Whats on your turntable tonight?

Maybe this will help you to respect me a little more.

Your mindset reminds me that I'll never do a deal like I did for you again.

@slaw, the quote you cite was from master guitarist Ry Cooder, on his way home with Jack Nitzsche (Phil Spector’s arranger and orchestrator, later in Crazy Horse for a couple of albums, including Neil Young’s Harvest, which Jack produced) and record producer/A & R man Denny Bruce (Fab T-Birds, Leo Kottke) from seeing & hearing The Band at The Pasadena Civic Auditorium in 1970. Ry said "I like them because they look and sound like men, not boys."

The quote is in the recent book The Story Of The Band; From Big Pink to The Last Waltz by Harvey Kubernik. I’m about a third of the way through it, and boy is it good. Another quote from the numerous music professionals asked for their thoughts on The Band:

Australian writer/critic David N. Pepperell on seeing Dylan and The Hawks (soon to change their name) in 1966: "To this day I will still say that Dylan and The Hawks was the greatest music concert I have ever attended. The Hawks made all the previous groups we had seen---including The Beatles, The Kinks, The Rolling Stones---sound like amateur outfits, almost kids’ bands. This was an aggregation of adults, people who understood dynamics as much as volume (me: SO few Rock bands understand this), tapestry of sound rather than just harmonics, and the way that playing less can be playing more."

That last concept (less is more) is well understood amongst jazz musicians. There is a quote, attributed variously to Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, and others (it doesn’t matter WHO said it, it’s the wisdom of WHAT was said), that goes "The notes you DON’T play are as important as those you DO." Again, most Rock musicians absolutely do not understand the concept, or appreciate it’s wisdom. An awful lot of guitarists and drummers approach their instrument as if the more notes they play, the better a player are they. Listen to Ry Cooder’s guitar solo in John Hiatt’s "Lipstick Sunset." Now THERE’S a guitarist who gets it!

Dylan single-handedly transformed Rock ’n’ Roll from teenage music to adult. And The Band transformed what a Rock ’n’ Roll band could and should be. Eric Clapton on hearing Music From Big Pink (played to him by George Harrison): "Music had been headed in the wrong direction for a long time. When I heard Music From Big Pink, I thought ’Well, someone has finally got it right’." Clapton broke up Cream, and went to West Saugerties, New York to hang with The Band at the Big Pink house (in the basement of which in 1967 were recorded The Basement Tapes), waiting for them to ask him to join. Until, he says, he finally realized they neither required nor desired his services. ;-)

My pleasure fellas! I offer the knowledge I possess in the name of furthering everyone's appreciation of The Band. @slaw, I forgot to offer some info concerning one point you brought up. The "house" you refer to is, I believe, the one in which The Band recorded, not Music From Big Pink, but the 2nd, self-titled one (the "brown" album).

After recording MFBP in "normal' pro studios in NYC and L.A., they wanted to make the second album in a more relaxed, organic fashion. Pro studios put up gobos (baffles) between all the players (the amplifiers often in isolation booths) to maximize separation, the players then needing to wear headphones to hear each other. Can you imagine conversing with someone having to speak into a mic, and hearing the other's voice only through headphones? Very artificial.

For the second album, The Band talked Capitol Records into loaning them a 2" multi-track recorder (8-track, I believe) and a bunch of mics. They looked for a house in L.A. in which to record, ending up finding one in the Hollywood Hills (owned by Sammy Davis Jr.). The house had a large pool cabana, which they transformed into a studio. So they lived in the house for two months, and recorded the album in about one.

The pictures on the inside of the gatefold cover show them in that studio, set up facing each other, able to hear one another without headphones. And believe it or not, they recorded the vocals live with the instruments! I can't think of another band that could, or did, do that. Well, except for Bluegrass bands.

Another thing that amazes me about the brown album is that pianist Richard Manuel is the drummer on about half the album's songs. He is an incredible drummer in the musical sense, though technically rather crude. Chops ain't everything! His drum parts make perfect musical sense, and are parts no "real" drummer would think of.

Michael Fremer always talks about the unique drum sound on the second album, attributing it to the set of vintage tubs organist Garth Hudson found in a pawn shop in L.A. Baloney; if you look again at the studio pics, you will see the drums are Levon's good ol' Black Diamond Pearl Gretsches, the same ones he played all through the 60's in The Hawks. Levon really knew how to tune drums and damp their heads (putting padding on the plastic heads to cut their high-frequency overtones and ring, to make them sound closer to calfskin heads), to get the deep, "thumpy" sound he is known for. Ringo has made a point of talking about Levon's drum sound in interviews. He was after the same sound, only partially achieving it (he came close on Rubber Soul, then lost in on Revolver).

“Kind of wish I never saw Reservoir Dogs. Every time I hear "Stuck in the Middle", I think of (that) scene.”