Derek & the Dominos (including Duane Allman) - Curtis Hixon Hall, Tampa, FL, 12-1-1970

I want to kick off the month of April 2025 with a special album posting. This album is the one and only concert recording of Derek and the Dominos with Duane Allman taking part. This has been bootlegged many times. But I'm proud to say this version has noticeably better sound quality than any previous version!

The classic album "Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs" was by the band Derek and the Dominos, with Eric Clapton the main star. However, one thing that made that album special was that Duane Allman of the Allman Brothers Band played his distinctive slide guitar all through the album. That kind of made him one of the Dominos, but only partially because he already had a full time job with the Allman Brothers Band, and they were touring constantly. It turned out during the couple of months that Derek and the Dominos went on tour, in late 1970, Duane Allman only took part in two concerts: this one, in Tampa, Florida, and one the next day in Syracuse, New York. 

Only this one of the two got recorded, and only an average sounding audience bootleg. But due to the unique presence of Allman playing guitar for the entire show, this is probably the most traded Derek and the Dominos bootleg, despite the sound quality issue. Personally, I had this in my music collection for years, but I almost never listened to it, due to the sound. But I noticed last week that a person named Goody posted a new version that adjusted the speed and the pitch. So I downloaded that. Then I tried to see what I could do to improve upon it. 

I used two tricks that I often use. First, I used the UVR5 audio editing program to boost the vocals relative to the instruments. There were some places in particular where the vocals were extra quiet. For instance, I went through parts of "Got to Get Better in a Little While" line by line. Probably, Clapton had his head too far from the microphone at times. I also got rid of most vocals that weren't actually by the band members. For example, in the middle of "Have You Ever Loved a Woman," a sad blues song, a woman in the audience could be heard laughing loudly for a few seconds. I didn't get rid of all of that, but I got most of it. I made a lot of other little changes like that.

Then I used the MVSEP audio editing program to get rid of most of the crowd noise, except at the very beginnings and ends of songs. Since this is an audience boot, there was a low level of crowd noise all through the songs. Sometimes, one could even hear snippets of conversation. I got rid of most of that.

I also cut down on the dead air between songs. There was quite a bit, for instance, guitar tuning. That probably shortened the album by a couple of minutes.

However, my audio editing skills are quite limited. So I then handed the files off to my musical associate MZ. Here's what he said he did to the file: "anomalies repaired, EQ rationalised, compressed (loud parts lowered, quiet parts made louder), etc... Numerous details fixed." When I listened to the music after he sent it back to me, I noticed a difference. 

Mind you, one can only do so much with the source material. This is still an audience boot, not a soundboard or FM boot. But if you compare this with previous versions, I'm confident you'll notice that this sounds better. Let's hope the powers that be who own the rights to this material do a professional job and officially release it, since this is a truly historic concert. There's so much that can be done these days due to improving audio editing technology.

Note that I previously included two songs from this concert, "Layla" and "Have You Ever Loved a Woman," on a Derek and Dominos live compilation album called "Live and Rare." I have now removed those, since they're here, and with better sound. Here's the link if you want to get the revised version:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/04/derek-dominos-live-and-rare-1970.html

Also note that in recent days I updated most of the Derek and the Dominos album covers with better versions, using the Krea AI program. They were generally pretty rough images due to the lack of many good photos of the band.

Finally, a big thanks to both Goody and MZ!

This album is an hour and 34 minutes long.

01 talk (Derek & the Dominos)
02 Layla (Derek & the Dominos)
03 Got to Get Better in a Little While (Derek & the Dominos)
04 Key to the Highway (Derek & the Dominos)
05 talk (Derek & the Dominos)
06 Why Does Love Got to Be So Sad (Derek & the Dominos)
07 Blues Power (Derek & the Dominos)
08 Have You Ever Loved a Woman (Derek & the Dominos)
09 Bottle of Red Wine (Derek & the Dominos)
10 Let It Rain - Drum Solo - Let It Rain (Derek & the Dominos)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/68ZtMkmG

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/C1iKYwbanNr5xa6/file

There are two parts to the cover art. The top part is a photograph of a genuine ticket from this historic concert. (That's Clapton on the left, Allman on the right, and bassist Carl Radle in the middle background.) I figured it contained all the important information needed, so I didn't add any text to the cover. The bottom is a photograph from this exact concert. The original was in black and white, and was quite dark. I colorized it using the Kolorize program. I also lightened it some, and used the Krea AI program to improve the quality a bit.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 7: The Allman Brothers Band

Here's the seventh and last part of the closing of the Fillmore East in New York City in 1971, featuring the Allman Brothers Band. I was a bit reluctant to post this, because it's the only portion of the concert that has been officially released. But I ultimately decided to post it for completeness's sake. 

