Brothers and Sisters Review - Alan Paul

 

Just a quick shout out on Alan’s Book “Brothers and Sisters.” It’s a quick three hundred page tight compact read. Meaning every line is filled with information, quotes, history, stories, names it’s just over brimming with information and as a fan and/or history buff you will devour it with ease.

While the original six coalesced into a musical ecstasy of infinite cascading thunder and bliss that deserves every second of your indulgence and passion. The Brothers and Sisters branch bloomed in a profound way from that mighty tree of music. Give me more Chuck Leavell and Lamar Williams any day of the week. If it’s in the vaults somewhere it deserves to be shared with the music lovers. Until then have fun devouring the pages of the inside story of the album that defined the ’70s. I know I did then and now.

 Alan Paul

Allman Brothers Band

 Kirk West

 

Allman Brothers Band - In Memory of Elizabeth Reed

In Memory of Elizabeth Reed off of the Eat a Peach Deluxe CD from the June 27, 1971 closing of the Fillmore opens up deliciously smooth and elegant. The band just slides into a relaxed tempo and it’s the most refreshing version of this number I have heard. Here the band is taking its time. The intensity slowly builds like true love making ought to be through this excursion.

The lead work is original and in the moment. The drums splash beautifully in the background as Dickey drives his vision forward with the band having his back all the way. After you play so long together you have a true sense where your band mate is going and you are allowed to listen and get there with them. You can really hear this in Berry’s playing and the drums, oh the drums gently sitting in the mix right where they should be never over powering but well heard. The rhythm section has the anchor and counterpoint in complete subtle sympathetic syncopation.

Gregg jumps in with short chord runs sharply leading the band. The clarity of the mix is perfect with the organ fully heard out front and it chimes and grooves and swaggers righteously. It sounds beautiful, fresh and inventive....then his brother steps up....

Biting, sharp, relentless guitar attacks funk out before sailing off and then returning to a blistering foray all the while Butch, Jaimoe Gregg and Berry keep the tempo locked down as we drift off into a meditative frame punctuated by mid tone arpeggios as the band sways easily like spanish moss....and then the gibsons get vicious, biblical with fierce clean attacks and not overwrought then settling down again for more delicious mid tone punctuations the entire band right there as the drum sticks come forward just a bit then everyone builds together catching fire once more in a tenacious drive while the overall groove stays calm and cool....(how the fuck do you play the guitar like that) fantastic as they perpetuate the drive forward abruptly to the drums briefly and then back to the closing and locking it back down as they close the door on their creation. Holy shit what’s behind that door they just opened and what kind of force, power and vision did they tap into in that graveyard? It's a thing of monstrous beauty whatever it is and strongly rendered. This is a sublime ferocious and beautiful version of a seminal tune.

In Memory of Elizabeth Reed deserves its own spot in the Smithsonian and for that reason I'm singling it out here. We all know the tune there must be thousands of renditions but this one reads all the passages in such a refreshing calm inventive and fierce manner. The nuanced beginning followed by the expansive meditative dynamic giving way to the fiery crescendos and the thundering close. It’s a standout version at once both mellow and intense with a deep deep groove. Upon hearing it again after so many years with fresh ears it is all too clear while some of us have the good fortune to be totally obsessed by this band and their music...

Allman Brothers Band - Eat A Peach

Stand Back - when listening to Eat a Peach and believe me it was almost impossible to get to as I had to pry The Fillmore Concerts out of my player - its beguiling to think, project where and what the band was going to do next had brother Duane decided to stick around for some more studio albums. His contribution to Les Bres alone would have taken that tune to another level and I say that absolutely loving that butt shaking tune that Berry just rumbles through.

