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Once Were Brothers in theaters Friday, February 28th

The new documentary on the greatest self-contained (songs, instruments, vocals) Rock ’n’ Roll band in the music’s history---The Band, is in theaters tomorrow. Quotations from the movie:

John Hammond Jr.: "Bob Dylan thought they were phenomenal. So he hired the guys."

Taj Mahal: "If there was any American musicians that were comparable to what The Beatles were, it woulda been them."

Bruce Springsteen: "There is no band that emphasizes becoming greater than the sum of their parts than The Band. (I disagree; even taken individually, Levon Helm, Rick Danko, Richard Manual, Garth Hudson, and Robbie Robertson are master musicians, singers, and songwriters).

Bruce continues: "When they came together, something miraculous occurred."

Eric Clapton: (upon hearing Music From Big Pink) "I thought, this is huge. It changed my life."

Mine too, along with every good musician I knew then and have known since.

bdp24
bdp24's avatar
bdp24 OP
10,493 posts
 
I share his adoration of J.S. Bach, but (this) man does not live by JSB alone.
rpeluso
1,135 posts
 
Eric, happy to see you can forgive and forget!  

We all will be old (er) some day

I hope.  

His predictability I find charming.  And amusing.  I am always looking for things to make me smile, or laugh out loud.  Schubert seems to do that with his words, short, terse, and biting.  I wonder how he is in real life, in person.  I have a mental picture that I am certain bears little in common with reality.
glupson
7,842 posts
 
It does not matter what schubert and I think, but I do find The Band a bit overpraised. I have an album, or two, but I do not think they were as great as they are talked about these days.

Having said that, Berlin Philharmonic has been slightly out of tune lately.
mezzrow
114 posts
 
Rock of Ages
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bdp24 OP
10,493 posts
 

The Band are sort of a Rorschach test. ;-) Bob Dylan thought they were phenomenal, Nick Lowe says Brinsley Schwarz (in which he was the bassist/songwriter/singer) were trying to be the British Band, Elvis Costello has expressed his deep appreciation, as have Lucinda Williams, Ry Cooder, the guys in Los Lobos, Buddy Miller, T Bone Burnett, Emmylou Harris, Joni Mitchell, Richard Thompson, John Hiatt, Neil Young, the guys in Little Feat, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, Jim Keltner, Jim Lauderdale, Springsteen (as noted above), Bill Graham, countless others. And Clapton gave up Cream after hearing Music From Big Pink, saying the album "changed his life." Is that "a bit overpraised."? ;-)

But that’s just them. Like anything else, The Band are not for everyone, only those who understand and appreciate what made them very, very special. No offense intended. I myself didn’t "get" them at first, try as I might. I couldn’t hear what all the fuss was about (there was a lot of fuss made about them in 1968 and ’69). Once I did, a new world was opened to me. You either get it, or you don’t. For those who don’t, oh well.

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