And They Called Her Big Pink
- Abigail Devoe
- Apr 21
- 17 min read
Who would’ve thought a not-so-little pink house would change rock-and-roll history?
Richard Manuel: vocals, piano, some organ
Rick Danko: vocals, bass, fiddle
Levon Helm: vocals, drums/percussion
Robbie Robertson: guitar, lead vocals on “To Kingdom Come”
Garth Hudson: organ, some piano, saxophone, clavinet
Produced by John Simon; contributes baritone horn, some piano, saxophone, tambourine
art by Bob Dylan
“We got off at an exit marked Saugerties. Then west on Route 212 until we turned right onto Pine Lane. It was late on an autumn afternoon, the maples and oaks were glowing orange and red, and I couldn’t take my eyes off Overlook Mountain and the rolling terrain. We’d driven by the Catskills a few times on the way to the Peppermint Lounge, but this was my first time in the Woodstock area. From that first day, the Catskills reminded me of the Ozarks and the Arkansas hill country. I had a shock of recognition. Going to Woodstock felt like going home.”
quoted from: Levon Helm with Stephen Davis, This Wheel’s On Fire: Levon Helm and The Story of The Band (2000)
In the interest of time, we have to get to Woodstock as quickly as possible. So here’s the entire history of the Hawks, I guess.
Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks were an old-school rock-and-roll band from Arkansas founded in the 1950s.Their drummer is 17-year-old Levon Helm. They go on tour in Canada. Who opens for them? 15-year-oldRobbie Robertson’s band! He hangs around backstage after the show and hits it off with the Hawks.
Ronnie likes the kid so much, he lands a spot in the Hawks. Being the two teenagers in the band, Robbie and Levon get close. They forge a songwriting partnership; with Robbie writing lyrics and Levon arranging them.Since Robbie came around, every time one of the Hawks from Arkansas quit, Ronnie would replace him with a Canadian player. Pianist Richard Manuel and multi-instrumentalists Rick Danko and Garth Hudson join in pretty rapid succession.
The Hawks strike it out on their own in early 1964. They wind up in New York, doing some session work; including John Hammond’s So Many Roads LP. At the same time as all this, folk darling Bob Dylan is trying this new thing called folk rock. Ergo, he needs a rock band to back him. John Hammond hooks Dylan up with the guys.
Being Bob Freaking Dylan’s band would be the gig of a lifetime for young musicians in the mid-1960s, but the Hawks themselves had a different perspective. Robbie likened it to “...a detour. We’re hooking up with this guy, and he’s changing the course of music...That’s not a bad thing to experience along the way too. We thought hey, let’s take that detour.” Even if it means getting booed every single night for like two whole years! This “us-against-the-world” attitude forges a strong bond between Dylan and the guys, but takes its toll on Levon. He quits in ’65. The replacement drummer was a nice guy, but results were mixed: “They were a hit in Memphis...and got booed in Philadelphia.”
In July of 1966, Bob gets in that mysterious motorcycle accident. I don’t think we’ll ever know what really happened that day. The only two people alive to tell the tale are Bob and Sara Dylan, and they’re not saying shit. Whatever happened, Bob from the public eye; settling into family life with Sara and their kids in fabled artists community Woodstock. Though Bob’s not on the road, the Hawks are still on his payroll. His manager, Albert Grossman, suggests the guys move out to Woodstock to stay close to him.
Rick finds this big ugly pink house. But the price is right: $125 a month. In February 1967, the Hawks move into “Big Pink.”
Soon, Garth Hudson sets up that famed basement studio. For the next ten months, they workshopped their own material for two or three hours a day, six days a week; on top of rehearsing with Bob in the mornings. He’s writing something like ten songs a week, Woodstock is treating him very well creatively. Among those ten songs a week were “Tears of Rage,” which he co-wrote with Richard, and “This Wheel’s On Fire,” written with Rick. Both appeared for the first time on The Basement Tapes; not officially released until 1975, but mostly recorded in ’67 and ’68 at Bob’s place and the basement of Big Pink, wouldn’t you know it!
Though he’s writing a storm and due to record John Wesley Harding in Nashville, Bob makes it clear he’s not touring again any time soon. Rick sees opportunity for the Hawks to have their own record deal. Albert Grossman’s wife Sally goes to bat for the guys. They cut a couple demos, but something’s just not right. Robbiesaid, “It was horrible, it sounded awful – the engineer couldn't get it straightened out." Somehow, Rick tracksdown Levon. A lot had changed in his absence. Their new style wasn’t like the Hawks’ rock-and-roll stuff or the psych rock of the day.
