contemporary Music – issue #7 – folk / Country rock
Folk rock is a popular music genre that emerged in the mid-1960s, primarily in the U.S. and UK, by blending the acoustic, lyrical, and melodic elements of folk music with the electric instrumentation, rhythm, and energy of rock & roll. It often features close vocal harmonies, poignant songwriting, and jangly guitars.
The American folk-music revival began during the 1940s; building on the interest in protest folk singers such as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, it reached a peak in popularity in the mid-1960s with artists such as Bob Dylan and Joan Baez: The Byrds are credited with creating the genre’s “jangle” sound, particularly with their 1965 cover of Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man”. Dylan himself popularized the genre by “going electric” at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. Besides Dylan and The Byrds, notable artists include Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Buffalo Springfield, Simon & Garfunkel, and The Band.In the UK, bands like Fairport Convention and Steeleye Span developed a distinct sound by electrifying traditional British folk tunes. Common instruments include acoustic and electric guitars, mandolin, banjo, and fiddle. In the United States folk rock acts personified a generalized, often self-righteous youthful rebellion that in its more pointed songs was labelled “protest” music. In Britain folk rock tended to be more respectful of tradition and combined centuries-old folk material with original, tradition-flavoured songs arranged for folk rock ensembles that often used old instruments to maintain a strong Celtic flavour. While the folk rock movement began and quickly surged in the 1960s, it has continued through the present day. It has spawned many offshoots, including psychedelic folk rock (Jefferson Airplane), country rock (the Flying Burrito Brothers, John Prine), progressive folk music (Richard Thompson, O’Death), punk-inspired folk rock (the Replacements, Dinosaur Jr., Buffalo Tom), and even folk metal (Skyclad, Moonsorrow). The annual Newport Folk Festival brings disparate folk acts together highlighting the wide array of songwriting and performance styles in today’s folk rock music.
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In Issue #7, we feature the Band
Music from Big Pink is the debut studio album by the Canadian-American rock band the Band. Released on July 1, 1968, by Capitol Records, it employs a distinctive blend of country, rock, folk, classical, R&B, blues, and soul. The album’s title refers to a house in West Saugerties, New York called “Big Pink”, which was shared by bassist/singer Rick Danko, pianist/singer Richard Manuel and keyboardist Garth Hudson and in which the album’s music was partly composed. The album itself was recorded at A & R Recording in New York and Capitol Studios in Los Angeles in early 1968, The cover artwork is a painting by Dylan. It included three songs written or co-written by Dylan (“This Wheel’s on Fire”, “Tears of Rage” and “I Shall Be Released”) as well as “The Weight”. Garth Hudson’s haunting electric organ swells beneath Manuel’s pleading falsetto on “Tears Of Rage,” the song a modern-day hymn if ever there was one. Elsewhere, the lyrical fixation on simpler times; the “weight” we all must shoulder; a constant questing throughout the record, are perfectly served by the deft musicianship. One of the few clear-cut solo spots on the album, the opening, classical-tinged organ flourish that Hudson unleashes on “Chest Fever” further makes the case for his unassuming brilliance, but then the others settle in behind him, leaving no confusion over why they were The Band: Levon Helm is solid as an oak, proving why he was one of finest drummers to emerge from the country-rock era, while Robbie Robertson’s sinewy guitar weaves its way throughout the gaps without ever muscling for more space than it needs.. While a thematic continuity ran through the music, the musical style varied from song to song. Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters deemed it the second “most influential record in the history of rock and roll”.
The Band, also known as The Brown Album, is the second studio album by the Canadian-American rock band the Band, released on September 22, 1969, by Capitol Records. The name stems from the album’s minimalist, sepia-toned brown cover. This landmark record is widely celebrated as a foundational masterpiece of the Americana genre, seamlessly blending folk, country, rock, and R&B into a tapestry of historical American storytelling. The Band has been viewed as a concept album, with the songs focusing on people, places and traditions associated with a traditional view of Americana. The album produced some of the most enduring anthems in rock music history: “Up on Cripple Creek”: The album’s major single and the group’s only Top 30 Billboard hit. “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”: A haunting acoustic-driven story written from the perspective of a poor white Southerner at the end of the American Civil War. “Rag Mama Rag”: A syncopated, ragtime-infused track featuring an unusual instrument swap among the band members. “King Harvest (Has Surely Come)”: A gritty narrative detailing a hard-pressed farmer’s struggles and reliance on a trade union. The album highlights the tight, egoless chemistry between the members of the band.
