Music for the Native Americans - one of my faves.

Robertson is a legend. Oddly, for one who has made such a huge contribution to American music he seems to be known by name to only a few, but everrybody knows his music. I mean just hum a few bars of "The Weight" or "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" or "Up on Cripple Creek" and all of a sudden people go "Oh... yeah I know that one". The guy is a monster guitar player and one of the best American songwriters of the 20th century. The contributions that he has made, along with the rest of The Band can't be overstated, and don't forget that when people talk about Dylan going electric- this was the guy who was his chief collaborator. *quality stuff.

He's probably also one of the worst singers in the world. The Band released 9 LPs with Robertson writing the majority of the material, but he only sang on 2 tracks in total. When the group performed live his microphone was usually turned off or was so low as to be inaudible. The Band played the Woodstock festival, but their set is nowhere to be seen in the movie- the rumour as to why is that Robbie's mic was live and the whole set was ruined.

This track is from his last album, released in 1998- an eternity in rock and roll years. I met Robbie at a book-signing in TO and asked him about any upcoming solo projects, he said he had something in the works- this was about 4 years ago. Takes him a long time to come up with new material I guess- he's only released 4 solo albums since The Band's last LP in 1977. Wikipedia says he's got a project in the works with Clapton. I'll be there in the store on release day.

For fans of Rock, Country, Soul, Folk, Funk, Blues, Roots (am I missing anything) you've got to check out "The Last Waltz" from Martin Scorsese- probably the best live concert ever captured on film.

Boosting this quality contribution up in the Hot Listing - declared quality by therealblankman.

Saw'em at the Aboriginal Achievement Awards awhile back. Gave one hell of a concert, Tho it's a shame when you look at his history. If you check around, online, Robertson isn't exactly the most popular guy in town. He apparently "stole" all the rights to The Band's songs and then quit entirely to focus on a solo career. As far as I know he and Levon Helm don't talk anymore. They both came out with biographies, "Across The Great Divide" from what I've read (haven't finished it yet) is quite heavily biased towards Robbie Robertson, tho I'd expect Levon Helm's "Story Of The Band" tells a different tale.

Regardless, remarkable man.

@therealblankman:

"...you've got to check out "The Last Waltz" from Martin Scorsese- probably the best live concert ever captured on film."

Saw that years ago with some friends. Loved it. Great show all around, but there's a scene where Robertson and Scorsese are having a talk that was just priceless. Scorsese is interviewing Robertson. Scorsese talks really fast, typical New Yorker, asks a question and can't shut up long enough to hear the answer. Robertson talks pretty slowly. And I can't remember what Scorsese said, but it sort of implied how slow Robertson was.

Well, there was a fly buzzing around Robertson when Scorsese said that, and Robertson caught it in mid-flight and tossed it on the table between him and Scorsese.

That's how I remember it, anyway.

@aniatario- Yup, definitely has a reputation as an asshole. As for "stealing" the rights to the music, well he's the songwriter for most of it and that's where the rights to revenues lies. That said the tracks that the band recorded were very collaborative, so he could have chosen to be more equitable, but chose not to. They worked together for over 20 years and by not sharing Robbie alienated himself from the rest of The Band, especially Levon Helm. So yeah... an asshole.

@rougy- During the editing process for The Last Waltz Scorsese and Robertson lived together and consumed copious quantities of drugs. I guess Scorsese was the typical New York hopped-up cokehead, and Robertson definitely seemed to be more of a mellow stoner.

Side note: Just read on Wikipedia that Elton John's song "Levon" was written as a tribute to Levon Helm, the drummer from The Band. Interesting.