The first version of the Burritos formed after bassist Ian Dunlop and drummer Mickey Gauvin left the International Submarine Band in the spring of 1967. Their bandmates Gram Parsons and John Nuese kept the ISB name, hired a number of session players and friends, and recorded Safe at Home (1968). The split was driven by different musical visions - Parsons and Nuese wanted to concentrate on country music, while Dunlop and Gauvin wanted to combine R&B, rock and country - but was relatively amicable.

Dunlop and Gauvin began playing their blend of styles at clubs around LA with a shifting group of musicians as the Flying Burrito Brothers (Dunlop came up with the name). Other original Burritos included guitarist and vocalist Barry Tashian and keyboardist Billy Briggs (late of Boston's legendary group, the Remains), horn player Junior Markham and saxman Bobby Keys (who played with Leon Russell and later backed Delaney & Bonnie, Joe Cocker and the Rolling Stones). Parsons actually played at their debut gig, and from time to time thereafter. The roster was flexible, featuring any number of friends, including Russell and Jesse Ed Davis.

The original Burritos deliberately avoided the music industry - they didn't want to get signed, they didn't want to have hits, they just wanted to play the music they liked. In fact, when they were recognised by fans on the streets of LA in mid-1968, they concluded that they were becoming too well-known and moved the core of the band to New York City. They continued to play under the Burrito name out East, even after Parsons adopted the name for his new group.

During Parsons' brief stay in the Byrds, he and Chris Hillman had discussed forming a band that would play country music with a rock attitude. They even recorded a few sessions with Clarence White, Gene Parsons and Gib Guilbeau in what Gene Parsons called a 'prototype Burrito Brothers'. Before any decision could be made, Parsons had quit the band and had fallen out with Hillman, while White and Gene Parsons had joined the Byrds.

Once Hillman quit the Byrds, he and Parsons reconciled their differences and revived their plans to form a country band. Parsons had already lined up a bassist in Chris Ethridge, who had been in the second version of the International Submarine Band and played on the album. They brought in Sneaky Pete Kleinow on steel guitar, but went without a regular drummer. They decided to borrow the name of Ian Dunlop's band, by this time relocated to New York - the Flying Burrito Brothers.

Parsons and Hillman got a house in the San Fernando Valley and dubbed it 'Burrito Manor'. This was a particularly productive period, with new songs such as Sin City, Devil in Disguise and Wheels.

The Burritos quickly landed a recording contract with A&M and by the end of 1968 were at work on their first album, The Gilded Palace of Sin. ISB drummer Jon Corneal played on half the songs and three different session drummers handled the rest. The album was released in early 1969 to critical acclaim and indifference from the public.

The Burritos then hired ex-Byrd Michael Clarke away from Dillard & Clark and headed out on a national tour by train (Parsons, like Gene Clark, had a fear of flying). As 1969 wore on, the Burritos came apart. Chris Ethridge left in the fall, so Hillman moved over to bass and Bernie Leadon, also late of Dillard & Clark, joined on guitar.

Parsons seemed less interested in working with his own band than in hanging out with the Rolling Stones, in town for several months to mix Let It Bleed. The follow-up album, Burrito Deluxe (1970) was written and recorded without any of the feeling or intensity of the first album. Parsons was also getting into a lot of drugs. A&M, predicting an even worse showing for the second album, withheld the release.

When the Rolling Stones announced in November that they would headline a free music festival in San Francisco, Parsons successfully got them to give the Burritos a slot in the lineup. The Burritos' appearance at Altamont was uneventful, despite the many disasters that plagued the show.

With A&M still sitting on the second album, Jim Dickson got the Burritos into the studio to record some classic country songs. Most of these half-finished songs saw release on Sleepless Nights (1976). Around the same time, Parsons injured himself severely while riding his poorly-maintained Harley with head Papa John Phillips. After a few weeks in the hospital, he went out with the Burritos again, seemingly determined to get himself kicked out of the band through contrariness and indiscipline. In this he was successful and was sacked in June 1970.

The Burritos continued as a foursome under the leadership of Chris Hillman, playing in that lineup through the summer of 1970. At some point during that time, they recorded a cover of Tried So Hard with Gene Clark (who had just left Dillard & Clark), which was released as a single in December 1970.