Stage Fright is the third studio album by the Canadian-American rock group The Band, released in August, 1970, by Capitol Records. Engineered by Todd Rundgren and mixed by Glyn Johns, it was recorded on a temporary stage inside the Woodstock Playhouse. The record reflects a darker, more anxious tone than their previous efforts, heavily influenced by the group’s sudden fame, drug struggles, and growing internal friction. Standout Tracks include “The Shape I’m In”: A driving rock track featuring a frantic, inspired lead vocal performance by Richard Manuel. Its lyrics subtly mirrored Manuel’s worsening personal struggles. “Stage Fright”: The title track showcases Rick Danko on lead vocals. It explores the intense anxiety, vulnerability, and pressure of performing under the spotlight. “The W.S. Walcott Medicine Show”: A brass-inflected, roots-rock staple that became a permanent fixture in the group’s live concert repertoire. The Band was widely acclaimed after its first two albums; Stage Fright seemed to be the group’s alarmed response, which made it their most nakedly confessional. It was certainly different from their previous work, which had tended toward story-songs set in earlier times, but it was hardly less compelling for that.
Cahoots is the fourth studio album by Canadian-American rock band the Band. It was released in September 1971 and was their last album of original material for four years. Recorded at Bearsville Sound Studio in New York, the album caught the group during a period of rising internal tension and exhaustion from celebrity life. The album features guest vocals from Van Morrison who delivers co-lead vocals alongside Richard Manuel on the rowdy track “4% Pantomime”. Libby Titus provided uncredited backing vocals on “The River Hymn”, marking the very first time a female vocalist appeared on a record by The Band. Bob Dylan contributed the track “When I Paint My Masterpiece”, which the group memorably covered for this release. Allen Toussaint arranged the distinctive, New Orleans-style horn section heard on the opening track “Life Is a Carnival”. By the time of Cahoots, Manuel had lost his enthusiasm for songwriting, leaving Robertson to shoulder most of the lyric-writing duties. The singer/guitarist wrote eight of the 11 songs on Cahoots, including such as “Last of the Blacksmiths” and “Where Do We Go From Here?,” a piercing study of the threat of extinction. The album is more than just one for completists. Cahoots is an interesting mix of moods and tones, and an album that found favour with the public and it continues to be an album that grows on fans of a group who wrote the blueprint for Americana.
In the mid-1960s, they gained recognition for backing Bob Dylan on his 1966 concert tour as Dylan’s first electric band. After leaving Dylan and changing their name to “The Band”, they released their 1968 debut album, Music from Big Pink, and its succeeding album, 1969s The Band, to critical acclaim and commercial success. Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters deemed their debut the “second-most influential record in the history of rock and roll”, and the music journalist Al Aronowitz called it “country soul … a sound never heard before”.
The Band were a Canadian-American rock band formed in Toronto, Ontario. It consisted of Rick Danko (bass guitar, guitar, vocals, fiddle), Garth Hudson (organ, keyboards, accordion, saxophone), Richard Manuel (piano, drums, vocals), and Robbie Robertson (guitar, piano, percussion), all Canadian, and Levon Helm (drums, vocals, mandolin, guitar, bass guitar), an American. The Band’s music combined elements of Americana, folk, rock, R&B, jazz and country. Between 1958 and 1963, the group were known as the Hawks and were the backing band for the rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins, based in Toronto, Ontario. After hearing the Band play and meeting with Robertson, Bob Dylan invited Helm and Robertson to join his backing band. After two concerts backing Dylan, Helm and Robertson told Dylan of their loyalty to their bandmates and told him that they would continue with him only if he hired all of the Hawks. Dylan accepted and invited Levon and the Hawks to tour with him. With Dylan, the Hawks played a series of concerts from September 1965 through May 1966, billed as “Bob Dylan and The Band”. Most of the concerts were met with heckling and disapproval from folk music purists. Helm was so affected by the negative reception that he left the tour after a little more than one month and sat out the rest. Helm spent much of this period working on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
The sessions with Dylan ended in October 1967, with Helm having rejoined the group by that time, and the Hawks began writing their own songs at Big Pink. When they went into the recording studio, they still did not have a name for themselves. Robertson suggests that during their time with Dylan everyone just referred to them as “the band” and the name stuck. Their debut album, Music from Big Pink, was released in July 1968 and was widely acclaimed. They performed at the Woodstock Festival (their performance was not included in the famed Woodstock film because of legal complications), and later that year they performed with Dylan at the UK Isle of Wight Festival. That same year, they left for Los Angeles to record their follow-up, The Band (1969). From their rustic appearance on the cover to the songs and arrangements within, the album stood in contrast to other popular music of the day. A critical and commercial triumph, The Band, established a musical template (dubbed country rock) and also influenced their musical contemporaries. After their second album, The Band embarked on their first tour as a lead act. The anxiety of fame was clear, as the group’s songs turned to darker themes of fear and alienation: the influence on their next work is self-explanatory. Stage Fright (1970) with producer Todd Rundgren and recorded on stage at the iconic Woodstock Playhouse. As with their previous, self-titled record, Robertson was credited with most of the songwriting. Initial critical reaction was positive, but it was seen as a disappointment from the previous two albums. About that time, Robertson began exerting greater control over the Band, a point of contention between him and Helm.
