Original subtitles

Okay.

- Okay, now. - Okay?

- Yeah, I'll start again. - Okay. Sync. Sync.

- Same slate still running. - Cutthroat.

Keep running, it'll get better. Start over.

- Same slate? - Yeah.

Tilting up.

Okay, Rick. What's the game?

- Cutthroat. - What's the object of it?

The object's to keep your balls on the table and knock everybody else's off.

You're still there, huh?

We're gonna do one more song, and that's it.

All right.

Happy Thanksgiving.

- Thank you very much! - Thank you!

Good night! Goodbye!

Okay, look. We've been together 16 years.

Who?

- Who? - Yeah.

The Band.

- Do you want me to plug that in there? - Yeah, let's do it again.

The Band has been together 16 years. Together on the road.

We did eight years in bars, dives, dance halls.

Eight years of concerts and stadiums, arenas.

We gave our final concert. We called it "The Last Waltz."

Why was it held in San Francisco in...

...Winterland, when you guys have been on the road for 16 years?

Winterland was the first place that The Band played as "The Band."

Some friends showed up and helped us take it home.

Not just friends. I mean, they were more than that.

Would you ask me that again?

I mean, they weren't just friends who came in to say hello.

You know what I mean? Get that fly.

No, they were more than just friends.

I feel they're probably...

...some of the greatest influences on music, on a whole generation.

We wanted it to be more than a concert. We wanted a celebration.

Celebration of a beginning or end?

Beginning of the beginning of the end of the beginning.

I see.

Good evening.

It was kind of--

We didn't know where we were going, didn't know what it was.

But for some reason it seemed like a good idea.

We got to this place, a joint in Fort Worth, Texas.

It was burned out, bombed out. The roof wasn't on the place anymore.

- Secret rooms. - They called it the Skyline Lounge.

We got there and set up and--

A big place, huge. A bar way at the back and a big dance floor.

- Real old. - Right, so we set up the 1st night...

...and go down to the place to play and...

...we go in and there's about three people in the audience.

A one-armed go-go dancer and a couple of drunk waiters.

A couple over here and a couple over there.

- Somebody shoots off a tear gas gun. - And a fight starts.

There isn't enough people in the place to get angry.

And we found out, a few years later, that it was Jack Ruby's club.

Sixteen years ago when we started...

...we started with a guy you might've heard of.

We'd like to start with him: The Hawk! Ronnie Hawkins!

He called me up and I said, "Sure, I'd like a job.

What does it mean? What do I do?"

He said, "You won't make much money...

...but you'll get more pussy than Sinatra."

Goddamn!

Big time, Bill! Big time! Big time!

Thank you, Ronnie!

The Hawk!

And the week went on and it was a little depressing.

It was especially depressing because we didn't have any money at all.

- No dough. - At one point we had no food money.

It got to the point where, coming from Canada...

...we had these big overcoats with pockets and everything.

We had a little routine. We'd go to a shopping center together.

- But I stayed at home though. - Oh, no, you didn't.

I got the cigarettes. I turned the machine upside down...

...and got everybody some cigarettes. Do you remember, man?

- That was on the quad. - You got me some bologna.

- What happened at the supermarket? - We'd go to the supermarket and...

...a couple people would buy some loaves of bread...

...because that was about the cheapest thing you could get.

The rest of us would be carousing the aisles, stuffing bologna.

We'd leave and the guy with the bread would go up to the counter.

"We'll meet you in the car. Go ahead and take the bread out."

-"Y'all come back!" - And with those overcoats!

And smale foweles maken melodye

That slepen al the nyght With open eye

So priketh hem nature in hir corages

Thanne Iongen folk to goon On pilgrimages

To ferne hawles, kowthe In sondry Iondes

And specially from Every shire's ende

Of Engelond, to Caunterbury They wende

The hooly blisful martir For the seke

That hem hath holpen Whan that they were seeke

Michael McClure!

You all know the Doctor? Dr. John? Mac Rebennack.

Come on, Mac.

In thankfulness to The Band and all the fellas.

Two, three, four, one.

The Doctor!

Everybody knows him.

You know this guy, I bet.

Hey!

Thank you, man, for letting me do this.

Shit. Are you kidding? Are you kidding?

I'd just like to say that it's one of the pleasures of my life...