In September, the band's manager, Eddie Tickner, introduced them to a young unknown named Rick Roberts, who auditioned and joined the band in time for their third album, The Flying Burrito Brothers (1971). At this point, Roberts had very little songwriting experience, and Hillman remained the unquestioned leader of the band. Nevertheless, Roberts was the dominant musical force on the album, writing three songs and co-writing four more with Hillman. The third album was more commercial than its predecessors, but was not very successful.

Sneaky Pete finally tired of unsuccessful touring and left the band to do session work. Al Perkins came in as steel guitarist, which would be the beginning of a long musical partnership with Hillman. Unhappy at being elbowed out of the singing and songwriting spotlight by Roberts, Leadon was next to leave, headed for Linda Ronstadt's band and fame with the Eagles.

The Burritos veered away from Roberts's soft rock when they replaced Leadon with Kenny Wertz (whom Leadon had replaced in the Scottsville Squirrel Barkers a decade earlier). Wertz brought along two cohorts, fiddler Byron Berline and bassist Roger Bush, who had been in the final incarnation of Dillard & Clark, and in the Doug Dillard Expedition after Clark's departure. Berline, Bush and Wertz had formed the bluegrass band Country Gazette in January of 1971. Only two months later, all three had joined the Burritos.

A 1971 tour with this version of the Burritos was captured on Last of the Red Hot Burritos (1972), issued the following May. The album featured some tunes from the Parsons era, some classic country covers and three rocking soul songs. This material, stronger than that on the previous album, showed off the band's new sound to good effect.

The Burritos were attracting critical notice for their live show, but by October 1971, Hillman had tired of constant touring in discouragingly small venues with no improvement in sales or exposure. With steel player Perkins, he accepted an offer to work on the new album by Stephen Stills, an old friend since the early days of Buffalo Springfield. Stills was at the peak of his commercial success, all five of his most recent albums having entered the Top Ten (with CSN, CSNY and solo). Hillman felt that his odds would be considerably better as a part of Stills's new project, Manassas.

Like Hillman, drummer Clarke did not see much future in the band, so he left as well. Roberts was left with no original Burritos, but a solid bluegrass backbone in the form of Wertz, Berline and Bush. Adding Alan Munde on banjo, Don Beck on steel guitar and Erik Dalton on drums, Roberts took the new outfit for a tour of Europe, captured on Six Days on the Road - Live in Amsterdam (1973).

After that tour, Wertz, Berline and Bush reactivated Country Gazette, taking Munde with them. Roberts retreated to Colorado and a solo career, although he reunited with Clarke in Firefall a couple of years later. The Flying Burrito Brothers were no longer a going concern - at least temporarily.

In July 1974, A&M released the double album compilation, Close Up the Honky Tonks, which featured cuts from each phase of the Burritos' career, plus a handful of outtakes and rarities. Perhaps as a result of heightened interest in Gram Parsons after his two solo albums for Reprise and his headline-making death in September 1973, the compilation did reasonably well.

Eddie Tickner, the Burritos' old manager, fielded a number of inquiries from clubs interested in booking the band, which started him thinking about reviving the Burritos. However, reviving the real Burritos was no longer possible, with Parsons dead, Hillman busy with the Souther-Hillman-Furay Band, Leadon doing even better with the Eagles, and Roberts and Clarke putting together Firefall. Instead, Tickner called another of his old clients: former Byrd Gene Parsons, who in turn called up Chris Ethridge, Gib Guilbeau and Sneaky Pete Kleinow. By mid-1975, the new model Burritos had a deal with Columbia and a new album, Flying Again (1975).

Ethridge, the first full-fledged member to leave the original Burritos in 1969, became the first to abandon the Refried Burritos as well. In his place, the group hired ex-Byrd Skip Battin, who had more recently been playing country-rock with the New Riders of the Purple Sage. Battin and Gene Parsons had been the rhythm section of the Byrds for three years, so Battin was a natural choice.

This version of the Burritos released Airborne (1976), which did not chart. Later, a live show by this group was released as Sin City (1992).

The Burritos continued touring around Europe and Japan during the 1970s, releasing two live albums: Flying High (1978) and Close Encounters to the West Coast (1991). With the addition of guitarist/vocalist Greg Harris, the Burritos continued touring (sometimes with Ed Ponder on drums) and in June 1979 released another concert album, Live from Tokyo.

Various incarnations of the Burrito name have continued touring and releasing albums almost to the present day, but never with any great success.