Watch The Last Waltz, devote life to embodying the spirit of The Band.
Seriously. In the 1960s and 70s, this 80% Canadian band constructed the tale of late nineteenth century America that we cling to today. They toured with Dylan on his infamous 1966 Britain tour, wrote "The Weight" and were all multi-talented babes who were also friends with Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and Eric Clapton, and recorded their debaucherous brilliance in a drugged-out binge of face-melting guitars and sweat with Martin Scorcese!
They'll make you rue the day "The Weight" became the poster song for yuppie nostalgia thanks to The Big Chill, and they'll make you believe in the integrity of the Confederacy, or at least question that convenient little narrative you were fed in eighth grade about the good guys in blue and bad guys in gray.
For being Canadian, for being the more awesome and under-appreciated cousin of the Grateful Dead and not even caring, for being the hosts to perhaps the greatest rager in recent American music history and dressing up for it, for having a good time all the time and for having the foresight to film it, Blogtrack salutes The Band.
1 comment:
beyond the fact that i would totally blow rick danko, rob rob and levon helm in like negative ten seconds for schooling/creating american rock 'n roll, your recommendations for august should also include "reconciling your sad soul to the fact that you'll never be as cool as any member of the band" as to-do numero dos. seriously, how the hell are the rest of us about to live in the shadow of baller musicians who melt face soloing on traditional folk songs and did more drugs than we wish we could begin to imagine? how rad is martin scorsese for making a movie about the fact that these guys are the biggest badasses you don't know? how lame am i for typing this ten feet away from you? (re: this last one, i'm taking a page from your memoir and blaming it on our generation. it's probably acceptable to finger sociopathic/terrifying/boring online networking sites for our cultural and interpersonal failures in this day and age). my lil' denim vest. my lil' blackberry cobbler.
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