...to be able to be on this stage with these people tonight.

They got it now, Robbie.

I don't know if the years connect, or it's coincidence...

...but it seems like, that's it.

That's what "The Last Waltz" is. I mean, 16 years on the road...

...the numbers start to scare you.

I couldn't live with 20 years on the road. I couldn't even discuss it.

Well, we were The Hawks.

And everything was fine...

...and one day, The Hawks meant something else altogether.

And it was right in the middle of that whole psychedelia.

You know, Chocolate Subway, and Marshmallow Overcoat.

Those kind of names.

When we were working with Bob Dylan, and we moved to Woodstock...

...everybody referred to us as "The Band." He called us The Band.

Our friends and neighbors called us The Band.

And we started out with The Crackers.

We tried to call ourselves The Honkies.

You know, everybody kind of backed off from that.

It was too straight, you know?

We decided just to call ourselves The Band.

- Still have that black pick? - This looks interesting.

Play "Old Time Religion" for the folks.

It's not like it used to be.

A dream come true.

Fascinating. Scary.

Kind of hard to take, the first time.

You have to go two or three times, before you can fall in love with it.

But that happens eventually.

We stayed at the Times Square Hotel on 42nd Street.

The title of the hotel, it sounded...

...like it was located in midtown Manhattan.

What did we know?

We came out of the hotel after checking in...

...thinking, "it's great to be in New York. Movie theaters forever.

All these friendly women walking up and down the street."

- It was great. - Yeah, New York was an adult portion.

That was an adult dose.

So it took a couple of trips, you know, to get into it.

You go in the first time, you get your ass kicked and you take off.

Soon as it heals up, you come back and you try it again.

Eventually, you fall right in love with it.

Roulette Records was in the middle of a mythical place, Tin Pan Alley...

...the songwriting capital of the world.

And we met some of the greatest rock'n'roll songwriters ever.

Doc Pomus, Mort Shuman, Lieber and Stoller.

They were all there. Carole King, Neil Diamond.

At the time, it wasn't a fair thing.

A songwriter was the low man on the totem pole.

But then, these people... And here come the '60s...

...with change, revolution, war and assassinations...

...and a whole other frame of mind coming along.

And these songwriters were expressing the feelings of people in the street.

In a way, it was kind of the beginning of the end of Tin Pan Alley.

Neil Diamond!

Great song!

When you started playing as The Band...

...you kind of shied away from publicity. Talk about that a little?

That was just part of a lifestyle that we got to love in Woodstock.

We got to like it, you know? Just...

...being able to chop wood, or hit your thumb with a hammer.

We'd be concerned with fixing a tape recorder...

...and fixing a screen door.

Stuff like that. Getting songs together.

We always seemed to get more done...

...when we didn't have a lot of company around.

We were more productive.

And as soon as company came, of course...

...you know, we'd start having fun.

And you know what happens when you have too much fun.

There's something we've kind of evaded, but I'll ask it now.

- What about women and the road? - I love them.

That's probably why we've been on the road.

That's it.

Not that I don't like music, you know.

I thought you weren't supposed to talk about it too much.

I thought we were supposed to pan away from that sort of stuff...

-...and get into something else. - Since we started playing together...

...just like we've all grown a little, so have the women.

- You know? And it's amazing. - That's right.

I just wanna break even.

Joni Mitchell, right.

Levon's home town is near West Helena.

At one time, we were there for some reason or another...

...and we decided to look up a legend of that town, Sonny Boy Williamson.

In my opinion, he's the best harp player...

...that's like harmonica, blues harmonica...

...that I've ever heard.

He's the big daddy of them.

He took us to a friend of his, a woman's place...

...who served food and corn liquor--

In a Southern booze can.

He was playing for us. We were drunk, trying to figure out where we were.

We were wiped out.

And he was spitting in a can, and I thought he was dipping snuff.

He kept spitting and playing, and we kept getting drunker.

Finally, I looked over in the can, and I realized it was blood.

He was getting tired and drunk by then.

We made big plans for all kinds of things we were gonna do.

And it was tremendous. A great night.

A couple of months later, we got a letter from his people...

...his manager, whoever, saying he had passed away.

Paul Butterfield.

Near Memphis...

...cotton country, rice country.