According to Rick, this is how the name came to be:
“Garth was interested in Scriabin around then, music and color and all that. Soon people around town started to get to know us. If I was trying to cash a check in the Colonial Pharmacy, someone there might vouch for me by saying, ‘Yeah, he’s with the band.’ Meaning Bob Dylan’s band. Everyone knew everyone else back then.”
quoted from: Levon Helm with Stephen Davis, This Wheel’s On Fire: Levon Helm and the Story of The Band (2000)
From Robbie’s perspective, it was a more casual thing; just people around town calling them “the band.” However the non-name came to be, it stuck. Just as Dylan fires Albert Grossman, the newly-christened Band is in business. They’re signed to Capitol Records as “The Crackers” and producer John Simon is brought on board to produce their debut album. After a hairbrained trip to California in which Rick, Richard, Garth, and Levon (the four Band members who absolutely should not have been left without adult supervision) took out a bum credit card, were hauled off their connecting flight by Chicago police until they came up with the money, raided the airport snack bar, and almost got beat up by a bunch of hippie-hating Vietnam veterans, Big Pink was recorded between A&R Studios in New York and Capitol’s facilities in LA.
The outcome, Music From Big Pink, was released that July, the outcome would quite literally alter the course of rock-and-roll history. Big Pink beat the Byrds’ country rock effort, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, by about six weeks. Creedence Clearwater Revival’s whopping three albums in a year and Dylan’s own country effort Nashville Skyline were still a year away, as was the first bootleg of the Basement Tapes!
In short. You know that back-to-basics thing I’m always harping on about? This was the start. Al Kooper called it his album of the year for 1968 – above the Beatles, the Stones, and Hendrix – and Eric Clapton all but admitted it was the album that broke up Cream.
“...it was (like) someone had nailed me through the chest to the wall. I was just immediately converted.”
quoted from: Once We Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (dir. Daniel Roher, 2019)
Meanwhile, Rick broke his neck in a car crash, Levon fell off his buddy’s motorcycle, and Richard sustained third degree burns on his foot from accidentally blowing up his grill?! Needless to say, the tour was cancelled.Accompanied by three Al Aronowitz-penned features in Life, Rolling Stone, and Hullabaloo that year, The Band became this shadowy, mysterious group. Despite a lack of promotional efforts by Capitol (the guys put the kabosh on a pink Cadillac sweepstakes,) the Big Pink material was being covered up the wazoo. Three Dog Night and Sugarloaf covered “Chest Fever,” Blood Sweat and Tears did “Lonesome Suzie.” Joan Baez, Ian and Sylvia, and Gene Clark all recorded “Tears of Rage.” The Byrds and the Hollies both covered “This Wheel’s On Fire,” so did Leslie West on his Mountain LP. After “The Weight” was featured in Easy Rider, it was covered by the likes of the Ventures, the Staples Singers, the Supremes and the Temptations, Dionne Warwick, Aretha Franklin, the Chambers Brothers, Joe Cocker, John Denver. None quite compared to “I Shall Be Released” though: it was covered three times at Woodstock alone!
Going in: I was worried that a. the hype would ruin Big Pink for me, and b. that I would hate this. I listened to this for the first time while getting ready to film the Climbing episode and I went, “Ohhh, no! Nothing is grabbing me!” It makes sense; I went from the rebellion to “rebelling against the rebellion,” as Robbie always called it. This great unplugging is certainly something to adjust to – especially when you wrote about the freakin’ Sonics before this!
The best way I can describe the sound of Big Pink is of instrument-swapping at a bonfire, but with a brass ensemble in the orchestra pit. This didn’t come from nowhere: Robbie spent his childhood visiting his mother’s side of the family on the Six Nations reserve, while Levon saw many traveling fairs and bands in Arkansas.
Robbie pushed for Tears of Rage to open the Big Pink; his reasoning being, at this time, no one opened their records with downtempo songs. It’d immediately set the Band apart. “Rage” sets the tone of Big Pink: referencing the past, but absolutely a product of its day. This might be the most somber tambourine rattle I’ve ever heard. The warm, cozy brass section is contrasted by guitar so heavily affected you’d be forgiven for mistaking it for an organ. You can practically smell the wood paneling on the walls. Co-written by Bob and Richard Manuel, “Rage” seems to directly address the generational divide that defined the 1960s. Their lyrics seem to be from the point of view of the parent – but this is Bob we’re talking about here. We can’t ever be too sure. “We carried you in our arms on Independence Day” makes immediate calls to Americana imagery with a Fourth of July parade, “And now you’d throw us all aside/And put us on our way.” “Tears of rage, tears of grief” initially made me believe this was about a parent having to bury their child. Richard sings with such strained passion, it’s easy to think he sings about literal death. But upon looking into the rest of the lyrics, it feels more like the parent is grieving their kid being a kid. Remember how your mom cried when she sent you off to college?
