Broken Arrow

The legendary Robbie Robertson passed away August 9th, 2023, 80 year old. Swedish vocalists Frida Öhrn and Jesper Lindell, together with Fleshquartet, pays tribute to Robertson with a heartfelt take on “Broken Arrow”, one of the really big songs from Robertson’s solo career.

“We perceive Robbie Robertson, apart from being so obviously gifted, must have been a really nice and humble guy. He was able to work together with so many musicians and performers over the years, acting as a kind of human dynamo without any need to be in the spotlight. He kept his dignity and integrity throughout a long careen on a very high level. We also have a lot of respect for Daniel Lanois, who created a sound and an atmosphere that suited the song and the lyrics perfectly. It feels like Fleshquartet, Jesper and Frida have 3 rather different musical backgrounds and musical universes, but we manage to mee in a 4th one. This song.” ~ Fleshquartet

“Broken Arrow” is taken from Robbie Robertson’s 1st solo album from 1987. As a solo act Robertson had a solid run with 6 albums. He also worked as musical director for filmmaker Martin Scorsese. But there’s no denying that his main contribution to rock history is as the guitarist and the main songwriter in The Band.

The 1st version of the band was called The Hawks, backin rock‘n’roll singer Ronnie Hawkins 1961-1963. After Hawkins they toured on their own for a few years, before Bob Dylan hired them as backup band for the infamous world tour of 1966. After the hectic and turbulent tour, The Hawks, now simply called ‘the band’, chose to withdraw to a pink house outside Woodstock to write songs and to charge the batteries. In that house they created, together with Dylan, the holy grail of music now called “The Basement Tapes”.

In 1969 they got out of the basement and released their 1st album, ”Music From Big Pink”. The 7 studio albums released by The Band changed rock music forever.

Let’s pay tribute to Robbie Robertson and enjoy Jesper Lindell, Frida Öhrn and Fleshquartet.

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