The coolest drummer on the planet: Taking the load off Levon Helm

A glowing 69-year-old Levon Helm arrives for his fourth and final appearance on “The Late Show with David Letterman” at New York City’s Ed Sullivan Theater on July 9, 2009. Helm was promoting his last studio album, “Electric Dirt,” with a New Orleans-fueled take of the Grateful Dead’s “Tennessee Jed” featuring slide licks from Larry Campbell’s customized “Frankenstrat” Fender Stratocaster. Photography by Nancy Kaszerman / ZUMA Press

Sandra B. Tooze’s third tome is the engaging Levon: From Down in the Delta to the Birth of The Band and Beyond. So far it’s the sole biography of the cash-strapped sharecropper’s kid from Turkey Scratch, Arkansas, who established rockabilly roots in Toronto upon high school graduation, backed Bob Dylan when he abandoned acoustic folk, and served as the groundbreaking Americana quintet’s quadruple threat of a signature tenor vocalist, groove-laying drummer, mandolinist, and inspiration to songwriting architect Robbie Robertson. The Canadian-born Tooze, whose previous musical manuscript was Muddy Waters: The Mojo Man, exclusively weighs in on a lawsuit threat, becoming a “method” researcher, a rare instance of Helm’s sloppy drumming, unreleased recordings, Band myths, grudges, regrets, humor, and legacy.

The Sandra B. Tooze Interview

Have you been a writer continuously?

My day job was as a book editor, so that’s how I came to writing books myself. Coincidentally, one of the books I edited was an autobiography of Ronnie Hawkins, Last of the Good Ol’ Boys [co-written by Peter Goddard in 1989; originally dubbed the Hawks, various members of the Band supported the Toronto rockabilly maverick from 1957–1963; Helm was the first to join]. I wrote a few articles, but mostly…