“Now, I want you to know that while we watched you discover no one would be true/Most everybody reallythought/It was a childish thing to do” One of the hardest things about being a parent is letting your kids fuck up. They have to learn from their mistakes by making them. You can’t shelter them forever, but you can say “I told you so.”
To Kingdom Come was the first – and last – time Robbie would sing lead on a Band album in nearly a decade. I understand why; He doesn’t exactly have a frontman’s voice. But each singing member of the Band had a wiley voice, making opportunity for some fantastic harmonies. Each man’s voice comes together into a broken wagon wheel; still spinning, but always skipping. The only comparable group I can think of are the Dead and their signature squiggly harmonies. Lo and behold, they loved the Band!
The first and second tracks of Big Pink are a bit of a bait-and-switch. I feel like “To Kingdom Come” was what this stage of the Band were really about. It’s a laidback, but no less momentous groove that comes from the guys truly knowing each other as musicians. The bright, beautiful piano (which benefits wonderfully from 8-track facilities) and weird synths mingle with Levon’s sturdy drumming and Robbie’s layered guitar parts.
“Kingdom Come” shows that Robbie had grown leaps and bounds as a guitarist since the Hawks’ Dylan days. He’s held onto his R&B influence; playing almost Motown licks. But his tone isn’t as raw as it was before. He’s incorporated vibrato (bending the string) as well; a very country and blues thing to do. It shows a level of refinement in his playing. A dead giveaway of a guitarist’s comfort level with their instrument is their phrasing. This is the only real guitar solo on Big Pink; Robbie’s phrasing is articulate without being stuffy.
Richard thought of In A Station as a “George Harrison-type song” – ironic considering George was thinking of the Band when he wrote “All Things Must Pass!” Sadly, I don’t get much of any of the best of George on “In A Station.” The melody feels awkward and unsettled with the harpsichord-like keys. It feels precious and dated, even though this was recorded and released in 1968 – the year of the harpsichord! I do get the quiet Beatle from the lyrics though. If you told me “Once I climbed up the face of a mountain/And ate the wild fruit there/Fell asleep until the moonlight woke me/And I could taste your hair” was a dropped line from one of George’s raga rock-era compositions, I might believe you. So does the smart “If a rumor should delay you, love seems so little to save.”
Caledonia Mission is another quick bait-and-switch. For the first five seconds, I’m bracing myself for a jolly watering hole jaunt. Then, an impressively limber key change into a ballad. Apparently Caledonia was real, a dancer in F.S. Walcott’s Midnight Ramble; a “hoochie coochie” traveling show, as Levon put it. “(Wolcott would) introduce one of the beautiful dancers from the four-girl chorus line and tell us how Caledonia would show us what made her famous down in Miami…” The music shifts and blends from country ballad to something more shimmy-able; not unlike Walcott’s act changed from day to late night. Where the Caledonia Levon saw was maybe famous for something...less savory...Robbie writes her as a mystical fortune-telling woman. She reads tea leaves, knows the I-Ching, and holds knowledge passed down to her from elder women. In this version of the story, the narrator is the traveler. He dreams of running off with this woman, assuring her, “We’ll be gone in moonshine time.” But it seems the stars told her to stay within the mission walls. Whether it’sone of the guys singing impossibly high, a mystery instrument, or an uncredited wife or girlfriend, the humming in the background of the verses reminds me of the ever-present Emmylou Harris on Desire. So does the “mystical woman” trope, now that I think of it. The seeds of mid-1970s Dylan gestated with the Band, after all. It took me a minute to get into Caledonia as it’s always dancing around genres, but once I do, I can enjoy it.
