Music: {allcanada} Robertson gets personal on new CD

Toronto singer-songwriter-guitarist Robbie Robertson's storied musical history is explored on his just-released fifth solo album, How to Become Clairvoyant.

It's Robertson's first solo disc in 13 years and his most personal yet.

"It was just following the music and trying to reach a real honesty with it," said Robertson, 67, relaxing on a couch in his luxury Toronto hotel suite this week.

For fans of The Band, that critically revered folk-rock group of four Canadians -- including Robertson, and American Levon Helm on drums -- the track to hear is This is Where I Get Off, which addresses the breakup of the group that has since been inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and received a Grammy lifetime achievement award.

"Walking out on the boys was never the plan, we just drifted off course, couldn't strike up the band," Robertson sings on the track.

Robertson, who will himself be inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame on Saturday night in Toronto, said his honesty was even a surprise to him.

"As it revealed itself, I was like, 'Oh, my goodness, look where we're going here,' " said the musician who's the product of a Mohawk mother (from Six Nations near Brantford, Ont.) and a Jewish father.

"It wasn't like, 'OK, now it's time to write a song about The Band.' I don't want to give myself credit for something that happens in a mysterious and magical way that, as it unfolded, became very emotional to me, and there was some uplifting, sad and hurtful about it. And, at the end of the day, I felt a certain release. I felt like, 'That's good medicine' to do this. And it's not a song about me leaving The Band. The Band left The Band. There was five of us and no one person was responsible."

Robertson said neither Helm nor Canadian keyboardist Garth Hudson, the other two surviving Band members, has heard the song yet.

In fact, Hudson was supposed to be part of Sunday night's Juno Awards in Toronto, in which two Band songs were played during a 40th anniversary tribute introduced by Robertson, but he fell ill.

"I heard he had some kind of a lung thing," said Robertson of Hudson. "And I know we tried to send him a message, just, you know, 'Get well soon,' 'cause I was looking forward to seeing him."

As for Helm, a throat cancer survivor, Robertson wishes him nothing but the best despite their contentious relationship in the past over Band songwriting credits.

"I think that he's done good with his recovery from throat cancer," said Robertson. "But there's damage from the radiation and treatments and everything. I know that it's difficult for his voice because it burns your vocal chords. Anyway, I'm rooting for him."

Of both Hudson and Helm, he added: "It is so special and precious to me, our musical journey together. I just am completely grateful and I love these guys. And if we were ever to do something together again, I'd be overjoyed."

In the meantime, it seems appropriate that Clairvoyant began as a collaboration between Robertson and his long-time friend Eric Clapton, who first met in 1968, the year The Band's debut Music from Big Pink was released. In fact, Clapton revealed much later he wanted to join the group at one point.

Flash forward four decades, and Robertson went over to London to record with Slow Hand, who performed on seven of Clairvoyant's 12 tracks and got three writing credits. Robertson would later finish the album in L.A. with guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine/Audioslave, pedal steel player Robert Randolph and Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor.

"It was magical," said Robertson of playing with Clapton. "When I first met Eric Clapton, he was intrigued by the subtleties in the music from Big Pink ... He said, 'Man, that's what I want, that's what I'm looking for.' And he was with Cream at the time. So he looks at me like a person who reaches for that kind of emotion.

"So when we were playing together in the studio, I would play something, and he would play something even less. It was like a conversation of these guitars and then they were intermingling and doing this whole dance, this ballet, almost, and I've never had that experience with another guitar player before."

HONOURED BY RECOGNITION

The homegrown hits just keep on coming for Toronto's Robbie Robertson, whose first solo album in 13 years, How to Become Clairvoyant, was released in Canada on Tuesday.

And on Saturday night, he'll be inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame in Toronto. He said being recognized in that way at home is an honour.

"Songwriting is probably the hardest thing I do and the most satisfying thing I do and the most personal thing I do," Robertson told QMI Agency. "In Canada, they've always been so generous and loving with the work that I've done that I'm really honoured with that. But the Songwriter Hall of Fame, it just has a special ring to it. So I'm just really grateful and thrilled."

Still to come, in late May, he'll return to Ottawa to finally receive the Order of Canada he was awarded in 2007, and in July, Canada Post is putting Robertson on a stamp.

"I'm thrilled -- I always say, 'I love this country!' " he said.

In a few months, he'll start writing his memoirs for Random House and he still has high hopes for a longtime project he's been working on with Toronto music and stage promoter Michael Cohl that would be a travelling celebration of First Nations music.

"It's about putting on a show that is the greatest celebration of the Native people of North America that the world has ever imagined," explained Robertson. "It will be held in the biggest teepee in the world, around the world, forever. So we're going to do our best."