Byrdmaniax

About Byrdmaniax

Byrdmaniax is the tenth album by the American rock band the Byrds. It was released in June 1971 on Columbia Records (see 1971 in music) at a time of renewed commercial and critical success for the band, due to the positive reception that their two previous albums, Ballad of Easy Rider and (Untitled), had received. The album was the second by the Byrds to feature the Roger McGuinn, Clarence White, Gene Parsons, and Skip Battin line-up of the band and was mostly recorded in early 1971, while the band were in the midst of an exhausting tour schedule. As a result, the band had little time to hone their new songs before recording commenced and thus, much of the material on the album is underdeveloped. Byrdmaniax was poorly received upon release, particularly in the United States, and did much to undermine the Byrds' new-found popularity. The album peaked at #46 on the Billboard Top LPs chart but failed to reach the UK Albums Chart. The song "I Trust (Everything Is Gonna Work Out Alright)" was released as a preceding single on May 7, 1971 in the United Kingdom but it did not chart. A second single taken from the album, "Glory, Glory", was released on August 20, 1971 and reached #110 on the Billboard chart, but again, the single failed to reach the UK chart. Byrdmaniax remains one of the Byrds most poorly received album releases, largely due to the incongruous addition of strings, horns, and a gospel choir which were overdubbed onto the songs by producer Terry Melcher and arranger Paul Polena, reportedly without the band's consent more »