Levon Helm and the Barn Burners
at The Silver Dollar in Toronto on Friday
In 1993, Levon Helm published his autobiography, This Wheel's On Fire, about his storied musical career, including his stints with Ronnie Hawkins, Bob Dylan and The Band. Eight years and a few days later, the book's title still has an eerie significance, because Helm's wheel seems to have turned, if not full circle, then at least 270 degrees of it.
Consider: In the early sixties, Levon Helm left his Arkansas home (via a brief stop in Memphis) and settled in Toronto to work as a drummer with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks. Both with Hawkins, and in subsequent outfits like The Levon Helm Sextet, Levon and the Hawks and The Canadian Squires, Helm was a regular performer on the Toronto club circuit.
After leaving Toronto, Helm went on to international stardom, first backing Bob Dylan during his move-to-electric-guitar period, then as drummer (and sometimes singer, guitarist and mandolin player) with The Band.
On Friday night, three decades or so after first arriving in Toronto, the snickering wheel o' life made another curious circuit, as Helm returned to Toronto to play drums in a crowded club on Spadina Avenue.
Now however, it was not Hawkins or Dylan or Robbie Robertson that Helm was backing, but a bunch of veteran blues performers: Chris O'Leary, Pat O'Shea and Frankie Ingrao. Oh, and one other, a vocalist name of Amy Helm.
It seems likely that the only reason the greying, 61-year-old would be out on the road with this rather generic blues outfit would be in his role of proud papa, as daughter Amy is one of the band's two vocalists. So strong is Helm's history and reputation in this town that The Silver Dollar was packed for this performance, with a significant number of the revellers sporting cameras as an accessory. They came to see Levon, but the corollary was that they saw Amy, too.
The bottom line on this performance was that the crowd got to see a little bit of Amy (she shared vocals on only a portion of the band's opening set), something of Levon (crouched over his drum kit like a jockey propelling a thoroughbred down the home stretch, but virtually invisible unless you happened to be one of the people crushed up against the small stage) and lots and lots of singer/harmonica player Chris O'Leary. Levon's on-going treatment for throat cancer prevented him from doing any singing, but a late guest appearance by "Blues Brother" Elwood Blues (Dan Ackroyd) helped fill the gap.
Basically, this was one of your Blues Brothers moments, with a passably interesting quintet chugging through a bunch of traditional house-rockers ( Wang Dang Doodle, I Just Want To Make Love To You) and a few like-minded originals. Think Downchild Blues Band at Grossman's Tavern, early seventies.
In other words, not exactly Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival or The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show.But it didn't seem to matter.
The veteran hard-core blues and rock fans who made up the majority of this audience didn't seem to care. They'd come to catch a glimpse of a legendary figure from the long-ago days of the young Toronto rock scene. And they did.