Moondog Matinee
Moondog Matinee is the fifth studio album by Canadian/American rock group the Band, released in 1973. It consists entirely of cover material reflecting the group's love of R&B and blues music, with one exception in their interpretation of the theme from the film The Third Man.
| Moondog Matinee | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | October 15, 1973 | |||
| Recorded | March–June 1973 | |||
| Studio | Bearsville Sound Studios, Bearsville, NY; Capitol Studios, Hollywood, CA; New York, NY | |||
| Genre | Rock | |||
| Length | 35:09 | |||
| Label | Capitol | |||
| Producer | The Band | |||
| The Band chronology | ||||
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| Reissue cover | ||||
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| Australian alternate cover | ||||
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| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   |
| Christgau's Record Guide | B+[2] |
| DownBeat | |
| Entertainment Weekly | B+[4] |
| MusicHound | 5/5[5] |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | |
In a 2002 interview, Levon Helm described the reasoning for recording an album of covers: "That was all we could do at the time. We couldn't get along—we all knew that fairness was a bunch of shit. We all knew we were getting screwed, so we couldn't sit down and create no more music. 'Up on Cripple Creek' and all that stuff was over—all that collaboration was over, and that type of song was all we could do."[7]
The original idea had been to replicate the group's setlists of the mid-'60s when they had been known as Levon and the Hawks, playing clubs throughout Canada and the US. Of the ten tracks, only one, "Share Your Love (With Me)" had been performed by the group in the mid-'60s. The rest were merely tracks the group admired, two of them, "Holy Cow" and "A Change Is Gonna Come", chronologically coming after the group's club days.
Rhapsody praised the album, calling it one of its favorite cover albums.[8]
Track listing
Side one
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Lead vocals | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Ain't Got No Home" | Clarence "Frogman" Henry | Levon Helm | 3:20 |
| 2. | "Holy Cow" | Allen Toussaint | Rick Danko, Helm | 3:15 |
| 3. | "Share Your Love (With Me)" | Deadric Malone, Alfred Braggs | Richard Manuel | 2:50 |
| 4. | "Mystery Train" | Junior Parker, Sam Phillips | Helm | 5:35 |
| 5. | "Third Man Theme" | Anton Karas | Instrumental | 2:43 |
Side two
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Lead vocals | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Promised Land" | Chuck Berry | Helm | 3:00 |
| 2. | "The Great Pretender" | Buck Ram | Manuel | 3:07 |
| 3. | "I'm Ready" | Fats Domino, Al Lewis, Sylvester Bradford | Helm | 3:22 |
| 4. | "Saved" | Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller | Manuel | 3:42 |
| 5. | "A Change Is Gonna Come" | Sam Cooke | Danko | 4:15 |
- Sides one and two were combined as tracks 1–10 on CD reissues.
2001 reissue bonus tracks
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11. | "Didn't It Rain (Outtake)" | Traditional | 3:16 |
| 12. | "Crying Heart Blues (Outtake)" | Joe Brown | 3:29 |
| 13. | "Shakin' (Outtake)" | Sam Cooke | 3:31 |
| 14. | "What Am I Living For (Outtake)" | Fred Jay, Art Harris | 5:04 |
| 15. | "Going Back to Memphis (Outtake)" | Chuck Berry | 5:02 |
| 16. | "Endless Highway (Studio version)" | Robertson | 5:09 |
Personnel
- The Band
- Rick Danko – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
- Levon Helm – drums, electric guitar, bass guitar, double bass, vocals
- Garth Hudson – organ, piano, accordion, synthesizer, clavinet, tenor saxophone
- Richard Manuel – acoustic and electric piano, drums, vocals
- Robbie Robertson – electric and acoustic guitars
- Additional personnel
- Billy Mundi – drums (brushes) on "Mystery Train"[9]
- Ben Keith – pedal steel guitar on "The Promised Land"
- Technical
- Mark Harman – engineer
- Jay Ranellucci – engineer
- John Wilson – engineer
- Edward Kasper – artwork
References
- link
- Christgau, Robert (1981). "Consumer Guide '70s: B". Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies. Ticknor & Fields. ISBN 089919026X. Retrieved February 21, 2019.
- "The Band: Moondog Matinee". DownBeat: 66. October 2001.
- "The Band: Moondog Matinee". Entertainment Weekly: 81. May 25, 2001.
- Graff, Gary; Durchholz, Daniel (eds) (1999). MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide. Farmington Hills, MI: Visible Ink Press. p. 72. ISBN 1-57859-061-2.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)
- Brackett, Nathan, with Hoard, Christian (eds) (2004). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th edn). New York, NY: Fireside. p. 42. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.
- Lopate, Mitch. "He Shall Be Levon...: The Band's Levon Helm Is Rocking Harder Than Ever With The Barnburners", GRITZ magazine, Fall 2002.
- Rhapsody’s Favorite Covers Albums retrieved 01-08-10 Archived 2010-07-31 at the Wayback Machine.
- http://theband.hiof.no/albums/moondog_matinee.html