Categories : Country + Western, Music Reviews, Rock + Pop.
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Rating: 5/5 Released: September 27, 2005 Reviewer: Trent Depue |
How many CDs worth of material does it take to adequately sum up as seminal a career as that of The Band? This box set release, with five (and a bonus DVD), seems to have hit the nail square on the head. The first disc in this history guides us through The Bands tenures with Ronnie Hawkins & The Hawks, Levon & The Hawks and finally Bob Dylan before leading into The Bands highly acclaimed debut album ‘Music from Big Pink,’ which is, to the credit of the album, visited in its entirety throughout the course of the box set. The 102 track collection, almost a third of which are an assortment of previously unreleased songs, live performances, song sketches and alternate takes, spans five discs and provides well over six hours of entertainment.
No modern day retrospective like this would be complete without an accompanying DVD: the sixth and final disc in the box provides an assortment of rare live performances, opening with a 1970 recording of ‘King Harvest (Has Surely Come),’ from Robbie Robertson’s studio in Woodstock then continuing on with a couple cuts from a night time set during the Calgary leg of the Festival Express Train Tour and concluding with a late career appearance on Saturday Night Live, where Richard Manuel belts out a beautiful version of ‘Georgia on my Mind.’ The sound and visual quality are a little rough on a few of the tracks, a victim only of the recording devices of the time, but rather than taking away from the DVD this adds a uniquely authentic quality to the material.
Appropriately, the final installment in this box set is a 100+ page colour illustrated history of The Band, following them from their early beginnings, to the peak of their popularity and through to their star studded final performance in the Martin Scorsese rock film ‘The Last Waltz.’ The text contains insight into The Band’s music and in depth analysis of each of their eight albums as written by Grammy award winner Rob Bowman.
For sixteen years The Band placed their mark on rock and roll history and with this comprehensive look at their career comes an opportunity for fans to experience everything they have to offer. Old fans have something new to add to their collection and new fans have the opportunity to experience, to the fullest, one of rocks most influential bands.
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