I just finished Robbie Robertson’s “sort-of” memoir “Testimony” (I’ll explain “sort-of later). My brother-in-law loaned me the book saying that it might be a future blog. Having written about the Band last year I wasn’t planning on doing a piece about this book. However it did offer some new perspectives on the Band’s story.
Robertson was the principal songwriter for the Band[1] and this is the final word on the group (unless Garth Hudson decides to weigh in, which is unlikely). Like his songwriting, Robertson is an engaging storyteller. We get a lot about his early days in Toronto and his very colorful, and somewhat lawless, extended family.
Some of these stories we have heard before in other books and re-release line notes: the chaos of the ’66 Dylan tour of Europe, Allen Toussaint losing his horn charts for the “Rock of Ages” shows and the preparations and execution of “The Last Waltz”.[2]
One of the interesting story lines for me is how Robbie eventually emerged as the leader of the Band. It didn’t start out this way. The drummer Levon Helm is the leader early on. He recruits Robbie in the early sixties into the Hawks, the backing band for Ronnie Hawkins. Levon and Robbie become close during this time. Eventually after multiple personnel changes, the Hawks lineup becomes the future members of the Band. After they split from Hawkins they become Levon and the Hawks. The Hawks are at a crossroads when Robbie goes to NYC and meets Bob Dylan at the recording session for “Like A Rolling Stone”. Dylan asks him to play guitar on his upcoming tour. Robbie then recruits the rest of the Hawks to back Dylan on his infamous ‘66 tour. Levon quits early on because he can’t take the unruly crowds. From this point on Robbie becomes the leader of the Hawks and later the Band. By the time Levon returns to join them in Woodstock it’s Robbie’s show.
Robbie becomes tight with Dylan on the ‘66 tour. This close relationship will continue on through their sabbatical in Woodstock after Dylan’s motorcycle accident, all the way through “The Last Waltz”. It’s probably not going too far out on the limb to say without Dylan there would be no Band. There is also Robbie’s relationship with Dylan’s manager Albert Grossman who champions the young group and helps them get signed. This is the development of Robbie as the ultimate insider, which continues after the Band moves to California and he forges relationships with David Geffen and Martin Scorcese.
The Band was atypical for the times. This was the peak of the counter culture. Kids were turning away from their parents and rock was leaning toward loud electric music with extended guitar solos. The Band cut against this grain with an understated, ensemble approach. They even put a photo of themselves with their extended families on the back cover of their first album. Their time in Woodstock shielded them from the influences of the outside world so they could forge their own sound. After they released their first album, “Music From Big Pink”, the world came looking for them trying to understand where this new music was coming from.
The Band, in addition to their understated ensemble sound, was also unique for having three lead singers, that didn’t include the principal songwriter (Robertson). According to Robbie he wanted this to be a balanced group, not one where he wrote the songs, sang them and played the solos. The fact that Rick Danko, Richard Manuel and Helm were outstanding singers helped achieve this goal. Even their stage setup was non-standard with Helm’s drums set up stage left in the front and Garth Hudson’s keyboards setup center, back where the drum riser usually is.
Robbie goes on at some length about the musical gift of the other bands members, particularly Garth Hudson, who is a virtuoso on his Lowery organ. All the members of the Band, other than Robbie, ironically, are multi instrumentalists. Rick Danko is said to be able to learn almost any instrument in a short time. The four would regularly switch seats and instruments during their shows.
Creatively the Band was effectively done after the release of their fourth album,” Cahoots” in 1971. Robbie and the others must have been feeling the strain of keeping up with the first two records. After Cahoots they would only release one more album of original songs, “Northern Lights, Southern Cross” in 1975 (not counting the outtakes, B-sides “Islands” that was put out in 1977 to satisfy their contract with Capital Records and allow “The Last Waltz” album to be released on Warner Brothers).[3] Helm, Danko and Manuel getting involved with heroin was the primary reason given for this drop in creative output. Robertson seems to stop writing altogether during this period.
Still Robbie plays nice when recounting his relationships with the others in the group particularly Levon Helm (compared to Levon’s Robbie bashing in his Band memoir “This Wheel’s On Fire”). Almost too nice when you know the tensions that were building after the their third album “Stage Fright”.
The book is strangely paced. The bulk of it deals with the Hawks, Dylan’s ‘66 tour and the Band’s time in Woodstock recording in the basement of their house with Dylan. The first 400 pages of the book take us to the 1971/72 New Year’s shows at The Palladium in New York City (from which the live album “Rock of Ages” is sourced). The last 100 pages covers from early 1972 to The Last Waltz in November 1976. There is a lot of ground to cover here: the Band’s members’ slide into heroin addiction, the historic show at Watkins Glen in 1973 with the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers (one page), the 1974 tour with Dylan and of course the Band’s farewell at Winterland with The Last Waltz. Then the book just ends. Nothing about the last album “Islands” or putting together The Last Waltz movie and album. And he completely avoids recounting the acrimony that ensued when the rest of the group realized that Robbie was moving on after The Last Waltz.
ARTS ROUNDUP:
Watching: Got back into the second season of “Billions” on Showtime. This is such a great show with US Attorney Chuck Rhodes, played by Paul Giamatti, chasing the hedge fund titan Bobby “Axe” Alexrod played by Damian Lewis. The show gets all the little things right that most TV series don’t, especially when it comes to the finance industry. The soundtrack is also killer, featuring the likes of Car Seat Headrest, Keith Richards and REM.
Reading: “Open and Shut” by David Rosenfelt is the first installment of a series featuring the New Jersey lawyer Andy Carpenter. Andy is a smart aleck who sometimes tries too hard to be funny but most of the time he is an entertaining and likeable character. It was a good, fast moving story and features the various NJ locales. I’m in for number two in the series.
Listening: I went to my local music store on Record Store Day last weekend. I almost bought a live album by the band Halestorm (I bought something else). I then looked them up and streamed their album “The Strange Case of…” They’re a hard rock band from York, PA formed by the brother and sister team of Elizabeth and Arejay Hale. She’s the lead singer. Picture Pat Benatar fronting Guns n Roses, at least for two thirds of the record. The middle section is a little less in your face but still has an edge. A song like “Beautiful With You” veers close to pop and you could imagine Taylor Swift singing it.
[1] The Band was Robbie Robertson, Levon Helm, Rick Danko, Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson.
[2] Robbie’s account of strong-arming the legendary promoter Bill Graham to cooperate with director Martin Scorcese’s preparations sounds strangely out of character for the mercurial Graham.
[3] “Northern Lights, Southern Cross” had some great songs on it. “It Makes No Difference” is one of the most gut-wrenching romantic songs ever written and “Ophelia” would fit on any of the Band’s earlier albums.