Search - The Band :: The Last Waltz

Wow.

Noah Stanzione | South Bend, IN | 12/17/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"To the extent "The Last Waltz" is praised, the focus tends to be more on the guest performances, and why not? They are universally (well, nearly universally; Joni Mitchell's set is pretty painful to get through) phenomenal. Of especial surprise was how much I enjoyed Neil Diamond (widely criticized for being included among the guest list), who turns in a great anthemic performance that--maybe surprisingly--fits with the spirit of the night, and Bob Dylan, who may be a great poet but--this astonishing performance aside--has always had an unbearably grating singing voice. Here, his voice has just the right timbre (in fact, this is the ONLY vocal performance of Dylan's I like), and he delivers on his whole set, but especially on "Forever Young."



Other standouts are, the aforementioned Joni aside, well, everyone! My favorites are a supremely soulful--and then supremely charged--Van Morrison (best version of "Caravan" hands down, and his Irish lullaby breaks my heart); the inimitable Muddy Waters; Paul Butterfield wailing his guts out; an appropriately sleazy Dr. John; Neil Young with a little help from a "rock" of a friend. Now, granted, having the concert video in my memory improves my listening experience, as I can picture many of these great moments (although what I would give if Marty had captured "Tura Lura Lura" into the film!). And, yes, they're still heavily overdubbed, and that's a little deflating to know that these are ideal versions of a concert that actually received mixed reviews at the time. But so what? We can still pretend.



Now, here's where I'm going to say something a little controversial: I think "The Last Waltz" box features the best concert work we have by The Band. I know there's still a good amount of the concert that's unreleased, and maybe that's a good thing, as word is some of it is pretty dreadful (although, based on the "Georgia" bootleg I've heard from the show, there's at least some further music from the concert deserving a remaster and official release). But what we have here works. To be honest, "Rock of Ages" and "Before the Flood" both underwhelmed me. A lot of the arrangements and performances seemed too busy ("Caledonia Mission" on ROA), too bizarre (think "When You Awake" on BTF), too Dylanesque (his typical discordant vocal work on both), or too clunkily funereal ("I Shall Be Released" on ROA), etc. This is not to say they're bad albums necessarily, but they're certainly overrated. But here everything The Band does is spot on. Again, maybe the issue is just that the compilers were a bit more fussy in what to leave off, as opposed to, e.g., the expanded re-issue of ROA, which added some really unnecessary tracks.



Even the fourth disc of rehearsal tracks is worthwhile as an album to play and enjoy, and not merely as a dieharder's curiosity disc, which we'd listen to once and perhaps find "interesting" but not actually enjoyable. Rehearsal versions of Van's two songs are especially good and display a wholly different sort of energy from the live ones.



The Band continued to show moments of brilliance in their post-Robbie reincarnation (e.g., "Where I Should Always Be" on "High on the Hog"), but they were generally few and far between. These four discs show them at the absolute top of their game, and it makes one wonder--as four of the five did...--why the hell they hung it up."