Here are two historical albums from the historically important southern rock/blues band The Allman Brothers. The twin lead guitar with a southern drawl was patented here, and two incarnations here are of importance for the collector of artifacts and sounds.
Allman Brothers Band; The Final Note is culled from a cassette recording of a concert at Painters Mill Music Fair in Owings Mills, MD back in October, 1971. They only had 2 studio albums to their name at that time, as well as the famous Fillmore East concert from this same year. They did play a song from the upcoming Eat a Peach lp in “Trouble No More”, but this recording with Duane and Gregg Allman, Dickey Betts, Berry Oakley, Butch Truchs and Jaimoe is probably for completists, as the cassette essentially bootlegged the concert. There are definitely exciting moments, with a real POW on the dramatic “Whipping Post”, the jazzy keyboards on “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” and some searing guitar work on “Don’t Keep Me Wandering”, the sonic effect is as if you’re listening to a concert while in the lobby; you can feel it, and hear the energy, but the nuance is still about 20 feet away. Still, there’s no denying the band was humming like a V8 that night as on “One Way Out”.
By 2005, the band still had Gregg Allman, drummers Trucks and Jaimoe along with Derek Trucks replacing Duane on slide and lead guitar, and percussionist Marc Quinones and Oteil Burbridge adding extra pulse. Haynes’ voice is wonderfully growling as he also plays both guitars for more exhibitions of sliding than a Rickey Henderson workshop.
Gregg is laconic on “Statesboro Blues” and the funky “Firing Line” and is a mellow soul on “Midnight Rider” and “Melissa”. Haynes is a blue eyed soul as he spews out “Trouble No More” and goes swampy on “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”. Susan Tedeschi does a cameo for a gorgeously evocative “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” , with the team shouting out “the night is still young” before tearing into “One Way Out”. The great thing about the latter period Allman Brothers is that, like the best of jazz bands, the song itself is not as important as the soloing, which changes from night to night. The guitar work by Trucks and Haynes is simply exhilarating, swirling like a tornado through a rural town, while the rhythm section is like a Class IV white water run on the Ocoee River.
Timeless sounds, in black and white or in color.