It was as if the group – not to say quite the group – had come back together.
Under a trio of softly lit chandeliers, more than twenty musicians, including Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Mavis StaplesEric Church and Bob Weir gathered on stage Thursday evening at the Kia Forum in Inglewood to pay tribute to Robbie Robertsonthe Canadian singer, guitarist, songwriter and composer who died last year at age 80.
The lineup of familiar names — not to mention the sleek lighting rig — was clearly intended to evoke “The Last Waltz,” director Martin Scorsese’s classic 1978 documentary about the Thanksgiving star blowout at San’s Winterland Ballroom Francisco which served as the final concert. by Robertson’s beloved rock-rock band, The Band. Indeed, Scorsese filmed Thursday’s show – officially billed as “Life is a Carnival: A Musical Celebration of Robbie Robertson” – for possible release as a full-fledged concert film.
Jamey Johnson performs.
(Michael Blackshire/Los Angeles Times)
Following the earlier deaths of Richard Manuel, Rick Danko and Helm of LevonRobertson’s death leaves Garth Hudson, 87, as the only surviving original member of the group. And Robertson wasn’t the only one missed at the Forum: Shortly after the show, which started around 7 p.m. and ended a few minutes after midnight, Mike Campbell of Tom PettyThe Heartbreakers noted that Thursday was “kind of a spiritual night for me” because he and longtime bandmate Benmont Tench were at one of their old haunts just three days before the late Petty turned 74.
So: memories upon memories upon memories. Yet at its best, the Robertson tribute — produced by Blackbird Presents, which also hosted Willie Nelson’s two-night show 90th anniversary show last year at the Hollywood Bowl — had a vividness that cut through the multi-layered retrospection of it all.
Eric Clapton performs.
(Michael Blackshire/Los Angeles Times)
Morrison, who appeared in “The Last Waltz,” gave a tangy three-song performance behind a pair of mirrored aviators, performing “Tupelo Honey” in “Days Like This” in “Wonderful Remark,” the last to which he contributed. Scorsese’s 1983 “The King of Comedy,” for which Robertson supervised the soundtrack. (Robertson later worked with Scorsese on many of the director’s films; this year he earned a posthumous Oscar nomination with his music for “Flower Moon Killers. “)
Clapton, who has spoken repeatedly about his desire to join the group, played sharp blues guitar in Bobby “Blue” Bland’s “Farther Up the Road,” which he performed in “The Last Waltz”; at the Forum, he also delivered crisp renditions of “The Shape I’m In,” “Chest Fever” and “Forbidden Fruit.”
Allison Russell, from left, Nathaniel Rateliff, Logan Staats, Margo Price, Julian Taylor, Jim James, Bob Weir and Trey Anastasio on stage at the Kia Forum.
(Michael Blackshire/Los Angeles Times)
Staples, a third alumnus of Scorsese’s film, led an attractively shaggy version of “The Weight” that featured two jam band icons in the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir and PhishingIt’s Trey Anastasio. Other highlights included Weir’s spectral solo performance of Bob Dylan’s “When I Paint My Masterpiece,” Church’s funky “Up on Cripple Creek” and a majestic version of the album’s “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” fearsomely bearded country singer Jamey Johnson, who also spent the evening in the concert’s crack house band alongside Campbell, Tench, Don Was, Ryan Bingham and an assortment of drummers, backing vocalists and horn players. (Elvis Costello and Noah Kahan were announced as participants but were not in attendance.)
Did anyone on stage Thursday reorganize your thinking about Robertson and his music – the way he thought about the past and systems of injustice, or the way he balanced his dedication to texture with his belief in crucial economy of a pop song? No. As with any tribute concert of this type, the program was ultimately too long, too midtempo, too full of warmly respectful performances from Jim James, Allison RussellNathaniel Rateliff and Robert Randolph.
It also needed a real star – someone who would generate an explosion of enthusiasm, as Paul McCartney did at the April party. Jimmy Buffett Memorial at the Bowl. (Bono, who wrote and recorded “Sweet Fire of Love” with Robertson, would have been a great achievement.) And yet, late as it was, one couldn’t help but be moved by the grand finale of the series: an all-hands “I Shall Be Released” that inevitably brought to mind the evening’s honoree all those decades ago at Winterland – surrounded by friends, sweating through his dress shirt, making the history of a moment.
