User:TenPoundHammer/NGDB

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band was founded in Long Beach, California, in 1966. Founding guitarist Jeff Hanna was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, but his family had moved to Long Beach four years prior.^[1] While in high school, he befriended guitarist Bruce Kunkel, and the two played in a local duo called the New Coast Two.^[2] As they wanted to form a larger group, the two began playing impromptu jam sessions at a Long Beach music shop called McCabe's Guitar Shop. Through these performances, they recruited four other musicians. These were Jimmie Fadden, who at the time played washtub bass, harmonica, and guitar, along with Ralph Barr (guitar, clarinet), Les Thompson (guitar, mandolin), and Jackson Browne (guitar). All six members also served as vocalists. Browne quit the group after only a few months and was replaced by John McEuen, who contributed on guitar, mandolin, banjo, and washtub bass.^[2] They briefly called themselves the Illegitimate Jug Band before selecting the name Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.^[1]

John's older brother William served as the band's manager, helping to book them as opening acts for artists such as Joan Baez. He also helped the band sign a contract with Liberty Records, who released the band's self-titled debut album that year.^[1] "Buy for Me the Rain" was released as a single from this project, and it reached number 45 on the Billboard Hot 100.^[3] The band released another album for Liberty, Ricochet, later in 1967. After this album, Kunkel quit over creative differences in the band's sound, and was replaced by multi-instrumentalist Chris Darrow.^[2] Of their style at the time, Mary Campbell of the Associated Press noted the band's use of acoustic instruments and rudimentary traditional folk instruments such as washtub bass, kazoo, comb and paper, and jug. She also noted that their clothing and song choices, such as a cover of "Teddy Bears' Picnic", reflected the music and mindset of the 1920s.^[4]

Their third album, 1968's Rare Junk, was their first to feature electric guitar, electric bass, and drums.^[2] Although Browne had left the band by this point, they covered his "These Days" on it. Johnny Sandlin contributed on drums.^[5] Bob Talbert of The State (newspaper) praised the album for the variety of instruments used, noting that said variety allowed influences of jazz and country music on top of the group's existing jug band sound.^[6] A year later, Liberty released a live album titled Alive, recorded at the Troubadour in West Hollywood, California.^[7] That same year, the band contributed the song "Hand Me Down That Can o' Beans" to the soundtrack of the movie Paint Your Wagon, starring Lee Marvin.^[2][8] Coinciding with the recording of this song, the band members moved to Aspen, Colorado.^[2]

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's fourth Liberty album, Uncle Charlie & His Dog Teddy (1970), featured a cover of Jerry Jeff Walker's "Mr. Bojangles". The band's version of the song was their first major hit, reaching number nine on the Hot 100.^[2] Also charting from the album were covers of Kenny Loggins's "House at Pooh Corner" and Michael Nesmith's "Some of Shelly's Blues".^[3] Richie Unterberger of AllMusic wrote of this album, "The group moved into a more accessible rock-oriented fusion of country, bluegrass, pop, and rock & roll, relying primarily on smartly chosen covers...Few bands had incorporated instruments more commonly associated with country and bluegrass, particularly mandolin and banjo, as comfortably into a rock setting prior to this release, and their well-crafted harmonies help put the songs over for those not-steeped-in backwoods sounds."^[9] Barr quit the band in 1971 and was replaced with Jimmy Ibbotson, who mainly contributed on bass guitar but also played drums, piano, and accordion.^[1][2]

Soon afterward, Liberty Records was sold to United Artists Records. The band's first project for this label was 1972's All the Good Times. The album had further cover songs on it, including Hank Williams's "Jambalaya (On the Bayou)" and Doug Kershaw's "Diggy Liggy Lo".^[1] The former of these was issued as a single, but peaked in the lower end of the Hot 100.^[3] Also in 1972, the band traveled to Nashville, Tennessee, to record the album Will the Circle Be Unbroken. This was a collaborative album featuring a number of country and bluegrass artists, such as Roy Acuff, Maybelle Carter, Earl Scruggs, and Doc Watson.^[2][1] Writing for The Los Angeles Times, Robert Hillburn thought that the band showed appreciation for the music of the collaborators, and that the album would appeal to music fans who did not like the then-contemporary Nashville sound.^[10] Will the Circle Be Unbroken went on to earn a platinum certification in 1997,^[11] The album also accounted for the band's first entries on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts: a cover of Hank Williams's "I Saw the Light" and the original "Grand Ole Opry Song", respectively featuring guest vocals from Roy Acuff and Jimmy Martin.^[12]