Among the less favorable contemporary critiques, a "Melody Maker" reviewer dismissed the album as "Not typical Byrds music, which is rather a pity." Writing in "Crawdaddy!" just before he withdrew from city life and temporarily retired from music journalism, Paul Williams lamented: "I'm beginning to think I'll have to make this jailbreak unaided … The Byrds have gone country and "Big Pink" is out, and it's beautiful stuff, man, beautiful … But country is just more relaxation, wonderful stifling inertia … and I guess this isn't the summer to look to be rescued by music." Robert Shelton of "The New York Times" similarly commented that "The latest Byrds album adheres to most of the 'rules of the game' about country sound, and yet, sad to say, to this old fan of the Byrds, the album is a distinguished bore."