Various Artists – Love For Levon: A Benefit To Save The Barn (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Dozens of luminaries from rock, country, and soul gathered at the Meadowlands’ Izod Center on October 3, 2012, to pay their collective respects in an unforgettable final tribute to Levon Helm. This incredible night was filled with one-of-a-kind performances by greats including Gregg Allman, Mavis Staples, Allen Toussaint, John Prine, Joan Osborne, Ray LaMontagne, John Mayer, Joe Walsh, Dierks Bentley and many others. The iconic artists performed songs associated with Levon Helm and The Band including “Up on Cripple Creek,” “Life Is a Carnival,” “Ophelia,” “The Weight,” “Rag Mama Rag,” “Ain’t Got No Home” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”.

Star-studded tribute to great Levon Helm shows how much good music flies under the commercial radar. – New York Daily News

Levon Helm was arguably the heart and soul of the Band, and his back-porch Arkansas drawl gave many of the Band’s best songs their strong sense of history and character. He was a remarkable vernacular singer in a band that had three of them (Rick Danko and Richard Manuel also knew how to put heart and soul into a song), and the Band, thanks in no small part to Helm, essentially put the Americana genre on the map in the mid-’60s. Helm’s death in the spring of 2012 from throat cancer stilled that voice, but as this warm, redemptive tribute set shows, failed to take away the warmth, wisdom, and vision of that voice. Helm started his famous Midnight Rambles at his rustic studio in Woodstock, New York in 2004. These were loose and intimate shows where local musicians and whatever musicians happened to be wandering through would play and jam to a small audience (some 200 seats), usually with Helm sitting happily behind the drums. This tribute, held on October 3, 2012 at the 20,000 seat Izod Center in East Rutherford, New Jersey, is itself like one of Helm’s Ramble shows writ large, and all proceeds are being used to insure that the Rambles continue in Helm’s memory. The show has the feel of a Band concert (only Garth Hudson was actually present from the original Band), with guest vocalists standing in for Helm, Danko, and Manuel, and it all works well, with a reverent and joyous vibe. Among the highlights are Warren Haynes’ faithful version of “The Shape I’m In,” My Morning Jacket’s take on “Ophelia,” Roger Waters’ striking version of “Wide River to Cross,” and a barnstorming “Up on Cripple Creek” from Joe Walsh and Robert Randolph, but the whole evening has a charmed feel, so picking favorites seems silly. Helm would have been proud. The only thing that could have made the event better was if he could have been there, but, as these things go, he obviously was in spirit. One would imagine the angels in Heaven are hearing some great Midnight Rambles of their own these days, since Helm wouldn’t have it any other way.

Tracklist:
01 – Warren Haynes – The Shape I’m In (with the All Star Band and Rami Jaffee)
02 – Gregg Allman and Warren Haynes – Long Black Veil (with the All Star Band)
03 – Jorma Kaukonen and Barry Mitterhoff – Trouble in Mind (with Larry Campbell, Justin Guip, Byron Isaacs and Jaimoe)
04 – The Levon Helm Band – This Wheel’s on Fire (with Shawn Pelton)
05 – Larry Campbell, Justin Guip and Amy Helm – Little Birds (with Byron Isaacs and Teresa Williams)
06 – Marc Cohn – Listening To Levon (with the Levon Helm Band and Greg Leisz)
07 – Mavis Staples – Move Along Train (with the Levon Helm Band)
08 – Allen Toussaint – Life Is a Carnival (with the Levon Helm Band and Jaimoe)
09 – John Prine and Garth Hudson – When I Paint My Masterpiece (with the Levon Helm Band and Joan Osborne)
10 – Bruce Hornsby – Anna Lee (with Larry Campbell, Amy Helm and Teresa Williams)
11 – Jakob Dylan – Ain’t Got No Home (with the All Star Band and Rami Jaffee)
12 – Lucinda Williams – Whispering Pines (with the All Star Band and Rami Jaffee)
13 – John Hiatt – Rag Mama Rag (with the All Star Band and Mike Gordon)
14 – David Bromberg and Joan Osborne – Don’t Do It (with the All Star Band)
15 – Grace Potter – Shall Be Released (with Don Was and Matt Burr)
16 – Ray LaMontagne and John Mayer – Tears of Rage (with the All Star Band)
17 – Dierks Bentley – Rockin’ Chair (with the All Star Band, Jessi Alexander and Jon Randall)
18 – Dierks Bentley and Garth Hudson – Chest Fever (with the All Star Band, Jessi Alexander and Jon Randall)
19 – Eric Church – A Train Robbery (with the All Star Band)
20 – Eric Church – Get Up Jake (with the All Star Band)
21 – John Mayer – Tennessee Jed (with the All Star Band and Steve Jordan)
22- Joe Walsh and Robert Randolph – Up on Cripple Creek (with the All Star Band)
23 – My Morning Jacket – Ophelia
24 – My Morning Jacket – It Makes No Difference
25 – Roger Waters, My Morning Jacket and G. E. Smith – The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down (with the All Star Band)
26 – Roger Waters and G. E. Smith – Wide River to Cross (with the All Star Band)
27 – Encore: The Weight (ALL)