Every member of the group was a multi-instrumentalist, enabling the musicians to create various configurations in service to the songs. Hudson in particular was able to coax a wide range of timbres from his Lowrey electronic organ. Singers Manuel, Danko, and Helm each brought a distinctive voice to The Band: Helm’s southern style had more than a hint of country, Danko sang in a tenor, and Manuel alternated between falsetto and baritone. Though the singing was more or less evenly shared among the three, both Danko and Helm have stated that they saw Manuel as the Band’s “lead” singer. Robertson was the unit’s chief songwriter, singing lead vocals on only three studio songs released by the group. The singers regularly blended in harmonies. The Band has influenced countless bands, songwriters, and performers.
Helm charged Robertson with authoritarianism and greed, while Robertson suggested that he made increased efforts to guide the group in part because Danko, Helm, and Manuel were becoming more unreliable due to their heroin usage. Robertson insists he did his best to coax Manuel into writing more songs, only to see him descend into addiction. Despite mounting problems among the group members, The Band forged ahead with their next album, Cahoots (1971). In late December 1971, The Band recorded the live album Rock of Ages, which was released in the summer of 1972. On Rock of Ages, they were bolstered by the addition of a horn section, with arrangements written by allen Toussaint. In 1973, the Band released the covers album Moondog Matinee. There was no tour in support of the album, which garnered mixed reviews. By late 1973, the first order of business was backing Dylan on his album Planet Waves. The album was released concurrently with their joint 1974 tour, in which they played 40 shows in North America during January and February 1974. By 1975, the recording studio, Shangri-La, was completed. That year, the Band recorded and released Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first album of new material since 1971. All eight songs were written solely by Robertson. Despite comparatively poor record sales, the album is favoured by critics and fans. In 1977, the Band released their seventh studio album Islands, which fulfilled their record contract with Capitol. Islands contained a mix of originals and covers, and was the last with the Band’s original lineup. The idea for a farewell concert came about early in 1976 after Richard Manuel was seriously injured in a boating accident and led to the Last Waltz film (a concert film–documentary by Martin Scorsese, released in 1978, along with a three-LP soundtrack). The original quintet performed together one last time: on March 1, 1978. The Band resumed touring in 1983 without Robertson. An accomplished musician from Woodstock, New York, Jim Weider, became lead guitarist. Robertson had found success with a solo career and as a Hollywood music producer. As a result of their diminished popularity, they performed in theatres and clubs as headliners and took support slots in larger venues for onetime peers such as the Grateful Dead and Crosby, Stills and Nash. After a performance in Winter Park, Florida, on March 4, 1986, Manuel hung himself, aged 42, in his motel room. In 1993, the group released their eighth studio album, Jericho. Jericho was their first album recorded since The Last Waltz, and also their first studio album since Islands. Without Robbie Robertson as primary lyricist, much of the songwriting for the album came from outside of the group. The Band was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame at the 1989 Juno Awards, where Robertson was reunited with original members Danko and Hudson. Later in 1994, Robertson appeared with Danko and Hudson as The Band for the second time since the original group broke up. The occasion was the induction of The Band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Helm, who had been at odds with Robertson for years over accusations of stolen songwriting credits, did not attend. The Band released two more albums after Jericho: High on the Hog (1996) and Jubilation (1998), the latter of which included guest appearances by Eric Clapton and John Hiatt. Helm was diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998 and was unable to sing for several years but he eventually regained the use of his voice. On December 10, 1999, Rick Danko died in his sleep at the age of 55. Following his death, The Band broke up for good. In 2002, Robertson bought all other former members’ financial interests in the group (with the exception of Helm’s), giving him major control of the presentation of the group’s material, including latter-day compilations. The Band received a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award on February 9, 2008, but there was no reunion of former members. In honour of the event, Helm held a Midnight Ramble in Woodstock. Levon Helm died at the age of 71 on April 19, 2012, after a prolonged battle with throat cancer. Robbie Robertson died at the age of 80 on August 9, 2023, after battling prostate cancer. Garth Hudson, the last living original member of the Band, died at the age of 87 on January 21, 2025.
Sound quality is important and the better online Streaming services will offer superior sound quality. As always, We do encourage you to purchase Favoured albums from good online or High street record stores. the Band label: - Capitol Records
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