Customer Reviews

Dirt Farmer

5 star:		(80)
4 star:		(26)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Levon Helm, the voice behind 'The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down' and 'The Weight,' is in fine form here. This music would have been good fifty years ago, and will be good fifty years from now. Levon's voice is perfect for these songs about life's sorrows and joys, full of perseverance and hope. The songs are real beauties with excellent traditional arrangements. I am a long-time fan of traditional folk, bluegrass, and blues music. What I liked best about this CD is that it is fresh, making these tunes vibrant and not museum pieces. Bravo!

Levon Helm is listed as 'Americana Roots' in some music charts. That is the perfect description of his music. This CD celebrates the American Way and Levon's roots in his music. A member of The Band, all those years ago, that glorious group that made the music we would sing, dance and love to. When I hear 'the Weight' I think of Levon, it is really his song, no matter whose name is on the label.

Levon Helm lives in Woodstock, NY, and this is where he makes his music. He has a home and an old barn that he has converted into a stage, where he and his friends sing. Every week he has what he calls a 'Midnight Ramble'. I receive his monthly mailings and one of these days I will see Levon in all his glory. Levon has recovered from throat cancer. It has been a struggle. For a while it was questionable whether he would ever speak or sing again. He has made it and this CD is a celebration of his recovery and his roots. His voice is throaty but it is Levon and his music. His daughter, Amy has been the driving force behind this CD, and she and Larry Campbell both contributed in voice and music. Levon Helm has dedicated this album to his parents. Levon, the only real American in 'The Band, was born in Arkansas and started his career in the South. He met up with other musicians on the road, and they came to form 'The Band, and the rest is history. Levon is my hero. Nate Chinen says, In singing the song 'Wide Rover To Cross' "I've come a long, long road," Mr. Helm sings in the chorus of that song, "but still I've got some miles to go." Coming around to the point -- "I've got a wide, a wide river to cross" -- he sounds like the voice of experience, humbled as well as emboldened."

Several of the songs on his CD, 'Dirt Farmer' are from his childhood. 'False-Hearted Lover Blues', 'Single Girl, Married Girl' and 'Blind Child'. 'Dirt Farmer' title song is a story of a farmer who has lost his crops and can't pay off his loan. He only is able to make stone. It has a Cajun beat and we can feel the misery and loss in the voice of Levon. He has the weight of the world on his shoulders. 'The poor old dirt farmer fell off his tractor and it rolled over his head.'He ain't got a loan and he can't grow no corn'. He sings about 'The Mountain' and 'The Girl I Left Behind'. 'Cavalry', Anna Lee' and 'Got Me A Woman' are the songs of life and love. 'Feelin' Good' is one of my favorite tunes. It seems to set the stage for the philosophy of the CD- and a tune to go out into the night with.

"Dirt Farmer seizes the southern pastoralism that always lurked in the Band's music and blows it up full size, in all its gritty, rollicking, joyous, melancholic, and even absurd wonder." Richard Marcus

This is a remarkable CD and is a rolling stone for the American south land and the roots of Levon Helm.

Highly, Highly Recommended. prisrob 10-30-07

A Musical History

Live at the Palladium NYC, New Years Eve 1977

The Midnight Ramble Music Sessions, Vol. 1

Levon Helm

If you loved The Band way back when, then you will love this recording. There were those who considered Robbie Robertson the quintessence of The Band, but I always connected this voice with the greater output of the music from The Band - and, thirty years on...after winning a war with cancer...Levon Helm's raw, wide-open sound has not dissipated all that much.

This is real mountain music, presented in the manner it was meant to be - oral tradition through song. It's not possible for me to determine which songs are relatively new and which are old, old stories derivative of Celtic tradition, brought to the mountains generations ago from Scotland and Ireland. The yearning, sorrow, and loss of some of the songs is perfectly projected in Mr Helm's evocative country voice - False Hearted Lover Blues, typical of the mountain songs I learned as a child, with the title of the song being all you need to know; Anna Lee, about a young mother cut down heartbreakingly early. There are humourous songs as well, like Got Me a Woman, with the man in the song describing a woman perhaps not what you'd call a looker but high in character that just knocks his socks off; Single Girl, Married Girl, about the things that make these two so diametrically opposed. There's even a song about Frank and Jesse James (A Train Robbery). Some of the songs have a beat reminiscent of music from The Band; I heard shadows of "Ophelia" in one piece, and nuances of other songs, but it is clear here that this album is pure tradition, and that Mr Helm is very much enjoying himself in presenting to us the music he learned as a child.

