Allman Brothers Band - Brothers and Sisters

Brothers and Sisters has taken up residence in my player. Bill put together a beautiful "Super Deluxe Edition" and Scott wrote a beautiful essay with Kirk and many others including EJ contributing. There is a ton of music.

And so now the band's sound has changed. Of course it has how could it not? You cannot take the human element away from the creation and not have that creation change in a profound way. No gear or person can substitute step in for another and have it be the same. It’s a physical impossibility. It doesn't matter if you have the licks down, it doesn't matter if you have the gear, it doesn't matter if you have the throat. The human factor, the heart, the hands, the journey, the affinity for the music, the vibe, the understanding, the knowledge, the study, the dedication, the humility, the ego, the upbringing all speak to the particular individual the intent, the focus, the clarity it’s all a part of the mix. Remove something as dynamic as one human individual and it changes. It's in the blood.

The beauty of the ABB is that they knew this quite clearly as Duane and Berry were their own men. And so they forged ahead without their brothers and created a new version of themselves as a band, a group, but more than that they stayed on the mission to stay as pure to the music as they could. They were still listening to each other both on and off stage.

Time doesn't stand still it morphs and changes as we do as well. Along the way it informs us as we mold the clay that is ourselves with our decisions, intentions, actions, thoughts, words and deeds. That is who we are and that is what comes out after we plug in. It sounds like you because it is you and you are who you are and what it is, what it becomes depends on those very factors, those points, that DNA that road you traveled and no one else has – hopefully it’s a good one and you are the hero of your own story. The guy on the left sure as hell was.

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.

The Allman Brothers Band - Berry Oakley

Fillmore East is still tearing up my stereo system and its time for a huge shout out to Berry Oakley who anchored the front line. Duane called him out as the third guitar player. I have spent countless words trying to get at the melded mind set of their musical trajectory coursing through the time and space that confronted them and us and the atmosphere they rearranged with their sonic homage to the creative spirit and their righteous attack that brought such purity to their music but in the end its a futile task just put the music on and listen, listen, listen and listen some more.

I try with varying degrees of success to focus on just one player to really appreciate what they are bringing to the show but in the end I'm over taken and overwhelmed by the complexity and intricacy of the entire dynamic and simply blown away by it all voice, words, tone, tempo and magnitude. So hell yeah I'm still listening to Fillmore East (The Fillmore Concerts version Tom Dowd mix) and hell yeah I can't stop....no surprise there though as well to all the brothers and sisters.

The Allman Brothers Band - The Filmore Concerts

Still listening to the Fillmore Concerts 1992 mix by Tom Dowd - Whipping Post is just crazy - the first six minutes dissolve into an amalgamation of themes, trances, movements and refrains that eclipse the standard format of what a popular song is and evolve into art. The shifts that this live exploration of sound make are a kin to winding through a mountain pass so subtle and soft are their landings you may fail to notice every strand of grass or shift in rock formation but they are there.

In its whole its a creative work of genius and the gods but each note, arpeggio and sonic exploration has a purpose and melds from the righteous spirit that drove their creation in the first place.

Their work together on these recordings are true compositions rivaling the masters Bach, and Mozart. Call it jazz, call it rock n roll but it is so much more and beyond the "jam band" moniker its ridiculous. Get this music out listen to it again deeply and pay attention. If you think you know it because you listened to it repeatably years ago you will be surprised at the sophistication, the maturity, the musicianship and the touches and flourishes that permeate the main themes and arcs. It's quite unbelievable what is going on here as the musicians work together and intertwine with each other.

Eat a Peach is on deck next on my musical sojourn back through their catalogue but its going to have to wait for a while more as I re-listen to disc two and circle back to the first disc - I really don't see an end in sight and that in and of itself is a beautiful thing.

Defining What It Means To Be A Man

Men of real accomplishment and legacy who affected positive change both for themselves and those around them. That is what real legacy is all about not passing your name down, or slapping it up on every building and billboard you can find or digging a hole so deep looking for gold you can not climb out.

We are steps away from success for all on our tiny planet with our whisper thin atmosphere in this enormous universe but that step is going to have to be a step up in consciousness. And its going to take real strength not avarice or a sycophant commitment to ones own ego.

These men lead by example and persevered undaunted by the attack the messenger clan of bullies. It takes real strength to be a gentleman, to be patient, to listen, to see the others point of view and to work out differences, to truly listen and it takes nothing at all to be arrogant, greedy, ignorant and afraid of the knowledge that confronts you and tells you who you are. We are steps away from a better world but its going to take the strength of humility and wisdom to confront the obvious wrong and make it correct. That's what these two men spent a life time doing and thats why in the final chapter they are both smiling.

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.