Robbie wrote The Weight about the changes in his life: became a husband and first-time father. “Pulled into Nazareth” was inspired by the makers’ stamp in his Martin guitar, and a dizzying journey unfolds from there. Our narrator gets himself into an absolutely ridiculous situation. This poor guy just wants a place to sleep for the night and bumps into the devil, possibly hooks up with some guy’s wife, gets chased by a madman, and getsstuck with this guy’s dog. “The Weight” is chock full of characters the guys met on their travels. Luke was a guitarist Levon knew, young Anna Lee was one Anna Lee Williams. Crazy Chester and Hop-along Cassidy were friends of Ronnie Hawkins’s, even Fanny was real. Though it became the Band’s greatest hit, according to Across The Great Divide: The Band and America, it was only included on Big Pink as an afterthought! Regardless of its placeholder intention, “The Weight” more than pays Big Pink’s price of admission. This and “Up On Cripple Creek” are The Band Songs for good reason!
I know there’s this weird rivalry between Robbie and Levon fans in the Band fandom online. The two had a falling out after the band broke up, then played the sue-me sue-you blues, but it’s from my understanding that they made up before Levon passed in 2012. Let’s get one thing straight: each one of the guys was essential. Garth was a master of his craft. Robbie was a first-rate lyricist. You don’t get that iconic barbershop“And...and...and…” without all three singers! “The Weight” exemplifies the communal nature of the Band at their very best. They trade licks and play off each other with ease. Though you hear each distinct instrument, it all comes together into one.
All that being said: Levon was the beating heart of the Band. He brought that down-home comfort with his gruff southern twang. He just sounded so damn good singing with Rick. I’m convinced that Dylan’s weird voice change between John Wesley Harding and Nashville Skyline was an attempt to rip off the Band; Rick specifically. Just listen to Rick’s verses on “The Weight” and you’ll see what I mean.
We Can Talk was written about the band itself. “It’s that same old riddle, only starts from the middle.”Apparently the lyrics were meant to mimic their banter; loaded up with plenty of puns, word play, and taking the piss out of each other. “I’m afraid if you ever got a pat on the back, it would likely burst your lungs!” It extends the communal feel of “The Weight” onto side two of Big Pink. The chorus is catchy as hell; the guys trading offlines in true Three (or four, or five) Musketeers fashion. There’s a call-and-response bit between Levon and I think Richard and Rick? Robbie might chime in on a line or two as well? Their vocal blend was so good, it gets hard to tell who’s who. That much is remarkable, considering all the different accents at play. “One voice for all, echoing along the hall,” and yes, someone chimes in to be the “echo.”
Long Black Veil is a cover of an old-school country ballad, originally recorded by Lefty Frizzell. It tells the dramatic tale of a man put to death for a crime he didn’t commit, when in reality he was romancing his best friend’s wife. He takes the secret to his grave; feeling taking the fall is a better fate than betrayal. She spends the rest of her life in mourning, wandering the woods in the titular black veil to cry over his bones. The organ and low brass make this story feel like it’s playing out at a one-screen movie theater.
If you’re getting sleepy listening to all these tales of the power of friendship and the sweet sounds of the past, Chest Fever will wake your ass up. About Garth Hudson, Robbie said:
“Garth was a reservoir of brilliant music, and I wanted to dive in deeply to learn and understand enough of it to appreciate its rewards.”
quoted from: Robbie Robertson, Testimony (2016)
Oft cited as Garth’s tour de force, it takes guts to take Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue” and flip it into an iconic intro the way he did. It feels mighty like a church pipe organ. He kicks the rest of the Band into gear. Levon thuds away at the drums like he’s playing for the back of the stadium, Robbie plays bent-up licks, and Rick plays a bassline completely indebted to Motown. It’s laid on thick, like a hot and humid summer night in a basement. The lyrics are obscure, and barely intelligible on my copy. It sounds like the delirium you experience while trying to sleep off a sickness. You hear people saying words, but you can’t quite make out what they are. Then the guys shove a makeshift Salvation Army Band in there, made up of Rick’s fiddle plus producer John Simon on the odd brass instrument. This song really does feel like a fever dream. It’s exciting in a way you’d never expect from a record born from hunkering down in the country. When I hear “Toccata” again, I get bummed because I just don’t want this to end.
Lonesome Suzie is Richard’s sweet ode to a broken-hearted girl; alone and crying after she apparently got stood up at the bar. “She just sits there, hoping for a friend/I don’t fit here, but I may have a friend to lend” What solution does our narrator pose? “Why don’t we get together, what else can we do?” It’s accented with gentle organ and piano, sensual brass, and soulful, romantic playing by Robbie.
Plainly, I feel wrong for not liking This Wheel’s On Fire.
