Wednesday, July 19, 2023

The Allman Brothers Band - Winterland, San Francisco, CA, 9-26-1973

I haven't posted any full Allman Brothers Band concert recordings until now mostly because they're pretty well covered with officially released ones. I just checked, and there are about 20 live albums by them, from all phases of their career. However, here's a really excellent one that has so far slipped through the cracks.

Musically, the band suffered a great loss when guitarist Duane Allman died in a motorcycle accident in 1971, and then again when bassist Berry Oakley died in a motorcycle accident in 1972. (Motorcycles are dangerous!) But, in my opinion, the band remained at a musical peak at least through 1973. That year certainly was their commercial peak, thanks mostly to the song "Ramblin' Man" from the album "Brothers and Sisters" hitting Number Two in the US charts. But, as so often happens, big success led to the usual drug and ego problems. The band slowly fell apart over the next couple of years, then broke up altogether in 1976, only to reunite a couple of years after that.

The point of all that is, in my opinion, this concert took place before those problems got in the way of the music. This concert happened only a month after the release of the "Brothers and Sisters" album, their most successful album, which would go on to sell over seven million copies worldwide. So they still hadn't been overwhelmed by the massive success that was just starting to hit them.

This is a flawless soundboard recording. There were no problems needing fixing. There's also next to no banter between songs.

This album is two hours and 23 minutes long.

01 talk (Allman Brothers Band)
02 Wasted Words (Allman Brothers Band)
03 Done Somebody Wrong (Allman Brothers Band)
04 One Way Out (Allman Brothers Band)
05 Call It Stormy Monday (Allman Brothers Band)
06 Midnight Rider (Allman Brothers Band)
07 Ramblin' Man (Allman Brothers Band)
08 In Memory of Elizabeth Reed [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
09 Statesboro Blues (Allman Brothers Band)
10 Come and Go Blues (Allman Brothers Band)
11 Southbound (Allman Brothers Band)
12 Jessica [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
13 You Don't Love Me - Amazing Grace (Allman Brothers Band)
14 Les Brers in A Minor [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
15 Blue Sky (Allman Brothers Band)
16 Trouble No More (Allman Brothers Band)
17 Whipping Post (Allman Brothers Band)

https://www.imagenetz.de/jvr9o

The cover photo of the band is from a concert in Little Rock, Arkansas, on August 17, 1983, about a month prior to this concert.

2 comments:

  1. That's Berry Oakley in the cover photo so it had to have been taken sometime before Nov 11, 1972. Lamar Williams would be the bassist in 1973.

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  2. The Bros did a coast to coast live broadcast on New Year's Eve 1973 from the Cow Palace in SF. As it was a live broadcast and required phone lines to all the radio stations (no wifi back then), this Winterland concert was the backup plan. The full show was mailed on seven inch tape reels to every participating radio station, to use in case of any network issues. That is why this show exists in pristine quality. Thank you Paul, for your astonishing work on this site. Truly a labor of love.

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