The Band: S/T and/or Music from the Big Pink

The Big Pink and The Band albums were bad news for musicians in the 60s (like me) because you realized how lame they made everything else seem (Clapton was supposedly rendered morose and depressed and tried to join the Band)…if you got to see these guys live you felt even worse. I think I actually destroyed a Band LP from playing it too much, and I knew at least one person who listened to only those 2 LPs. I liked all of their stuff, and my old the Band (or Brown Album as we called it) LP that survived and I listen to often must be from the early 70s although not likely the original run. In any case, that album still kicks utter ass on every level both musically and as an amazing sounding thing. I think I'm gonna go put it on now.

I think the mics "bleeding" may represent what music is supposed to sound like, as I've heard very few albums from 1969 that have the coherency or overall tone that is as appealing (to me anyway) as the Brown album. Robertson did surprise the Band by grabbing all the songwriting credit (Levon remained pissed off about that forever), but I somehow doubt the pool house had much to do with how hip the tone was…I think it was more about experienced guys paying attention to detail with the knowledge that people were going to be listening pretty close to that stuff, and a remarkable attention to precise song specific arrangement instead of the dense "everybody fill up the available space" sound of lessor bands.