"The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down".
I am very fortunate in having heard this amazing song performed live by The Band on their tour in support of the s/t "brown" album. The only other live music experience I’ve had that equals it was hearing Little Village perform John Hiatt’s "Lipstick Traces" on a soundstage in Burbank in ’92. The Little Village album was not so hot, but they sure were!
The Beatles? Saw them in ’65. Hendrix? Saw him in ’68 and ’69. Cream? Saw them in ’67 and ’68. The Who? Saw them in ’68 and ’69. Who else ya wanna name? Sorry, hearing The Band live spoiled me for just about EVERYONE else. Not Iris DeMent, whom I just saw this past Thursday. Stunningly great!
Here’s J.R. Robertson, Eric Levon Helm, and some other guy talking about the song and its’ creation:
https://youtu.be/nVYBW_zCvOg?t=1
@roxy54 the old cliche is that people that don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. @onhwy61 As a general history buff, and having had many holocaust survivors and victims in my family, I am pretty “read up” on the subject. I understand that sometimes pain has to be inflicted upon civilians and soldiers in order to shorten conflicts and minimize further suffering down the road. That doesn’t mean that we can’t have sensitivity to the suffering of all involved |
For me, not even the great JS Bach can spoil, or even diminish, the greatness of Mozart, Scriabin, Janacek, Shubert and others. Seems to me that it is pointless and counterproductive to compare and judge as “greater”, for instance, Miles vs Armstrong, Coltrane vs Prez, and on and on. Ultimate greatness in art has to be judged against the backdrop of the point in time of its creation. Good art is always a reflection of its time and is an expression of the evolution of that particular art form. Whether we personally like any particular example of that art form or not is an entirely different matter. |
