(Untitled) (The Byrds album)

(Untitled)
Studio album / Live album by
the Byrds
ReleasedSeptember 14, 1970 (1970-09-14)
RecordedLive album: February 28, 1970, Colden Center Auditorium, Queens College, New York City
March 1, 1970, Felt Forum, New York City
Studio album: May 26 – June 11, 1970, Columbia, Hollywood
Genre
Length71:27
LabelColumbia
ProducerTerry Melcher, Jim Dickson
The Byrds chronology
Ballad of Easy Rider
(1969) 		(Untitled)
(1970) 		Byrdmaniax
(1971)
Singles from (Untitled)
  1. "Chestnut Mare"
    Released: October 23, 1970

(Untitled) is the ninth album by the American rock band the Byrds and was released in September 1970 on Columbia Records.[1] It is a double album, with the first LP featuring live concert recordings from early 1970, and a second disc consisting of new studio recordings.[2] The album represented the first official release of any live recordings by the band, as well as the first appearance on a Byrds' record of new recruit Skip Battin, who had replaced the band's previous bass player, John York, in late 1969.[3][4]

The studio album mostly consists of newly written, self-penned material, including a number of songs that had been composed by band leader Roger McGuinn and Broadway theatre director Jacques Levy for a planned country rock musical that the pair were developing.[4] The production was to have been based on Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt and staged under the title of Gene Tryp (an anagram of Ibsen's play),[5] but plans for the musical fell through.[4] Five of the songs that had been intended for Gene Tryp were instead recorded by the Byrds for (Untitled)—although only four appear in the album's final running order.[4]

The album peaked at number 40 on the Billboard Top LPs chart and reached number 11 on the UK Albums Chart.[6][7] A single taken from the album, "Chestnut Mare" b/w "Just a Season", was released in the U.S. in October 1970, but missed the Billboard Hot 100 chart, bubbling under at number 121.[1][8] The single was later released in the UK in January 1971, where it did considerably better, reaching number 19 on the UK Singles Chart.[1][7] Upon release, (Untitled) was met with positive reviews and strong sales, with many critics and fans regarding the album as a return to form for the band.[2] Likewise, the album is today generally regarded by critics as being the best that the latter-day line-up of the Byrds produced.[9]

  1. ^ a b c Rogan, Johnny. (1998). The Byrds: Timeless Flight Revisited (2nd ed.). Rogan House. pp. 544–547. ISBN 0-9529540-1-X.
  2. ^ a b Rogan, Johnny. (1998). The Byrds: Timeless Flight Revisited (2nd ed.). Rogan House. pp. 307–311. ISBN 0-9529540-1-X.
  3. ^ Rogan, Johnny. (2000). (Untitled)/(Unissued) (2000 CD liner notes).
  4. ^ a b c d Fricke, David. (2000). (Untitled)/(Unissued) (2000 CD liner notes).
  5. ^ Hjort, Christopher. (2008). So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star: The Byrds Day-By-Day (1965–1973). Jawbone Press. p. 200. ISBN 978-1-906002-15-2.
  6. ^ "The Byrds Billboard Albums". AllMusic. Retrieved 2010-02-05.
  7. ^ a b Brown, Tony. (2000). The Complete Book of the British Charts. Omnibus Press. p. 130. ISBN 0-7119-7670-8.
  8. ^ Hjort, Christopher. (2008). So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star: The Byrds Day-By-Day (1965–1973). Jawbone Press. pp. 253–257. ISBN 978-1-906002-15-2.
  9. ^ Eder, Bruce. "(Untitled) review". AllMusic. Retrieved September 7, 2018.