Tag: The Band

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Joan Baez’s Weird Homage to Slavery

Way back in 1971, Joan Baez released a double album called “Blessed Are”, which, in retrospect, may be one of the weirdest album releases of all time.

Blessed Are... (Joan Baez album - cover art).jpg

Joan Baez, in case you don’t remember or weren’t born yet, was a famous folk singer who became a prominent anti-war, anti-racism protest leader during the 1960’s, and an interpreter of Bob Dylan’s songs.  As a result, unsurprisingly, she pissed off a lot of patriotic war-loving Americans who regarded her, along with Jane Fonda, as treasonous dupes of the radical left.  They may not have liked John Lennon; they may have regarded Dylan with hostile indifference; they may have ignored Pete Seeger; but they hated Baez and Fonda with a toxic rage.

“Blessed Are” appears to be a peace offering of some kind, to southerners, patriots, farmers, and, perhaps, country music fans.    It featured a hit for Baez, “The Night They Drove old Dixie Down”, by Robbie Robertson of The Band (and subject of a bitter dispute between him and The Band’s drummer Levon Helm).

Levon Helm says in his autobiography:

“I remember taking him [Robertson] to the library so he could research the history and geography of the era and make General Robert E. Lee come out with all due respect.”

Helm was so bitterly annoyed by Baez’s version of “The Night They Drove old Dixie Down” that he refused afterwards to sing it in concert.  I wonder if he was more annoyed by her politics than anything else.  What musician gets upset when another artist makes a signature song more popular?

Anyway, to make General Lee come out with “all due respect”– all the respect due to a slave-owning General who led the war effort to preserve the institution of slavery– may strike some as a dubious cause.

Look at the lyrics:

Like my father before me, I’m a working man
I’m like my brother before me, I took a rebel stand
Well, he was just eighteen, proud and brave
When a Yankee laid him in his grave
I swear by the blood below my feet,
You can’t raise a Cain back up with it’s in defeat

Some claim that the song is sympathetic to the Lost Cause ideology and defends slavery.  I think it does neither.  The fact that it was written by a Canadian should clue listeners in: this is an observational song, not propaganda for either side.  In fact, its observational qualities are acute and beautiful and tragic.

The album also has a song by Jagger and Richards, a paean to the “hard-working” average joe who always gets the short end of the stick.  And a tribute to a southern farmer friend with “the slowest drawl I’d ever heard” showing the narrator and friend around his beautiful farm.  There’s an intriguing song about apocalypse: Three Horses.

But let’s move on to “Lincoln Freed Me Today”.  If “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” seems ambiguous, “Lincoln Freed Me Today” is decidedly revisionist.

Been a slave most all my life
So’s my kids and so’s my wife
I been working on the Colonel’s farm
Aint been mistreated, aint done no harm…
The Colonel’s been right good to me
He’s taken care of my family

The Colonel rode his buggy in from town
Hitched his horse and called us all around
Said he couldn’t keep us here no more
I saw a tear as he walked toward the door

Wow!

I’m sure Baez did not have in mind the idea of rescuing slavery from the dustbin of history, or, giving us the positive side of antebellum culture.  I’m sure she thought, well, it’s a true picture of some slave-owners, and some slaves.  And one must be fair by presenting both sides of the issue.   But the “I saw a tear” is kind of repulsive.  That’s the image we’re supposed to take away from this kindly old slaveholder?

You see how convoluted we become.

The songwriter is variously credited as David Paton, David Patten, and David Paton.  It’s likely David Patton.  There’s very little information out there about him.

 

 

Ian and Sylvia do a just peachy version of this song.

 

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Tears of Rage: American Patriotic Hymns

See “Tears of Rage” by The Band.

Do I feel guilty?

I think I’m one of the ones who went out to receive all that false instruction that you never could believe.

But you didn’t “point us the way to go”. You gave us weapons and sent us off to get ourselves killed on behalf of your own masters, who deceived you into thinking they had something you should protect, and that they, in turn, would care for your interests. We lost our legs and arms and souls for you only to find out you didn’t even know the words to your patriotic hymns.

And oh you looked so manly with your hand on your brow, so solemn and pious in front of our gravestones.

I found it hard to forgive the totally unnecessary, contrived, phony crisis that you could see coming a mile away.

“Tears of Rage”, however, is a great song by the best rock band ever.

