It's been a good 15 years since I've read Levon's book, but my recollection is that he did not cite any examples of songs where he claimed another Band member wrote the melody but Robbie took the credit, or another Band member wrote most of the lyrics but Robbie took the credit. What he said is that the Band members contributed significantly to the arrangement of songs, and they came up with unique instrumental ideas or solos. He also said that Band members contributed an occasional line of lyric, and that some of the songs were inspired by stories he told Robbie about people he knew in Arkansas. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't know of any examples where he claimed he or another Band member wrote a melody or the majority of the lyrics for a song but were not credited. I presume if he had any such examples he would have mentioned them. And I don't think Robbie would dispute any of the above claims about Band member contributions. What is at issue here is not the facts of what happened. The area of disagreement is that Levon believed the above contributions warranted songwriting credit and royalties, while Robbie did not. And as I've said above, Robbie's position is the one that is consistent with the vast majority of bands/songwriters over the past 50 years.
"unique instrumental ideas" can be a very slippery slope. In the bands I've been in, if someone wrote a chord change or a lyric they got a credit period. I've seen other posters on here state that the other guys weren't entitled to credit if they "just wrote a simple chord change". Nothing could be further from the truth. A simple chord change can completely make or break a song or a section (I bet anyone on this site who has ever written music has sat for hours stuggling over "the next chord" at one point or another...I know I have). It also can completely change how the melody line is created or minimally how the melody sounds over the whole band. If one of those guys just did a solo that's one thing, but if they actually wrote chord changes or even a single lyric, they deserved a songwriting credit. I don't care about "old ways" and "new ways". That's just the honest man's way...not that the music business ever cares about that. But just because Robertson may have done nothing legally wrong doesn't mean he didn't do something ethically wrong. Also, if Robertson wrote songs based around stories that Levon told or that his family told, Levon should have received credit. Coming up with the concept of what the song is about is extremely important IMO.
I've always believed that while Robbie wrote the bulk of The Band's stuff, all of the guys added their input here and there as well. Not to mention, thier own touch and feel on their respective instruments. In a perfect world, the credits would've read "all songs written by The Band". That would've solved the money/publishing issue. If you were a songwriter and wrote full songs, would you want to share in the publishing with your bandmates, even if they didn't offer any musical ideas or lyrics to those specific songs? I see both sides.
Every band adds their own touch and feel, though. But that's not something that is typically given songwriting credit. Do you think the Who deserves songwriter co-credit for My Generation? Their recording is drastically different than Townshend's demo. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of examples like this in rock history.
It's an excellent book. Levon (Robbie would admit) provided lyrical and narrative inspiration for Robbie's early songwriting (Robbie's admitted this as well). The few songs thst Levon wrote for The Band when they reformed credited everyone who made even minor contributions. I suspect that Levon's bitterness seemed from the fact that he didn't get songwriting credit for contributing to Robbie's lyrics either as inspiration or for providing editorial support. Stylistically I think that Robbie wanted to put some distance between The Band's sound later in his career. I'dnote also that there's a lot of solo Beatles stuff tht doesn't sound like The Beatles but ht doesn't mean that Paul, George didn't write or contribute to the band's sound.
Richard was one of music's great tragedies- brilliant singer, great songwriter, fantastic and versatile musician and tortured soul. His voice is the first one you hear on BIG PINK. In a band with three wonderful and distinctive vocalists, Levon said they considered Richard to be their lead singer. "Whispering Pines" is all you need to hear to know that he was one of the greats. I don't know if he only had "a dozen" songs in him, but his personal struggles surely made it difficult for him to fulfill is creative potential. BIG PINK definitely had Manuel songs that were a match for JRR songs. IIRC, Scorsese's wife said that Marty and Robbie should have just @#%#^$ each other and gotten it over with. Marty is a brilliant filmmaker, but his bias towards Robertson shows through in the film. Only Levon seems to be able to get a decent amount of talk time compared to Robbie. Richard comes across as oddball but endearing. His line "I just want to break even" is hilarious and heartbreaking at the same time.
