THE BAND – STAGE FRIGHT LP – EXC+ UK 1970  BOB DYLAN

The Band – Stage Fright
(Capitol Records  1970  EASW425  Green Labels)
UK Pressing

G&L Gatefold Sleeve in Excellent/Very Good+ condition
 – some light ringwear and sticker tear in top right corner
Insert in Nr MINT condition

Vinyl in Excellent+ condition
(there are some surface marks visible on the vinyl when held up to the light but they don’t affect the sound quality apart from some light pops/crackles)

The Band was a Canadian-American roots rock group, originally consisting of four Canadians—Rick Danko (bass, vocals), Garth Hudson (keyboards), Richard Manuel (piano, vocals), and Robbie Robertson (guitar)—and one American, Levon Helm (drums, vocals). The members of the Band first came together as they joined the rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins’s backing group, the Hawks, one by one between 1958 and 1963.

In 1964, they separated from Hawkins, after which they toured and released a few singles as Levon and the Hawks and the Canadian Squires. The next year, Bob Dylan hired them for his U.S. tour in 1965 and world tour in 1966. Following the 1966 tour, the group moved with Dylan to Saugerties, New York, where they made the informal 1967 recordings that became The Basement Tapes, which forged the basis for their 1968 debut album, Music from Big Pink. Because they were always “the band” to various frontmen, Helm said the name “The Band” worked well when the group came into its own. The group began performing as the Band in 1968 and went on to release ten studio albums. Dylan continued to collaborate with the Band over the course of their career, including a joint 1974 tour.

The original configuration of the Band ended its touring career in 1976 with an elaborate live ballroom performance featuring numerous musical celebrities. This performance was immortalized in Martin Scorsese’s 1978 documentary The Last Waltz. The Band recommenced touring in 1983 without guitarist Robertson, who had found success with a solo career and as a Hollywood music producer. Following a 1986 show, Manuel committed suicide. The remaining three members continued to tour and record albums with a succession of musicians filling Manuel’s and Robertson’s roles; the final configuration of the group included Richard Bell (piano), Randy Ciarlante (drums), and Jim Weider (guitar). Danko died of heart failure in 1999, after which the group broke up for good. Helm was diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998 and was unable to sing for several years, but he eventually regained the use of his voice. He continued to perform and released several successful albums until he died in 2012.

The group was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1989 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994. In 2004 Rolling Stone ranked them No. 50 on its list of the 100 greatest artists of all time, and in 2008 they received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2004, “The Weight” was ranked 41st on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.

In 2014, the Band was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame.

Stage Fright is the third studio album by Canadian–American group the Band, released in 1970. It featured two of the group’s best known songs, “The Shape I’m In” and “Stage Fright”, both of which showcased inspired lead vocal performances (by Richard Manuel and Rick Danko, respectively) and became staples in the group’s live shows.

Stage Fright was a contradictory record, combining buoyant music and disenchanted lyrics, and exploring themes such as peace, escape and frivolity that revealed darker shades of melancholy, anxiety and fatigue. Writer Ross Johnson described it as “a cheerful-sounding record that unintentionally was confessional… a spirited romp through a dispirited period in the group’s history.” As a result, it received a somewhat mixed reception compared to its widely-praised predecessors, largely due to the ways that it departed from those records and, perhaps, frustrated expectations. Generally, critics agreed that the music was solid. They hailed aspects like Garth Hudson’s diverse textural weavings, Robbie Robertson’s incisive guitar work, and the funk of the Danko–Levon Helm rhythm section, but differed on the record’s troubling tone and overall cohesiveness. In later years, on the occasion of reissue and remaster releases, many critics reappraised the album as showing “no drop-off in quality compared to the first two” and “evidence of a group still working at the top of their form.”

Much more of a rock album than the group’s previous efforts, Stage Fright had a more downcast, contemporary focus and less of the vocal harmony blend that had been a centerpiece of the first two albums. The tradition of switching instruments continued, however, with each musician contributing parts on at least two different instruments. The album included the last two songs composed by pianist Richard Manuel, both co-written with Robertson, who would continue to be the group’s dominant songwriter until the group ceased touring in 1976.

Stage Fright peaked at number 5 on the Billboard albums chart, surpassing the group’s first two albums, which reached numbers 30 and 9, respectively. It was one of three albums by the group, including The Band and Rock of Ages, to be certified gold (more than 500,000 sales).

Track listing

Side one

Side two

Personnel

The Band

• Rick Danko – bass guitar, fiddle, double bass, vocals
• Levon Helm – drums, guitar, percussion, vocals
• Garth Hudson – organ, electric piano, accordion, tenor saxophone
• Richard Manuel – piano, organ, drums, clavinet, vocals
• Robbie Robertson – guitar, autoharp

Additional personnel

• Todd Rundgren – mixing and recording engineer
• Glyn Johns – mixing engineer
• John Simon – baritone saxophone on “The W.S. Walcott Medicine Show”