The Best Reactionary Rock’n’roll Songs:

  • I’d Love to Change the World (10 Years After Undead)
  • Who’ll Stop the Rain (Creedance Clearwater Revival)
  • The Night They Drove old Dixie Down (The Band)
  • Sweet Home Alabama (Allman Brothers Band)
  • My Way (Frank Sinatra/Paul Anka)

Why does “Having my Baby” not make the list: because it’s a piece of shit not worthy of being on any list..

Same goes for “Ballad of the Green Berets” and “Okie From Muskogee”.  See Haggard Haggard.

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Bob Dylan Live: London, Ontario, 2006-11-03

I saw Bob Dylan and the Band in 1974 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. I was 17 and it was my first major concert. Our music enrichment class at Beacon Christian High School went, with Lambert Zuidevaart, our music teacher. I believe we stayed overnight at his friend’s apartment. We visited Kensington Market, ate at a Chinese restaurant, then walked to Maple Leaf Gardens. That’s what I remember. It was 32 years ago.

I remember vividly the opening chords of the first song: “Most Likely You’ll Go Your Way and I go Mine”. The Band may well have been the greatest back-up ensemble Dylan ever played with. Their performance was incredibly rich, textured, and vibrant. (“Before the Flood”, a double-album of performances from that tour, is worth having.)

Thirty-four years later, my son and I attended a Dylan concert in London, Ontario, at the John Labatt Centre. Like Maple Leaf Gardens, this is a hockey arena, so the acoustics were not great. His backup band was good, but not as good as The Band.

In 1972, Dylan and the Band played the complete concert, with the odd Dylan solo on acoustic guitar, and a few songs performed by The Band without Dylan.

The John Labatt Centre is a newer arena, well-furnished and gleaming. The staff seemed unduly concerned with stopping people from recording the concert with cameras or cell phones. This was a little baffling: who cares if someone creates a 160×80 grainy mpeg of this performance? Are they out of their minds? But the attendants stood guard near our seat, watching intently. When it looked like someone was using the camera on their cell phone or a real camera, they stepped in and asked the person to stop. I had to be clever to snap the few shots I did, and most of them are blurry.

The men sitting in five seats to the right of us seemed to have a dire need to go for beer or to the bathroom about once every song– that is not much of an exaggeration. The seats are so close together, I had to stand up to let them pass each time. It was annoying. Whey they weren’t drinking or peeing, they were yakking away, or making fun of Dylan’s incomprehensible voice.

The voice– unlike old copper or English gardens or Tom Waits– has not taken on an atom of patina or richness. If anything, I think he has become more shrill and spastic, and less coherent, than even in his “Street Legal” or “Saved” days. If I hadn’t already known most of his lyrics by heart I wouldn’t have been able to make them out.

Dylan played a keyboard exclusively – he didn’t touch a guitar– and every song featured the entire band.

Dylan’s encore was generous: four songs, including two of his most revered: “Like a Rolling Stone” and “All Along the Watchtower”. He sounded better singing these two than almost any other song of the night.

Dylan apparently is not content to simply perform the same songs over and over again as originally recorded. Several songs were radically restructured, musically, especially “Desolation Row”, “It’s All right Ma, I’m Only Bleeding”, and “Girl From the North Country”. He performed a generous mix of classics and more recent works. His voice is problematic, but give him credit for investing in his own work, taking risks, and reinventing himself.

Memories

I am fascinated by memory issues and this recollection of mine brought up a few.

I was able to determine that the concert was in 1972. Let me see if I can find the exact date: no it wasn’t 1972. It was in 1974, January or February. Surprisingly, I’m having a hard time googling the exact date.

Okay — it was exactly January 10th, 1974. I know because though he played two dates in Toronto (both at Maple Leaf Gardens), I vividly remember the first song I heard: “Most Likely You’ll Go Your Way and I’ll go Mine”, and only the January 10th concert began with that song. (The January 9th set began with “Rainy Day Women”

Where I found the info: www.bobdylan.com

What I don’t remember: how we got to Toronto. Who drove. I don’t remember anything about sleeping over other than the fact that we probably slept over somewhere. Or maybe not. I vaguely remember that the idea of sleeping over was vetoed by a parent. I seem to remember that we ate out at a Chinese restaurant in Kensington Market and then walked to Maple Leaf Gardens.

One person who claims to have attended the concert reported that Dylan came out in a Toronto Maple Leaf’s jersey. I think I would have remembered that. I think this person possibly has the wrong night.

Who came with? Janie Lou Kannegieter — I see her in the picture in the beige coat. Pauline Hielema. Our teacher, Lambert Zuidevart. A smart, cultured student from the grade 11 who liked to write — Gertie Witte? I think that was her name. I am not sure about her.