Great post. I don't agree that "All songs written by The Band" is the gold standard of 'fair' in this case, but I think more split credits or partial credits were likely warranted. As an example, David Byrne wrote almost all Talking Heads material on the first three albums. With Remain in Light the group dynamic changed and so did the credits. He did the lyrics and the music was credited to the four band members collectively, plus Eno. I assume that Byrne got 60% (50% for lyrics + 10% for music) and the other four got 10% each. Those kinds of splits are easy enough to establish and I suspect that Helm felt he deserved partial shares of some publishing. It doesn't have to be 50/50 and it doesn't have to be All or Nothing. But All or Nothing was the JRR/Albert Grossman paradigm.
Townshend called the shots like no other band leader. The songs he brought to the table were almost always full and whole and usually fully-arranged. I've never heard any sour grapes accusations from the other members of The Who. I don't think I'm splitting hairs here. An arrangement of a published composition can be copywritten, if I understand correctly, so your earlier Nelson Riddle analogy is incorrect. When a writer brings an unfinished in-progress song to a group rehearsal session and significant contributions are made by the other members, shared credit should be established. As I've said a few times, it doesn't have to be Even-Steven. But arranging isn't what it's about here. Aretha Franklin didn't take partial credit on RESPECT for adding the whole sock-it-to-me hook. And I'm first in line to weigh the tonnage of Jimmy Page's staggering bad karma for stealing Dazed and Confused from Jake Holmes. The extended solo section is nothing more than musical jewelry... the song was written by Jake.
Amen. As far as I'm concerned Richard Manuel was The Band. In his prime, the dude was one of the best singers I have ever heard. I'm not belittling the others' contributions -each of those guys brought something special to the table- but IMO if Robbie -for all intents and purposes, since he was 'chief songwriter'- was the brains, Levon & Garth were the heart (since their sheer musicality brought the music to life), and Richard (and to a slightly lesser degree) Rick were the soul. Put 'em together...I can't think of many other bands where the sum made up the parts so well. That's why they were THE BAND...
As Jason, Guy and others keep pointing out in this discussion, the way it works in most bands is everybody tends to contribute in one way or another, but it's mainly the guy who came up with the basic idea who gets the credit. Of course, some groups -in the interest of solidarity, or keeping things on a level financial playing field- they split the credits ("All songs written by the band"). Based on my personal experience, I've done it every which way: if the song did indeed include input from everyone within the musical composition, it was credited to the band collective. Or if I wrote the thing myself, and came up with all the parts -which I would then instruct the others how to play- I gave myself credit. And, about 50% of the time, the songs were written by myself and our guitarist in a typical So And So/So And So collaboration (being a power trio, all that meant was that we'd tell the drummer what to play, with varied results) Having said that, though, I'm very liberal with my credit: if someone contributes even one line (in some cases it's been the line that makes the song) or even a slight musical suggestion, they get credit too...whether they feel deserving of it or not.
True, but . . . Richard and Rick were pretty wasted when they did talk, Garth doesn't seem to really talk at the best of times and Levon disliked the whole interview process. Robbie was the only one that was really into it. And, as you mentioned, the director had a man crush on him. The bias is really evident in the concert footage which almost always features Robbie front and center.
Likewise. The most important thing, which The Band did not do, is to decided how songwriting credit is going to work BEFORE any songs are recorded. It's not easy, I begged a band I was in once to do that but they ignored me. Flash-forward a couple years and we recorded a few songs and had planned on doing an entire album when the topic came up. Everybody argued, nobody agreed, and in a very short time there was no more band. I just listened to those tapes a few weeks ago and lamented what could have been if they'd just listened to me and figured it out ahead of time. In The Band's case, my impression is that they were all too busy living like Rock Stars to care about paperwork and eventually the more sober Robbie decided to cover his own butt.
