Listen & Be Heard Weekly Archives

It was not by design that the CD reviews for January 2008 have all featured recordings by members of The Band. I never know from week to week what I am going to choose as a subject. The past three weeks?Äô reviews of the music of Rick Danko, Levon Helm, and Robbie Robertson have inspired me to pick through the Band CDs in my collection and get reacquainted with some of their songs. Again, not by design: my standard practice for years (and I do mean YEARS) has been to load up on Beatles music during January, sort of a way to get the year off to a good start in musical terms. Why I have been so preoccupied with The Band this year, to the point of consciously not listening to any Beatles music at all during this month, is a mystery train I currently ride?Ķsixteen coaches long?Ķ

In 1968 my dad made a table for the kitchen. It was designed to function like a Murphy bed: the table would fold down at a ninety-degree angle from the wall, where it was kept in place by a pair of hooks, and the one sturdy leg at the table end farthest from the wall would support it. I would sit at that table every morning, eat breakfast, and listen to KFRC for my daily dose of Top 40 music.

One summer morning I was seated at that table with a mouthful of Captain Crunch or Lucky Charms or whatever sugar-filled cereal was available and I was listening to the radio. I heard a terse melody line slowly being picked on an acoustic guitar, followed by drum beats that were more like the sounding of an alarm than as a way to maintain the song?Äôs tempo, then bass and keyboards joined to escort the song?Äôs opening lines: ?ÄúPulled into Nazareth/Was feelin?Äô ?Äòbout half past dead/I just need some place/Where I could lay my head/Hey, mister, can you tell me/Where a man might find a bed/He just grinned, shook my hand/?ÄôNo?Äô was all he said.?Äù That was my introduction to The Band: ?ÄúThe Weight.?Äù

The song is credited to Robbie Robertson as its writer. He may or may not have had some assistance by Band members, depending on who is telling the story. He may have been channeling ancient spirits with tales to tell from the Nazareth of Palestine to the Nazareth of Pennsylvania. Whatever happened resulted in magic and that is all that really matters. Most rock groups tend to work toward producing a masterpiece, The Band began with one of the best pop songs written during (cue the chorus of angelic voices) The Sixties. And it?Äôs STILL one of the best pop songs written.

The album containing ?ÄúThe Weight?Äù and ten other songs was titled ?ÄúMusic from Big Pink.?Äù As first recordings go, this one is its own box set of classic performances. Robertson, whose writing would dominate the group?Äôs recordings and concerts beginning with the next album (he wrote or cowrote all twelve of its tracks), is represented by just four songs on The Band?Äôs debut. Manuel never wrote or sounded better than his work on this album. Play ?ÄúLonesome Susie?Äù and keep a box of tissues at arm?Äôs length. He cowrote the opening song, ?ÄúTears of Rage,?Äù with Bob Dylan and sang another of Dylan?Äôs songs, ?ÄúI Shall Be Released?Äù in a surprisingly delicate falsetto to close the album. The Band also covers Dylan?Äôs ?ÄúThis Wheel?Äôs On Fire,?Äù this one cowritten with Danko. Danko also takes lead vocal duties for ?ÄúThe Long Black Veil,?Äù a country song from 1959 about a man falsely accused and convicted of murder, who goes to the gallows and dies because he will not tell his accusers that he had been with his best friend?Äôs wife when the murder occurred.

The narrator in ?ÄúThe Long Black Veil?Äù is either honorable, a fool, or both. The Band?Äôs approach to their music on this recording is like that narrator: they honor their musical traditions and are not afraid to get a little foolish at the same time. The first time I heard ?ÄúThe Weight?Äù sitting at that table my father built, I thought I was hearing a hillbilly band from some holler in a coal mining state. The Band knew how to tap into that source of musical knowledge. John Lennon used to use the analogy of a chair to explain how blues music was a part of popular music and rock and roll. The Band, then, might be the table where Lennon would find a barely-teenaged kid sitting in that chair, trying to figure out how to take a load off Fanny and put the load right on me.

It?Äôs a good table. Forty years old. We can talk about it now. If your memory serves you well.

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