I think the girl with the long brown scarf in the picture is Pauline.

So I was in grade 12. I graduated a few months later and then went to college.

As you can see from the pictures, oddly, I sat in roughly the same location at both concerts: high up on the left side of the arena looking towards the stage. The first is from 1972, the second from 2006. The third picture is Pauline Hielema, and Janie-Lou Kannegieter, and someone else walking ahead of me somewhere near Kensington Market. The picture is blurred, but I am fond of it, because it looks like dusk in winter in Toronto.

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The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

One of the few advantages of having lived a few years is that you get actually find out which works of art, tv shows, dramas, movies, and songs really stand up over time. Sometimes you find out that a brilliant piece of music or drama is far more rare than you had ever imagined.

Sometimes something you once thought was brilliant turns out to be pedestrian.

“The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” (first released in September 1969) is simply a terrific song, whether you prefer the raucous version by the Band, or Joan Baez’s cool, crisp, symmetrical rendering. I almost always prefer the versions performed by the composer, and I love the Band, but in this case I like the version by Baez more. For one thing, it’s tight construction prevents Baez from indulging in too much warbling or emoting– makes her sound like she really does have a good voice. For another thing, it’s a damn fine arrangement of guitar, bass, and drums.

The hardest element of music to describe, teach, or duplicate is rhythm. Sometimes people even call it “feel”, as if it was something you can’t see or taste, or even hear in a literal sense. Baez’s version has the same intangible as Dire Straits “Sultans of Swing” and Dylan’s entire “John Wesley Harding” album. At the time of it’s recording, you heard this kind of crisp, tight rhythm more often in Nashville recordings than you did in Los Angeles or New York. These are cracker-jack musicians.

Virgil Caine is the narrator. His rustic “voice” dryly recounts how he worked on the Danville train until the tracks were torn up by Stoneman’s (Union) Calvary. Then he took the train to Richmond just before it fell and the Confederacy surrendered. “It was a time I remembered oh so well”. Robertson’s clever lyric then has the people singing nothing more specific than “na na na na na na, na na na na, na na na na na”, as if life goes on no matter what disasters befall us, and the disaster is too great for words.

Many have commented on the fact that the song takes the voice of a southerner, at a time when many people regarded the South as an embarrassment of bigotry and repressiveness. It’s a brilliant stroke and almost everyone who hears the song immediately realizes how right and true it is. Not a few attribute this unique perspective to the fact that Robbie Robertson was a Canadian, who saw the South without jaundiced eyes, and fell in love with the mystique, the cadences, and the culture of the South.

There is another angle to this song that is a bit disturbing. Levon Helm claims that he “helped” Robertson write the song. Helm is from Arkansas, a Southerner, and some commentators on the Band think that there is some bitterness between him and Robertson over the song. Does the song belittle the South? That would be totally contrary to almost everyone’s impression of the song, which is the opposite. Or is it something to do with the credits? Who knows?

One oddity. Why does “Robert E. Lee” in the Band’s version become “the Robert E. Lee”, a steamboat in the Baez version? Turns out that it could be because Robert E. Lee never passed through Tennessee after the war, but the Robert E. Lee did. Less forgivable is “I took the train to Richmond, it fell” for “On May the 10th, Richmond had fell”. I don’t know what problem Baez had with that– other than the fact that Richmond did not fall on the 10th– the entire confederacy did. Richmond “fell” on April 2. And utterly contemptible is the “so much cavalry came” for “Stoneman’s calvary came”. Joan Baez, do you think your audience is too stupid to accept the name of an obscure Union officer who was responsible for executing Grant’s scorched earth policy instead of “so much”? Geez!

Doesn’t matter. If you read the website at the link above, you will notice two thing: endless, obsessive fussiness over the details of the song, and boundless admiration for it. A typical comment: it is easily the best popular song ever about the Civil War. And that it is.

On The Band

There was a horrible tendency of bands of this era to indulge in long, utterly incomprehensible overtone-laden guitar-solo driven codas, in the mistaken belief that something “deep” would reach out and contact them.  You have to keep that in mind to appreciate just how stunning “Music From the Big Pink” was.

There is a lengthy and somewhat bizarre dissection of the lyrics here.  Is it “mud” below Virgil’s feet or “blood”?  Did Robert E. Lee actually pass through Tennessee after the war? 

Update 2022-05-02

In performances, Joan Baez has corrected the lyrics.  It wasn’t malice: just carelessness.  Now that she knows the right lyrics, she sings the words Robbie Robertson wrote.