Sad news: Levon Helm, former singer/drummer for The Band, is in the final stages of his battle with cancer, according to a note from his family posted on his website. Helm was treated for throat cancer 1998 and after a nearly decade-long recovery was able to perform again. In 2007, he released the critically-acclaimed Dirt Farmer and performed steadily since then, up until recent weeks.

The statement from Helm’s family:

Dear Friends,

Levon is in the final stages of his battle with cancer. Please send your prayers and love to him as he makes his way through this part of his journey.

Thank you fans and music lovers who have made his life so filled with joy and celebration… he has loved nothing more than to play, to fill the room up with music, lay down the back beat, and make the people dance! He did it every time he took the stage…

We appreciate all the love and support and concern.

From his daughter Amy, and wife Sandy

The Band performs “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” in The Last Waltz.
 

 
Bob Dylan and the Band caught on primitive b&w half-inch open reel videotape at the Isle of Wight Festival on August 31, 1969. Dylan rejected an offer to play at Woodstock to headline the festival.

The set list was heavy with songs from Nashville Skyline and John Wesley Harding. Allegedly this was shot by a friend of John Lennon and Ringo Starr (who can be seen in the audience here). This makes sense because a) only someone relatively wealthy would have had access to a half-inch open reel video-recorder at the time and b) whoever shot this was right up front. What got preserved for history was:

1. The Weight
2. I Threw It All Away
3. Highway 61 Revisited
4. One Too Many Mornings
5. I Pity The Poor Immigrant
6. Minstrel Boy (partial)

I make no claim of being a Dylanologist, but this is not something I’ve seen before.