The Band started as the backing group for Ronnie Hawkins before joining up with Bob Dylan for his epic 1966 tour. The following year, while Dylan was recovering from a motorcycle accident, they shacked up with him in their Woodstock home and recorded the fabled 'Basement Tapes,' and their legend was sealed. Their debut album from 1968, 'Music From Big Pink,' is a rock classic; the follow-up album, simply titled 'The Band,' remains a cornerstone of rock Americana -- an astonishing feat considering four of the five members (Robbie Robertson, Richard Manuel, Garth Hudson and Rick Danko) are Canadian (drummer Levon Helms hails from Arkansas). After a series of successful albums on their own, they teamed up with Dylan in the mid-'70s for his No. 1 LP 'Planet Waves' and a successful tour. Manuel committed suicide in 1986, Danko died in 1999 from heart failure and Helm passed away in 2012 of cancer.