Remembering When The Band Released a New Studio Album After They Said Goodbye at ‘The Last Waltz’ in 1977

Rarely does a longstanding band bow out smoothly. Breakups and/or band dissolutions usually get messy. Occasionally, a band will be able to leave on its own terms or at least appear to do so.

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The Band looked like they wrapped everything up in a neat little bow when they delivered their triumphant The Last Waltz concert in 1976. Imagine the surprise of fans when a brand-new album by the group arrived just months later.

Nearing the End

The Band never achieved the commercial success to match the critical appeal they amassed throughout their career. Even as their first three albums were universally hailed and gained the immense respect of fellow musicians, they didn’t deliver hit singles. It meant that the quintet still operated far from the mainstream.

When their excellent 1975 album Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first LP of original material in four years, didn’t sell much, it discouraged them. On top of that, the hard-living ways of some of the members of the group were taking their toll.

With Robbie Robertson spearheading the project, The Band decided to hold a concert called The Last Waltz that would act as a farewell. At the time, none of the five members knew how permanent it would be. And they knew for sure that they’d have one album coming out after that fateful concert.

Record Company Requirements

The Band received a huge offer from Warner Bros. to be a kind of sponsor for The Last Waltz project, a setup that included releasing the concert album on their label. But the group couldn’t do that without first completing their contract with Capitol. They needed to record one more album for their previous label.

Unfortunately, the timing wasn’t great for The Band. They wanted to include a bunch of special guests in The Last Waltz concert. That required extensive rehearsals taking place in the group’s California studio. Meanwhile, they also tried to bang the material for the final studio album into place.

Luckily, they had been recording bits and pieces of original songs over a period of two years or so. While they did that without an album in mind, they at least had built up a backlog of stuff that they could use as a basis for this contractual obligation LP.

So it was that they worked double duty in the weeks leading up to The Last Waltz on Thanksgiving Day, 1976. They split the time between rehearsing for the show and squeezing in the finishing touches on the album that would be called Islands when released in March 1977.

One More Go-Round

Understandably, Islands lacks the ambition of much of the band’s previous work. And yet, there’s charm to spare throughout the record, perhaps a byproduct of the offhand nature of the recording.

“Right As Rain” imagines them as an adult contemporary act, as Richard Manuel offers a lovely vocal. “Knockin’ Lost John” and “The Saga Of Pepote Rouge” find the band doing their historical thing on a somewhat smaller scale. And “Christmas Must Be Tonight” deserves a spot on any best rock Christmas song list you might make.

Islands sold poorly when released. It wouldn’t quite be the last time The Band would release new studio material. Three of the original members came back together to release a trio of late-career records, starting with Jericho in 1993.

Photo by Gijsbert Hanekroot/Redferns