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Imagine an on-the-road concert documentary shot in the anything-goes days of 1970 — a hurly-burly vérité jamboree like “Mad Dogs & Englishmen” or “Elvis on Tour.” It’s about the biggest rock band in the world. It encompasses 11 shows in 26 days, with headlines and controversies and a film crew to capture it all. We see the band members backstage, on planes, in their nightly lodgings, and onstage. The crowds are rapturous.

“What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears?” is, in a way, that movie. The band that’s on tour, the mighty but fraught Blood, Sweat & Tears, was full of great musicians who most people didn’t know by name. Yet as fronted by the intoxicating huskiness of lead singer David Clayton-Thomas, they emerged from the embers of the counterculture to become one of the first true supergroups. By the time their 1970 tour arrived, Blood, Sweat & Tears were the most popular rock band in America,...

Music and politics were always entwined for Steve Katz. As a teenager in the Sixties, he’d travel from his apolitical family’s home on Long Island to Greenwich Village, where he’d watch radical folkies like Tom Paxton, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, and Dave Van Ronk play. He grew especially close with Van Ronk, who taught Katz guitar — and took him to socialist party meetings.

So it was frustrating and difficult when, in 1970, the U.S. State Department announced that Blood, Sweat & Tears – the band Katz had co-founded in 1967 — would...

Dick Halligan, who won two Grammys for his early work with the group Blood, Sweat and Tears and later turned to film and television work, died Jan. 18 in Rome, Italy at age 78. The family cited natural causes.

Halligan was a member of Blood, Sweat and Tears for the horn-driven rock band’s first four albums. He played trombone on the group’s heralded 1968 debut, “Child is Father to the Man,” then moved over to keyboards and flute for their second album, the self-titled, “Blood, Sweat and Tears,” after co-founder and keyboardist Al Kooper left the band. With David Clayton-Thomas coming in as the grittier new lead vocalist, the group had a major commercial breakthrough and went from the counterculture cult popularity of the debut to winning the 1969 album of the year Grammy for the sophomore release. Halligan remained on board for two more albums before taking his leave in 1971.

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Aerosmith kicked off their Deuces are Wild Las Vegas residency over the weekend at the MGM Resort’s Park Theater, which seats just 5,200 people. That’s about a quarter the size of the arenas they usually play, but that intimacy comes at a steep price. Tickets in front go for $1,300 each and that’s not even counting the option of shelling out an additional $2,500 to meet Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, $750 to meet Joey Kramer, Tom Hamilton and Brad Whitford, or a mere $275 for a backstage tour and the chance...

Filed under: Movie News

It's hard to put a definitive label on actress-turned-filmmaker Sarah Polley; at various stages of her career she's been a child star, indie darling, political activist, genre movie leading lady, and Oscar-nominated writer/director. This intentionally-eclectic body of work has endeared her to fans around the world, but now Polley's been officially stamped with a label that's about to be laid in cement: she is one of the most famous Canadians. Ever.

The 31-year-old actress was honored with a star on Canada's Walk of Fame on Saturday, an annual event created to celebrate Canadian achievement, now in its thirteenth year. Unlike its American counterpart in Hollywood, the award isn't restricted to the entertainment industry. It acknowledges excellence in a variety of fields, including science and innovation, as well as sports and the arts.

Joining Polley and the 124 existing inductees this year were singers Nelly Furtado and Blood,...