Feature Photo: Randy Miramontez / Shutterstock.com
The average consumer of popular music in the year 2023 may not count themselves familiar with Leon Russell, the marble-mouthed musical messiah of the 1970s. Sat perched behind the piano, bearded, sporting a flat, detached affect along with his signature top hat, Russell was deftly poised at any moment to deliver the dogma that was his own unique blend of southern rock, gospel, and R&B as though sent to do so by the good lord himself.
The diminishing recognition of Russell’s musical mastery over the decades is seemingly an issue which is becoming less dire in more recent years. Sir Elton John’s insistence upon the release of 2010’s The Union – a collaborative album between Russell and John himself, released just six years prior to the former’s passing – brought a fair amount of attention to the musician to whom John has referred to as his “idol.”
Nonetheless, despite harnessing unquestionably remarkable ability, garnering seemingly endless praise from his contemporaries, and securing a spot in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame during his lifetime, Leon Russell remains a distinctly less recognizable figure in the modern day than many of those same contemporaries who would namecheck him as a musical influence.
Getting his professional start as a pickup pianist for hire, Russell was part of The Wrecking Crew – a cast of sharpshooter studio musicians known for their ability to knock out tracks quickly and effectively. This line of work led him to sessions where he would contribute to tracks from the likes of the Byrds, The Beach Boys, Willie Nelson, Frank Sinatra, and many others.
During the 1970s, he began a career as a solo act. He collaborated extensively with musical icons of the day, such as George Harrison, Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, and Eric Clapton. Russell’s solo run, seemingly equal parts revered and forgotten altogether, produced a wealth of material ripe for examination from future generations seeking to extract a gem revealing even the slightest nuance of the musician’s unique and highly stylized musical touch.
With a discography as multifaceted as the performer himself, Russell’s commercial output encompassed everything from straight-ahead rock and roll, collaborative LPs, a slew of live records, and even intrepid explorations of classic country styles under the pseudonym Hank Wilson.
The most popular of this material also serves as some of the most engaging, as Russell’s star-studded 70s output remains readily available for utilization as a guiding light for up-and-coming connoisseurs of the craft. The pianist’s 1970 self-titled debut stands as a key example of his craftsmanship, with many of the tracks featured going on to achieve success through interpretations by other artists.
“Roll Away the Stone” – a track that encapsulates many of the most impactful attributes of Russell’s artistry – closed out proceedings on the musician’s eponymous debut but kicked off the tracklist of the Best of Leon compilation album released just six years later. The song precedes the Mott the Hoople track of the same name by four years, and while conceptually similar, the distant-relative tunes feature substantially different approaches in tonality and central theme.
While Mott the Hoople’s Bowie-esque plea to an estranged lover keeps things mostly general, Russell’s boogie-infused lament functions in equal sufficiency as a rumination on the narrator’s own rotten luck. Translating like a psychoanalysis/love letter fried in bacon grease, the desperation of Russell’s “Roll Away the Stone” is infused with a frustration reinforced by descending piano lines and squalling electric guitars that briskly push the stakes beyond those of a relationship gone sour.
Delaney Bramlett of Delaney & Bonnie provides the guitar track in question and acts as an exceptional compliment to Russell’s vicious vocal and piano takes. The remainder of the track’s personnel nearly mirrors that of a bulk of the tracks found on The London Howlin’ Wolf Sessions recorded in 1970, with Steve Winwood providing keys and The Rolling Stones’ Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts providing their indelible swing as the rhythm section. While Eric Clapton, who also played on The London Howlin’ Wolf Sessions, is absent for “Roll Away the Stone,” he does contribute guitar to three of the tracks featured on the tune’s parent album.
Like much of Russell’s material, “Roll Away the Stone” feels almost like a religious experience – a sensation amplified by the musician’s penchant for gospel-influenced chordal and melodic movements and religious lyrical imagery. In this case, the titular “stone” refers to that used to seal the tomb of what was intended to be the final resting place of Jesus Christ.
As such, Russell’s prose paints the ultimate betrayal, drawing a direct correlation between the brutal murder and subsequent abandonment in a tomb of the body of Christ to the unspecified personal issue with which the song’s narrator is tasked with navigating. Russell himself often appeared not dissimilar to a more modern reincarnation of the religious leader; the trials of the preceding centuries having drained the color from what would become a silver mane nestled beneath his trademark top hat.
Despite the purported act of wickedness dictated, the song sees the narrator pleading for reconciliation with the party responsible for the betrayal, seemingly resigning himself to an association with such an individual as being his best shot at contentment.
“Roll away the stone, don’t leave me here alone. Resurrect me and protect me; don’t leave me laying here,” the chorus beseeches. “What will they do in 2000 years,” comes the closing line as the progression moves to a ruminative G major, simultaneously defining the critical structure of the song and asserting narrative implications that reach far beyond the man, woman, and friend detailed in the lyric.
Narratively, the subtleties and presentation of the lyrics endow the tune with an emotional depth and sense of realism often lost in translation within the standard “done me wrong” songwriting trope. Here, rather than simply pointing the proverbial finger, Russell peers into the mirror to ruminate upon his own contributions to the less-than-ideal situation with which he finds himself grappling in the song.
“Roll Away the Stone” can be assessed as serviceable a song as any in conveying the musical gifts of Leon Russell; the Southern wildcat with the heart of a composer, the soul of an intellectual, and the awareness to acknowledge himself as part of the ongoing joke that is the human experience.
