Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde

Following the departure of Gram Parsons from the band, lead guitarist Roger McGuinn and bass player Chris Hillman decided that they needed to find a replacement member to meet their forthcoming concert obligations. With an appearance at the Newport Pop Festival looming, McGuinn and Hillman moved quickly to recruit noted session guitarist and longtime Byrd-in-waiting, Clarence White. After the Newport Pop Festival appearance, White began to express dissatisfaction with the band's drummer, Kevin Kelley, and soon persuaded McGuinn and Hillman to replace Kelley with Gene Parsons (no relation to Gram), a friend of White's from their days together in the band Nashville West. The new McGuinn, Hillman, White and Parsons line-up of the band was together for less than a month before Hillman departed to form the Flying Burrito Brothers with Gram Parsons. Amidst so many changes in band personnel, McGuinn decided that he alone would sing lead vocals on the band's new album, to give it a sense of sonic unity. McGuinn felt that it would be too confusing for fans of the Byrds to have the unfamiliar voices of the new members coming forward at this stage and so White, Parsons and York were relegated to backing vocal duties during the recording of the album. Ultimately, the band were unhappy with Johnston's work on Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde and, as a result, it was the only Byrds' album to be produced by him. In that instance he incurred the band's wrath by overdubbing a female choir on to the recording, allegedly without the Byrds' consent. When the single then stalled at number 132 on the Billboard charts the band decided that they would not work with Johnston again. ==Recording==

Recording sessions for the album began on October 7, 1968, with nine songs intended for the album being recorded during that month. Among these songs were "Nashville West", an instrumental written by Parsons and White during their tenure with the country rock group of the same name, and "Your Gentle Way of Loving Me", a song that Parsons and Gib Guilbeau had released as a single in 1967. Another song recorded during these sessions was McGuinn's "King Apathy III", a comment on political apathy and a championing of the rural idyll as an antidote to the excesses of the L.A. rock scene. which McGuinn had originally learned from watching Bob Gibson and Bob Camp at Chicago's Gate of Horn club back in April 1961. "Old Blue" features the first appearance on a Byrds' recording of the Parsons and White designed StringBender, an invention that allowed White to duplicate the sound of a pedal steel guitar on his Fender Telecaster. Emery was not, in fact, a Klansman. An acetate version of Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde, dated October 16, 1968, and containing a seven-track programme for the album is known to exist. At this point the album consisted of the songs "Old Blue", "King Apathy III", "Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man" and "This Wheel's on Fire" on side one, with "Your Gentle Way of Loving Me", "Nashville West" and "Bad Night at the Whiskey" on side two. while the McGuinn—York penned title track was not. A medley featuring the Dylan-authored Byrds' hit "My Back Pages", along with an instrumental named "B.J. Blues" and a jam version of the blues standard "Baby What You Want Me to Do" was also recorded during this December recording session. ==Release==

Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde was released on March 5, 1969, in the United States (catalogue item CS 9755) and April 25, 1969, in the United Kingdom (catalogue item 63545 in mono, S 63545 in stereo). Like the Byrds' previous LP, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, the album was issued exclusively in stereo in America, but appeared in both mono and stereo variations in the UK. Sales of Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde were poor in the U.S., causing it to stall at number 153 on the Billboard Top LPs chart and giving the album the dubious honor of being the lowest charting album of the band's career, edging out the later Farther Along by just one place. The album fared better in the United Kingdom, however, where it reached number 15 on the UK Albums Chart. The "Bad Night at the Whiskey" single was released ahead of the album on January 7, 1969, but it failed to reach the Billboard Hot 100 or the UK Singles Chart. The album's title, along with the back cover photo sequence, which featured the band changing from astronaut flight suits into cowboy garb, illustrated the schizoid nature of the album's material. The psychedelic rock of "Bad Night at the Whiskey" and "This Wheel's on Fire" sat alongside the Bakersfield-style country rock of "Nashville West" and "Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man". Despite containing only ten tracks, Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde is the Byrds' longest single album, clocking in at approximately thirty-five minutes in length. Only the double album (Untitled) is longer. ==Critical reception and legacy==

The album was released to generally positive reviews, with famed rock critic Robert Christgau declaring the album "first-rate Byrds, a high recommendation." Johanna Schrier, writing in The Village Voice, described the album as "smooth and strong like a blended whiskey", before suggesting that it was "Part kin to Sweetheart of the Rodeo, part the acid offspring of Notorious Byrd Brothers." Disc magazine were particularly enthusiastic in their praise of the album, stating "[This is] their best album since perhaps Younger Than Yesterday, perfectly illustrating the two completely disparate sides of the group: far-out electronic rock and hick, twangy country." Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde was remastered at 20-bit resolution as part of the Columbia/Legacy Byrds series. It was reissued in an expanded form on March 25, 1997, with five bonus tracks, including the outtake "Stanley's Song". Although the producer of the Columbia/Legacy Byrds' series, Bob Irwin, has stated that only the first four Byrds' albums underwent any remixing, some fans of the band maintain that Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde was also remixed, citing distinct differences between the 1997 reissue and the original album. Among the differences found on the reissue are a lessening of reverb on many songs, the appearance of the spoken word "three" over the opening seconds of "This Wheel's on Fire", and a longer, unedited version of "Candy" appearing on the album for the first time. ==Track listing==

Adapted from The Byrds: Timeless Flight Revisited and ''So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star: The Byrds Day-By-Day (1965-1973)''. The Byrds • Roger McGuinn – guitar, lead vocals • Clarence White – guitar, backing vocals • John York – electric bass, backing vocals • Gene Parsons – drums, harmonica, banjo, backing vocals Additional personnel • Lloyd Green – pedal steel guitar on "Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man" ==Release history==

Single release • "Bad Night at the Whiskey" b/w "Drug Store Truck Drivin' Man" (Columbia 44746) January 7, 1969 ==References==