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Most people know Ian and Sylvia by their signature songs—his “Four Strong Winds” and her “You Were On My Mind”—and think of them as the iconic Canadian folk duo of the early 1960s. But few beyond fans or aficionados are familiar with their fine subsequent solo work, or Sylvia’s with the wondrous Quartette. And fewer still are aware that the talented pair once pioneered the country-rock genre with their excellent band Great Speckled Bird. A superb new collection of live recordings should change all that. Produced by Danny Greenspoon, The Lost Tapes (Stony Plain Records) features 26 tracks recorded between 1971 and 1974, a time when Ian was hosting a popular weekly country music TV show (on wh...

For defunct rock groups, 1983 has become the year of the reunion. Among the acts from rock’s golden years re-forming are The Guess Who, The Animals, The Hollies and Simon and Garfunkel. But the most unexpected return is that of The Band, Canada’s most celebrated rock ensemble. Its farewell concert seven years ago was so lavish and final that it made any suggestion of reunion seem dishonest. Now, with a two-week, 11-city Canadian tour which began in Halifax and ends in Vancouver on July 18, The Band is back, although without the services of guitarist Robbie Robertson. From the heady days of the southern Ontario bar circuit in the 1960s to Martin Scorsese’s touching movie tribute, The Last Wal...

Stepping off a Greyhound bus from Toronto in 1961, a 17-year-old boy found himself in West Helena, Ark., by the banks of the Mississippi River, unable to believe his senses. “It smelled different and moved different,” Robbie Robertson recently recalled. “The people talked and dressed different. And the air was filled with thick and funky music.” The experience left an indelible impression on the budding guitarist and songwriter. Years later, Robertson drew on it to write some of rock’s most evocative songs—including “Up on Cripple Creek” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” And he performed them with his group, The Band, which critic Greil Marcus has called “the best rock ’n’ roll band...

As museum pieces, they are the most humble of artifacts: a few report cards, a black leather jacket, a pair of government-issue eye glasses. Yet for many, the three objects are priceless. Once the property of John Lennon, those treasures are now on display at the recently opened Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, Ohio, where they are already among its most popular exhibits. Looking at the articles, it is easy to see why: each of them brings the viewer closer to the real Lennon. His elementary school report card reveals that one of his teachers found rock’s future genius “hopeless,” while the well-worn, sloppy jacket somehow perfectly captures the musician’s irreverent charm....

My friend Peter and I missed out on Woodstock. In the summer of ʼ69, we were simply too young to make the trek. But we did get to go to an all-Canadian version of that historic festival. Held in a campground near Orangeville, Ontario, over the Labour Day weekend, the Freak Out at Rockhill Park featured no fewer than twenty-one of Canadaʼs best bands on three stages, including one on a small lake. My parents drove us up from Toronto, actually right into the campground, which proved to be both a curse and a blessing. On the one hand, as sixteen-year-olds, we were mortified that we needed a parental escort at all, when most people had driven themselves or hitchhiked. On the other, being in the ...

His father cast a long shadow. Fela Anikulapo Kuti was a musical star and political icon whose global popularity made him both a hero and an enemy of the state in his native Nigeria. But Femi Kuti has learned to live in that shadow. As the son of the inventor of the politically charged, wildly percussive music known as Afro-beat, Femi has picked up where his legendary father, who died in 1997, left off. Signed to a French record label, Femi has taken Afro-beat and fused it with elements of soul and hip-hop to create one of this spring’s most talked-about releases. Titled Shoki Shoki (Barclay/Universal), the powerful album promises to make a star of the 37-year-old singer-saxophonist, who has...

They are one of rock’s most on-again/off-again partnerships, a pair of icons whose relationship was once described as the longest running soap opera in Canadian history. Although they have much in common, such as their Winnipeg birthplace and each taking turns at different times as members of Ringo Starr’s All-Starr Band, myriad differences have kept Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings apart, including friction caused by Cummings buying the publishing rights to the Guess Who songs he’d co-written with Bachman. But on July 18, the two Canadian rock legends will reunite for a one-time charity fundraiser for Canada’s Walk of Fame at Toronto’s Casa Loma. Billed as “Music Under the City Stars,” the...

During the early 1970s, no musician wore his Canadian nationality more proudly on his sleeve than Blake Fordham, better known as Kelly Jay, the charismatic man mountain who fronted boogie-rockers Crowbar. At a time when many still shied away from overt flag-waving, Mr. Fordham, the singer and pianist behind the anthemic hit song “Oh What a Feeling,” unabashedly embraced a good-time nationalism in both his lyrics and clothing. “Kelly Jay and Crowbar made young Canadians feel cool about their country, about being Canadian and everything that stood for,” recalls Frank Davies, Crowbar’s original producer and publisher, who cited Mr. Fordham’s “Captain Canada” nickname, beaverskin hats, deerskin ...

There's plenty to love about Martin Scorcese's new Netflix documentary about Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue tour. There are some illuminating present-day interviews with cast members including the masked ringleader Dylan himself, although he claims to barely remember anything about the tour, as he wasn't "even born yet." The story itself is one of rock's great dramas. Rolling Thunder was an entirely different way of touring. It began with the idea of Dylan, his buddy Bobby Neuwirth and mentor Ramblin’ Jack Elliott playing small venues while traveling around in a station wagon. When that proved impractical, it grew into a larger, illustrious cast of characters that included Joan Baez, Roge...

It was 52 years ago today, June 18, that the Monterey International Pop Festival opened, kicking off 1967's Summer of Love with a star-studded lineup that included the first major American appearances by the Jimi Hendrix Experience and The Who, the first large-scale performance by Janis Joplin and the introduction of Otis Redding to a mass American audience. Others on the bill for the groundbreaking three-day festival were San Francisco's Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead, the Mamas and the Papas, The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, Eric Burdon & the Animals and Simon  & Garfunkel. Monterey also marked the big U.S. debut of Canada's The Paupers, a band on the cusp of greatnes...