The most interesting thing is probably the music.

Levon, who came from around there?

- Carl Perkins. - Carl Perkins, sure.

- Muddy Waters, king of country music. - Yeah.

Elvis Presley.

Johnny Cash, Bo Diddley.

That's kind of the middle of the country back there, so...

...bluegrass or country music...

...if it comes down to that area...

...if it mixes with the rhythm, and if it dances...

...then you've got a combination of all different kinds of music.

Country, bluegrass, blues music...

- A melting pot. -...show music.

- What's it called then? -Rock'n'roll.

- Rock'n'roll. Exactly. - Sure.

Wasn't that a man? Muddy Waters!

Playing guitar, Eric Clapton.

One, two. One, two, three.

Okay.

Rick, what is a Shangri-la? Maybe you can give us a tour.

-It's a clubhouse. It's where we... - You go first.

...get together and play, make records.

Yeah?

Kind of better. It's like an office. But it used to be a bordello.

- Bordello? - You can tell by the wallpaper.

That decadence, that softness in the barroom.

I've heard a few funny stories, man.

- That's why all these rooms-- - You can't believe...

...most of what you hear, but...

This was a master control bedroom, and it's now a master control music room.

What are you doing now that "The Last Waltz" is over?

Eddie, why don't you--?

Yeah.

- Just making music, you know. - Oh, yeah.

Trying to stay busy, man.

-It's good. -It's healthy.

It's where the music takes you. You'd never go to such a situation.

And because of the music, it took us everywhere.

- It took us to some strange places. - Physically and spiritually?

Physically, spiritually and psychotically.

It just always wasn't on the stage.

- Even though you were on the stage. - Even though we were on the stage.

Garth was one of the most amazing musicians that we knew at the time.

He could play better than anybody we ever heard.

And Garth joined The Band...

...if we would make him the music teacher.

We didn't know why or what it was about, but we said, "Sure...

...we're interested anyway." And we had to pay him $10 a week each...

...for these music lessons. Then I was sure it was a riff.

But then I found out what it really was...

...was that where he was from, and his musical education...

...to tell his parents that he was joining a rock'n'roll band...

...would've been like pouring it down the drain.

So he justified it to his people, his background, by being a music teacher.

There is a view that jazz is evil...

...because it comes from evil people...

...but, actually, the greatest priests...

...on 52nd Street, and on the streets of New York City...

...were the musicians. They were doing the greatest healing work.

And they knew how to punch through music...

...which would cure and make people feel good.

Most of the show stuff was like traveling shows...

...like tent shows.

One was Walcott's Rabbit's Foot Minstrels.

- Walcott's what? - Walcott's Rabbit's Foot Minstrels.

You know, they used to have the show start, right?

They'd have the singers, the players and the different parts of the show.

Then the master of ceremonies would come out...

...and explain that after the finale, they'd have the midnight ramble.

- The midnight--? - The midnight ramble.

The songs would get a little juicier. And the jokes would get funnier.

And the prettiest dancer would get down and shake it a few times.

A lot of the rock'n'roll duck walks...

...and steps and moves came from all that.

Everybody did it. So when you'd see Elvis Presley, or Jerry Lee Lewis...

...or Chuck Berry, or Bo Diddley really shaking it up...

It didn't come out of nowhere.

It was the local entertainment everyone saw.

When they exposed it to the world...

...it was like this unknown beast that had come out.

Grotesque music that the devil had sent, you know.

John!

Here we go.

Hey, Van the man!

Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

Let us pray

Our Father, whose art's in heaven

Hollow be thy name

Unless things change

Thy wigdom come and gone

Thy will, will be undone

On earth as it isn't heaven

Give us this day our daily dread

At least three times a day

And forgive us our trespasses

On love's territory

For Thine is the wigdom And power and glory

Oh, man

Thank you.

Ringo and Ronnie Wood will help us out on this one too.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

The road gave us a sense of survival. It taught us all we know.

There's not much left that we can take from it.

You know, we've had our share of-- Or maybe it's just superstitious.

- Superstitious in what way? - You can press your luck.

The road has taken a lot of the great ones.

Hank Williams, Buddy Holly, Otis Redding...

...Janis, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis.

It's a goddamn impossible way of life.

- It is, isn't it? - No question about it.