and John York comprising a strong and sympathetic rhythm section. But while everyone on board was a great musician, they don't always sound like a band just yet, and the strain to come up with new material seems to have let them down; McGuinn contributes a few strong originals (especially "King Apathy III" and "Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man," the latter written with Parsons before his departure from the group), but the two songs he penned for the movie Candy are just short of disastrous, and the closing medley of "My Back Pages" and "Baby What You Want Me to Do" sounds like padding. Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde proved there was still life left in the Byrds, but also suggested that they hadn't gotten back to full speed yet.

Isn't Untitled the one with a song about falling in love with a horse?

I want it to be known that I typed that review up after my first listen, but didn't submit it and am on the second listen and i am wrong about everything, its the greatest album ever

No album by the Byrds -- at least, among those that weren't originally regarded as well-nigh perfect -- has risen more in some reviewers' estimation in the time since its release than Untitled. True, it always had a following -- and among the later (i.e., post-1968) Byrds albums, it was always the one to own, even if you weren't a huge fan. A double LP issued with two discs for the price of one, Untitled was one of the rare modest commercial successes for the latter-day group, which was understandable, as its 69 minutes of music held a great deal of allure, but the album's sales success was also a result of all of the talent there was in the latter-day group, as well as most of the circumstances surrounding its creation all lining up, for once, in the same direction. The first of the two LPs was a live recording from Queens College's Colden Center, from a February 1970 concert, and it was also somewhat contentious at the time. Some longtime fans -- remembering the fine harmony singing and the carefully articulated playing of the original five-man lineup from the mid-'60s -- didn't care for the approach taken by the 1970-vintage version of the band. It was only in the last decade of the 20th century, many years distant from any version of the band, that some came to accept this recording on its own terms. But then the whole album came into proper focus -- the live rendition of "Eight Miles High," which takes up a full side by itself, is the high point of the whole release, a 15-minute jam that showcases this band's prowess, which extended far beyond Roger McGuinn and Clarence White's playing; the original quintet may have sung better, but could never have done with any part of its repertory what this lineup (McGuinn, White, Gene Parsons, Skip Battin) did on-stage, as captured here. What's more, the rest of that live set isn't to be slighted -- just when it seemed like one couldn't breathe life into "Mr. Spaceman," "Mr. Tambourine Man," or "So You Want to Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star," Clarence White and company do just that, with the added attraction of a first-rate Dylan cover ("Positively 4th Street") plus a new, better than first-rate Roger McGuinn song, "Lover of the Bayou." The latter was a remnant of the musical that McGuinn had been working on with Jacques Levy, a rock adaptation of Peer Gynt to have been entitled Gene Tryp.

albums featuring michael mcdonald backing vocals

Did you guys skip Preflyte and Ballad of Easy Rider?