Okay so maybe I'm stating the obvious but we really only get Blue Sky, Stand Back and Little Martha as studio cuts from Eat a Peach. It’s an immense rip off by the music gods. I know, I know they are a live band and Duane is more than well represented on the Eat a Peach Album I'm listening to the Deluxe Edition with the June 1971 closing of the Fillmore represented on the second disc. It's a wonderful compilation with excellent liner notes, packaging and throwback labeling on the discs. But contrast Stand Back, Blue Sky and Little Martha for a moment and hold them in your mind. Each tune is in its own right a different genre. While Stand Back is the fuel injected brothers swaggering through their composition Blue Sky is its melodic counter point. Much like their playing these two songs back to back represent the branches of the tree that was the Allman Brothers. They are two tonal opposites yet together much like Dickey and Duane trading riffs. Of course Gregg is writing here and Dickey is writing there but what brings them together the playing of Duane is a very necessary bridge. Not to draw too fine a point on it but Duane was the glue that kept Dickey and Gregg together and without Duane they blew apart and it’s no one’s fault and their personal vision which they were more than entitled too and deserved were different but Duane was the Fulcrum through which their immense talents traveled.

Considering the emergence of the sound that Dickey was bringing forward (Blue Sky) and the swagger of the ABB (Stand Back) and then Little Martha is it really that far out to imagine an all-acoustic album considering Dickey's Highway Call effort (which I freaking love) and Duane's solo work with Sam Samudio as featured on the track Goin' Upstairs? Would it have been so far out of the question that the Allman Brothers with Duane would have done a record sounding like Taj Mahal melded with their swagger? Considering all their influences that were revealed the above mentioned Highway Call and Gregg's Low Country Blues would such a collective effort over time eclipsed or outfitted the Dawg Music genre with the power of the blues as opposed to just Django? It’s fascinating to imagine what that would have sounded like.

Much has been written and spoken about Duane and the Trane - John Coltrane and Miles - righteous brothers indeed and Tom Dowd's jazz cat ways but what about the root of the tree of music as embodied by Little Martha? How much more of that would we have seen and heard (Pony Boy)? What would have Duane's input done to Jessica and Southbound (songs I am passionate about)?

So here we are with Eat a Peach and we just have three studio cuts that are dynamic and all together different and just the greenest of shoots of the myriad of directions this band would have taken, could have taken, fanning off like a giant river oak.

The tree of music that remained and rebirthed time and time again was fortuitous and mighty in its own right and we are all the better for its perseverance, fortitude, drive and power but for a moment play the what if game and use Stand Back, Blue Sky and Little Martha as your jumping off points.

I'm a big fan of the ABB studio work as well, Gregg's and Dickey's solo efforts but imagine if it had all stayed together - just three studio cuts from Eat a Peach point the way.

Beginnings - The Allman Brothers Band

Beginnings: It's still so highly inconceivable that these young men in their twenties created such an abundance of sophisticated music. Go back and listen to the first two albums (ABB and Ildewild) reissued in 1973 as the album Beginnings. The level of musicianship is already in place and each track is a mini symphony of blues, gospel, soul, jazz and screaming rock and roll played not only with fire but nuance. Check the 3:12 mark of Dreams as Duane dances dramatically on point literally sliding through the song seemingly effortlessly. The road had taught tightness but each member brought their own life experience to the band. Dickey grew up in a family full of musicians, Jamioe had been playing in Otis Reddings band, Duane had worked with as many top notch musicians and artists as one possibly can. This wasn't a garage band. This wasn't just a bunch of stoned out hippies. These guys were deadly serious about their music. Lifting the arm of a 45 player with your foot studying the old blues masters I mean come on I love my guitar and to play out live but I freaking hate changing my strings.

Go back and listen to each song deeply and take the time to notice the interplay between Butch and Jaimoe. Listen for the bass how it runs along side of the guitar leads while still holding down the rhythm, listen to that organ as it stalks the whole movement in the background and then when it captures the front of the mix and the words. World weary at such a young age already confronted by a record industry selling them out and the music out to churn out a buck, witnessing the struggles of a single Mom in the 1950's and 1960's these men had a depth of character and a level of commitment and a vision they were not going to relinquish.

Get Beginnings if you don't have it put it in your car player and listen. There is a tidal wave of interplay going on each and every cut a miraculous layering of acoustic, electric rhythm and voice. If you are in a drum circle focus on Jaimoe and Butch. The subtleness and sensitivity in which these twenty year olds played right out of the gate on their first two albums is beyond incendiary.