What I can't figure out his how Richard Manual never got a credi on the 4% Pantomine. When you listen to it it is hard to believe tha Robbie and Van Morrison brought the song in cold for Richard to sing. It seems to me that he had to have a hand in shaping it. Robbie did hang out with Dylan when he was writing songs, and attended some of his recording sessions, so I'm sure he picked up on the business end, especially if he ever saw or heard about Dylan's royalty checks.
The Who didn't usually change the arrangement of Townshend's demos, but they certainly added their own distinctive instrumental parts, particularly Moon and particularly in the early days. I brought them up because someone had suggested that the Band's unique "touch and feel" on their instruments warranted songwriter co-credit. There were a lot of bands (like the Band and like the Who) who made significant contributions to songs in this way, and didn't receive co-writer credit for it.
Levon didn't sue over songwriting credit for "The Weight", he sued to try to prevent the Band's performance from being used in a TV commercial. And he lost the suit.
I think this is a fascinating question.. We can apply the same question the Stones, he claims for example Jumping Jack Flash should have been Wyman-Jagger-Richards cause he wrote the riff.. You point out serious flaws in music copyright law... that are difficult to correct, you can examine the case of George Harrison in the Beatles, by their own admission, five or ten of those Lennon/McCartney hits should have probably had Harrison included as the third writer for shaping the song or the riff, for example Harrison we learned recently wrote the gorgeous riff on "And I Love Her" By all writes, probably that song should have been credited to McCartney/Harrison, but the whole showbiz, the whole sacrosanct Lennon-McCartney, moving on, I think its quite possible Roger Daltrey deserved writing credit on several Who songs, where he did significant arrangement or other contributions, but Townshends ego didint want that we have examples showing Daltrey can write or cowrite. But I don't know if you have proven your case about Robbie Robertson, maybe more cowriter credits should have gone down, these were heady times, maybe, Robertson was up there with Nicholson and Scorsese tooting coke, and drinking, in the HOllywood hills, maybe Danko or Levon had 1/3 of a song, and Robertson fleshed it out, maybe Danko said, hey I get half of that one, and maybe Somebody blurted out, well heck you ow me about ten grand in hospitality, i'll tell you what, you helped a little, but I wrote 3/4 of the song, we'll wipe out your debt, and give me the song, but I'll pay your bills you cant pay I;m not saying that happened... I have been robbed blind by Steve Stills, Phil Seymour, Cold Blood, different people., its not unusual, and its like pulling teeth to get any justice, and there are short statuetes of limitation, happens a lot, there are some pretty grody creepy people in music, but you did you think you were in OZ and these things dont happen, look at Norman Petty and Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, there are many examples, I dont know if you have proven your case regarding the BAND<<<<< Certainly all the guys could write, why didint they, you havent fleshed out the story enough to determine what the truth is, I sus[ect to a certain degree you may be on to something
And then there has been the on again off again back an forth authorship legal crap of A Whiter Shade of Pale because of the organ riff. Brew the most played song in history in the UK
Don't know enough facts or claims about Robertson's doings...but, I will say that - my opinion only - he sure comes off as one greasy dude in interviews. Not on the surface, but just has that sorta "Oh, I don't remember" way about him that is very trademark of people who can't be trusted with a stick of gum, much less anything else. Being a musician doesn't help either. Love his stuff. Great talent. But, still greasy.
I believe that is correct, and he also said those unique instrumental parts were equally important to the song as the lyrics were and should have been recognized as such. One example he gives is "Chest Fever": "Do you remember the words? Me neither. I remember Garth Hudson playing the organ. Now look at the writer's credit: "J.R. Robertson." (He does have a point about that one: the lyrics were literally throwaway placeholders that they ended up using because Robbie never got around to writing new ones. But needless to say, Helm did in fact remember them: I saw them in September '94 and they played "Chest Fever".)
