m001's Full Review: Music from Big Pink [Bonus Tracks] [Remaster] by T...
If ever an album documented a vision of Americana, Music from Big Pink does, in a way that can only be described as cinematic and archival. This is an album of song-stories, of tales to be passed between men and women, of tradition and trust. Far from affected, the tone here is absolutely real; rustic and gritty in a way that, today, can usually only be achieved with studio tricks and treatments. The album is perfectly unpolished. The tone reflects the content masterfully--tales of trusts lost, of debts paid and unpaid, of grieving and loss, and of the most gorgeous yearning you've ever heard.
Robbie Robertson ought to be as universally revered as Dylan. In circles that know and understand, he is. He was the master craftsman, and he had the horses to get the job done. Never the frontman, Robertson was more the carnival barker directing a rag-tag group of earnest, hardworking musicians. Together they produced the most lived-in recording of the late sixties.
There are enough classics here to stop a train. 'The Weight' is majestic and yearning, rollicking steadily along to its own cinematic logic of lives lived and promises made. 'Long Black Veil', 'Chest Fever', 'I Shall be Released', 'This Wheel's on Fire'--each a plaintive, powerful confession of the soul, set against the spirit of the frontier and the promise of the expansive heartland. Come on, these lines from 'Long Black Veil' are simple enough, powerful enough, somber enough to make you think that the Band is recounting some long lost version of our history that they were witness to:
Ten years ago
On a cold dark night
Someone was killed
'Neath the town hall light
The people who saw
They all agreed
That the slayer who ran
Looked a lot like me...
Bitter, beautiful and raggedy, Big Pink yearns for community in all the places it may be found: In a promise made, in a love longed for, in a challenge put forth, in a handshake, in a bottle of whiskey...
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
![Music from Big Pink [Bonus Tracks] [Remaster] by The Band](http://di1.shopping.com/images1/pi/72/85/8e/2001989362-177x150-0-0.jpg)
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.