After his successful fending off of a deadly disease that by all accounts should have robbed us of his characteristic howl, it is a wonder and a blessing that this album got to be made. The first notes of his singing literally sent shivers up my spine. I truly wish I lived anywhere close enough to Woodstock, New York; I would somehow contrive to be a regular at his Midnight Rambles, the shows he periodically puts on in a barn on his property, and at which quite a few excellent old friends of his pop in to share in the musical bounty. This is real entertainment; and I know "Dirt Farmer" is only a taste of what Levon Helm has stashed away from a lifetime devoted to music. Long may he continue his Rambles; long may he continue to bring us gems like this.

Having been a fan of Levon's since the days of Ronnie Hawkins and The Hawks and having just been to one of his Rambles, I couldn't wait for the release of Dirt Farmer.
I've been listening to this CD almost non stop since I got it and I'm absolutely in love with it. With the help of daughter Amy Helm (vocalist with Ollabelle)and the incredible Larry Campell on guitar and fiddle, Dirt Farmer is the Real Deal. This is what music should be. Emotional, heartfelt and timeless. Dirt Farmer is a masterpiece,the work of a true musician.
The Weight has paid off
Jeff

Levon Helm brings it home with this great new collection. Each song starts off as a seed and starts to grow and gets nurtured and before your very ears turns into a solid oak tree. In todays world where musicians depend on electronics,Levon brings back basic skills like playing real instruments. How refreshing to hear 3 part harmony over just a fiddle. Wow The placement of Levons snare drum in a waltz will set the standard for years to come. Real instruments, real songs and real people, that's bringing music back home.
JG

As a casul fan of The Band I purchased this product in the hopes of renewing my interest in their music. This recording has been something of a complete suprise to me. After reading the product description I was expecting a contempary take on some classic american music. However, this album sounds like it could have been recorded in the 50's. The sound itself is crystal clear, it's the interpretation of these songs that sends you back to an era complete with sawdust on the floor, someone playing a 'jug' bass, fiddles, juice harp, and a 'triangle'. All and all I've been pleasantly suprised, and the more I listen to it the more I find myself enjoying it. This is an album that I could easily sit around and listen to while playing cards with my Grandfather(RIP, love ya...) & Dad.

Considering all that Mr. Helm has been through these last 10 or so years his voice sounds remarkably well. You can hear the slight struggle in Levon's voice on the occasional note, but this only seems to add character to the song as opposed to being a distraction. If your a fan of The Band, or just plain good ol' american music you will not be dissapointed.

This album is from Levon Helm's roots in Arkansas. Without going into detail about each cut, the total package paints a mural of rural life in the South that will affect you to your bones.

As a bonus, Levon is donating $1 from each CD sold during December to charity; half to the Imus Ranch for Kids With Cancer and half to The Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. By purchasing this CD, you will be doubly blessed with great American music and doing a good deed.

"Dirt Farmer" is well worth the wait since Levon Helm's last solo CD many years ago. If you're a fan of The Band or country roots music this one's for you. Levon's Arkansas drawl is better than ever following throat cancer surgery in 1999. His voice is bolstered by the heavenly harmonies of his daughter Amy Helm, Co-Producer, and Teresa Williams, wife of the other Co-Producer- Larry Campbell. Larry's virtuoso musicianship (fiddles, guitars, mandolin and dulcimer) is the icing on this cake.
Amy suggested to her Dad that they build this CD around the three traditional songs Levon's parents taught him when he was a child: "Little Birds," "The Girl I Left Behind"(one of my favorites), and "Blind Girl". "Single Girl, Married Girl" is another traditional song (by A.P. Carter, and one of Levon's and my favorites). The title cut is another traditional song and features the funniest line. Following a tractor accident, "now his head, shaped like a tread, but he ain't quite dead."
Levon taps some great songwriters here. Steve Earle contributes "The Mountain" with great harmonies by Buddy Miller and Julie Miller. Paul Kennerley contributes "A Train Robbery" and "Got Me A Woman" (another favorite, and a very funny lyric). Buddy Miller and Julie Miller's "Wide River To Cross" is Levon's masterpiece here, his greatest and most soulful vocal to date: "I'm only half-way home..." Levon is fully back and we're the thankful ones.

Levon does it again. An inside look at Helm's roots. Levon is truly an American treasure....one of the true musicians left. Dirt Farmer is sure to be a classic. Levon has assembled himself with a music legend and master in Larry Campbell. Amy Helm and Teresa Williams add the perfect balance to Levon and Larry.

Well, I love Levon and everything he does but I must warn the uninitiated that this is the most Arkansas twang music I have heard in a long while. If you like downhome folk music you will probably appreciate this but it is definitely not "The Band".