The story of how Luis Buñuel influenced The Band to write ‘The Weight’
Avant-garde filmmaker Luis Buñuel doesn’t exactly have a stronghold on rock and roll. Apart from the Pixies song ‘Debaser’ and the screenings of Un Chien Andalou before David Bowie took the stage on his ‘Isolar Tour’ in 1976, there don’t seem to be many references to Buñuel throughout rock music. That doesn’t mean that he hasn’t been an influence, it just means that there aren’t many artists who have copped to it.
One surprising acolyte of Buñuel’s work is Robbie Robertson, the guitar player and songwriter for roots rock pioneers The Band. Robertson was, and remains, a cinephile who takes in many different directors’ works. His extensive collaborations with Martin Scorsese just proved what was already clear: Robertson had an eye for storytelling, especially the cinematic kind.
“I thought that if I hadn’t gotten addicted to music at such a young age and thrown myself into it 100 per cent, I would have ended up being a screenwriter or filmmaker of some kind,” Robertson told Long Island Weekly. “The idea of movies that could tell a story and make you part of it.”
“What really pushed my button was film noir,” Robertson revealed. “I was so drawn to the look, the vibe and again, to the danger. That drew me in and it’s when I became dedicated and addicted to movies. I just kept going deeper and deeper until I was finally checking out [Akira] Kurosawa and [Federico] Fellini. Then I wanted to know more about [Ingmar] Bergman and [Luis] Buñuel and on and on. And of course before that, Howard Hawks, Orson Welles, John Ford and all of these tremendous American film directors.”
In discussion with writer Jake Grogan in 2018, Robertson revealed that Buñuel had a prominent influence on The Band’s most famous song, ‘The Weight’. “He did so many films on the impossibility of sainthood. People trying to be good in Viridiana and Nazarín, people trying to do their thing. In ‘The Weight’ it’s the same thing,” Robertson explained. “People like Buñuel would make films that had these religious connotations to them but it wasn’t necessarily a religious meaning. In Buñuel there were these people trying to be good and it’s impossible to be good.”
“In ‘The Weight’ it was this very simple thing,” Robertson added. “Someone says, ‘Listen, would you do me this favour? When you get there will you say ‘hello’ to somebody or will you give somebody this or will you pick up one of these for me? Oh? You’re going to Nazareth, that’s where the Martin guitar factory is. Do me a favour when you’re there.’ This is what it’s all about. So the guy goes and one thing leads to another and it’s like ‘Holy shit, what’s this turned into? I’ve only come here to say ‘hello’ for somebody and I’ve got myself in this incredible predicament.’ It was very Buñuelish to me at the time.”
Check out ‘The Weight’ and sense the Buñuel connection for yourself below.