Apparently Garth ran a telegraph key through a toy organ to get that absolutely weird synth-sound. It sounds about a decade ahead of its time. Not even Brian Eno would be working with sounds like these for another five years at least. Objectively, that kind of forward thinking is impressive as hell. Though the vocals are sublime, “This Wheel’s On Fire” is an unfortunate case of me preferring cover versions over the original. I just don’t jive with the late ’70s sound, it completely takes me out of the rest of the song. It’s a shame; this might be my favorite set of lyrics on the LP.
“If your memory serves you well/You’ll remember you’re the one
That called on me to call on them/To get you your favors done,
And after every plan had failed/And there was nothing more to tell
You knew that we would meet again/If your memory served you well.”
They whisper of trying to outrun the inevitable, to no avail. Dylan played with this idea on much more abstract terms on “All Along The Watchtower” from the year before. Considering how the consequences of living too fast and building too big a myth caught up to Dylan in 1966 – and would catch up to the Band themselves – clearly they saw this concept worth meditating on in writing.
I Shall Be Released proved to cast a long shadow, to say the absolute least. It became the Band’s signature song and one of the most covered songs of all time. The Last Waltz finale version with Dylan is literally transcendent; like rock-and-roll’s grande finale.
Richard’s voice was always so soul-crushingly tender; with a perpetually injured tone and vibrato like a hummingbird’s wing. No chest about it whatsoever. He was the perfect choice to sing this song. “I Shall Be Released” is about a man imprisoned; whether physically, mentally, or spiritually we don’t know.
“They say every man needs protection/They say every man must fall
Yet I swear I see my reflection/Some place so high above this wall”
Life isn’t living without highs and lows, every action has consequences, and no matter how thin faith has worn, there’s always hope for a better way of living. Our narrator doesn’t dream of salvation, he has absolute faith in it: “Any day now, I shall be released.” When one remembers the demons that dogged Richard through his too-short life, the recording on Big Pink takes on a new meaning. The arrangement feels like an endless mental march towards the light of freedom – whatever freedom means to the listener. A somber battle-return snare drum, that airy piano that could bring a tear to even the most hardened heart.
People often confuse the intents of The Basement Tapes and Big Pink. The Basement Tapes weren’t much more than demos; five guys plus one of the greatest songwriters to ever live just screwing around at home. There was no audience. Big Pink was recorded for an audience.
It seems the Band were one of those groups who were at their best when they had something to prove. Though they seemingly came out of nowhere, the hype as “Dylan’s band” had been bubbling under the surface for years. With Big Pink; the Band asserts they’re their own people and a united front.
About Big Pink, Levon said: “The main thing was the spirit. We worked so hard on that music that no matter what the song credits say – who supposedly wrote what – you’d have to call it a full-bore effort by the group to show what we were all about.” People get caught up in all the bullshit surrounding the Band, but when things were good, they were really good. Big Pink is proof. Self-titled may be “better,” but not every band could make something as odd upon release as Big Pink “work.” Sometimes it doesn’t. The Americana schtick gets samey, some instruments just don’t fit. Its worst moments are nice, its best moments are truly show-stopping. It’s got country, folk, gospel, even a tinge of classical thanks to Garth, blended with R&B and rock-and-roll from their Hawks days the likes of which the pop music sphere had never seen. Everyone brought something different to Music From Big Pink. In doing so, the Band brought something new to the table.
Who would’ve thought a little pink house would have such far-reaching consequences for rock-and-roll history.
Personal favorites: “To Kingdom Come,” “The Weight,” “We Can Talk,” “Chest Fever,” “I Shall Be Released”
– AD ☆
Watch the full episode above!
Bowman, Rob. “Life Is A Carnival.” Goldmine vol. 17 no. 15, 7/26/1991. https://theband.hiof.no/history/part_5.html
Helm, Levon, with Stephen Davis. This Wheel’s On Fire: Levon Helm and the Story of The Band. Chicago: A Capella Press, 2000.
Hoskyns, Barney. Across The Great Divide: The Band and America. New York: Hyperion, 1993. https://archive.org/details/acrossgreatdivid0000hosk_m2t6
Kooper, Al. “Music From Big Pink.” Rolling Stone, 8/10/1968. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/music-from-big-pink-182508/
Robertson, Robbie. Testimony. New York: Crown Archetype, 2016.
Roher, Daniel, dir. Once We Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band. Magnolia Pictures, 2019.
Simmons, Michael. “The Making of The Band’s Music From Big Pink.” Mojo issue 299, 10/2018. https://www.mojo4music.com/articles/stories/the-making-of-the-bands-music-from-big-pink/
“The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time” Rolling Stone, 12/31/2023. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-albums-of-all-time-1062063/the-band-music-from-big-pink-2-1063133/
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