In 1968, the Band recorded “The Weight,” a song full of images and characters that Robbie Robertson said he had been storing in his imagination for years. Robertson admits in his autobiography, Testimony, that he struggled to articulate to producer John Simon what the song was even about, but it’s become the Band’s most well-known classic, and it still echoes loudly today. Playing for Change, a group dedicated to “opening up how people see the world through the lens of music and art,” recently spent two years filming artists around the world, from Japan to Bahrain to Los Angeles, performing the song. Robertson takes part, and so does Ringo Starr. Web traffic for the video has surged in recent days as the world confronts the coronavirus, and it has been a top story on RollingStone.com.
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/robbie-robertson-the-weight-coronavirus-974210/