The Byrds were on a bit of a comeback following the commercial success of their '69 album, Ballad of Easy Rider, a proper country-folk-rock album that was every bit as concise, gentle, and hard-hitting as it needed to be. How to follow it up? Well, Roger McGuinn was initially working on a country musical, but when that fell through he held on to the songs and began working with the group on another album. (Untitled) is the group's only double LP, with one disc being live recordings and the other being studio. To make a long story short, the live disc is where you get your money's worth, with the studio disc having a batting average on par with Josh Naylor. It's essentially The Byrds' equivalent to Cream's Wheels of Fire, but they aren't as sharp as Cream - that doesn't mean they don't fly high at some points, however.
You'll find the most galvanizing half of (Untitled) with disc one, with some recordings at Queens College's Colden Center Auditorium, and others at the Felt Form. This was the group's first officially released set of live recordings, and for the most part it's a damn-good set. Every song they present us with here, from the swampy opening track "Lover of the Bayou" to a galvanizing rendition of "Mr. Tambourine Man" showcases a particularly tight lineup of The Byrds - of course, Roger McGuinn is still a great guitar player, but new hire Skip Battin proves to be an excellent bass player throughout. Perhaps the only weak point is drummer Gene Parsons, not so much for a lack of talent but for a lack of variety - it sounds like he's doing the same drum pattern every song. There's also a pretty poultry rendition of "So You Want to Be a Rock 'n Roll Star" that has half the energy and far less polish in comparison to the glorious studio version that opened Younger than Yesterday. Besides that, though, we have a solid rendition of "Positively 4th Street," which I found to be more filling than any Byrds version of "Mr. Tambourine Man," and a soaring 17-minute "Eight Miles High," which didn't disappoint.
Disc two shows us a new set of studio recordings, and in comparison to the incredibly tight, varied action of Ballad of Easy Rider, just about every other moment on this disc leaves something to be desired. Of course, it's The Byrds and they can still churn themselves out a great tune, such as disc opener "Chestnut Mare" or the soaring pure country of "Yesterday's Train," but often moments like these are contrasted by some seriously weak moments like the semi-embarrassing "Truck Stop Girl" or the overblown disappointment of a closer that is "Well Come Back Home." Really, it's the lyrics that showcase the weakest contents of a Byrds record in quite some time, prime example being "Take a Whiff on Me," a song that I cannot take seriously no matter how many times I try to.
Perhaps in its excess, (Untitled) shows itself as the group's weakest album, but this isn't necessarily the group's White Album. The live disc is, again, an excellent showcase of a powerhouse group, which leaves the spotty material on the studio disc all the more confusing - how did they drop the ball like this? Almost certainly not as an appealing an album as Easy Rider, and certainly not up there with other Byrds classics like Fifth Dimension or Younger than Yesterday - nevertheless, this is still regularly ranked as one of the group's best with their latter-day line up? Who knows, maybe I'm missing the boat here, because what we have at the end of the day is a very good live album backed with a pretty ho-hum proper album.
RATING: ✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯
Listen to (Untitled).
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