The version of "One Way Out" here is actually the version that appeared on the band's "Eat a Peach" album in 1972. (Other live songs on that come from earlier concerts.) Then, when the deluxe version of "Eat a Peach" was released in 2008, the entire show was included as a bonus disc. The whole show was also included on the 2014 box set "The 1971 Fillmore East Recordings."

The farewell concerts to the Fillmore East actually took place over three days, but only the final night was broadcast live on the radio, so that's the only night where we have excellent recordings. Promoter Bill Graham, who controlled the Fillmore East, considered the Allman Brothers Band his favorite musical act. So he had them as the final act for all three nights.

Unfortunately, while this set by the band was certainly excellent, it sounds like the band's set from the night before was even better, and much longer. It's considered a kind of lost holy grail for fans of the band, but no recording of it has ever emerged. According to different accounts, the band played for anything between four to seven hours!

Band member Dickey Betts later said of the concert on June 26th (the night before this one), "That was a special show. We played until daylight that morning. I remember it was dark in there, and when they opened the door, the sun about knocked us down. We didn't realize we had played until seven, eight o'clock in the morning. Bill Graham just let us rattle, and nobody said, 'We gotta cut the time.' It was just a really free kind of thing."

Band member Butch Trucks added, "We played for roughly seven straight hours with everything we had. We played a three-hour set and then came back out. The feeling from the audience, not necessarily the volume, but the feeling was just so overwhelming that I just started crying. Then we got into a jam … that lasted for four straight hours. Non-stop. And when we finished, there was no applause whatsoever. The place was deathly quiet. Someone got up and opened the doors, the sun came pouring in, and you could see this whole audience with a big shit-eating grin on their face, nobody moving until finally they got up and started quietly leaving the place. I remember Duane [Allman] walking in front of me, dragging his guitar while I was just sitting there completely burned, and he said, ‘Damn, it’s just like leaving church.'"

Trucks added, "The next night, Bill [Graham] came running over, grabbed me around the neck so hard it hurt, and said, 'Thank you, thank you, thank you, for that show. It made all the years of crap I had to put up with worth it.' And I'll never forget what he said next: 'If I had my way, when you finished this morning, I would be sealed up in my bubble and gone off to wherever I’m going.'" 

So yeah, too bad we don't have THAT recording. But this one certainly is nothing to be ashamed of. Consider that the band liked it enough to include the whole thing on the deluxe version of "Eat a Peach," when there were other 1971 soundboard recordings they could have put there instead (with some of them eventually being released later). But I read the band was tired from the night before, and they felt the audience was tired too, so they chose to keep their set short and sweet, by their relative standards.

It's also worth noting that Graham gave the band an unusually prolonged and heartfelt introduction. That included the comment, "In all my life, I've never heard the kind of music that this group plays. The finest contemporary music. We're going to round it off with the best of them all – the Allman Brothers." 

Band member Gregg Allman later commented, "That was special. I'd heard a rumor before that Bill had said of all the bands he'd ever worked with, we were his favorites, but I hadn't believed it. So when I heard him say that with my own two ears, I was elated."

This album is an hour and 16 minutes long.

63 talk by Bill Graham (Allman Brothers Band)
64 Statesboro Blues (Allman Brothers Band)
65 talk (Allman Brothers Band)
66 Don't Keep Me Wonderin' (Allman Brothers Band)
67 talk (Allman Brothers Band)
68 Done Somebody Wrong (Allman Brothers Band)
69 One Way Out (Allman Brothers Band)
70 In Memory of Elizabeth Reed [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
71 Midnight Rider (Allman Brothers Band)
72 talk (Allman Brothers Band)
73 Hot 'Lanta [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
74 Whipping Post (Allman Brothers Band)
75 talk (Allman Brothers Band)
76 You Don't Love Me (Allman Brothers Band) 

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376045/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197107AllmnBrthrsBnd.zip.html

The cover photo of the band's slide guitarist Duane Allman comes from this exact concert. This one, along with the photo I used for the Albert King set, were the only two good ones I could find that were actually in color. So that's why I used a photo that only shows Duane, because this was what was available.

The Allman Brothers Band - One Way Out - Non-Album Tracks (1971)

Here's another album of stray tracks from the Allman Brothers Band. This one just covers 1971, from the part of the year when guitarist Duane Allman was still alive.

The band had a pretty limited repertoire of songs. Instead of playing lots of songs, they focused on a small number, but varied their soloing and instrumental interplay dramatically. That said, they did do some songs that didn't appear on their studio albums.

The first three songs here are well known by fans of the band because they appeared on the classic live album "At Fillmore East," which was both recorded and released in 1971. No studio versions are known to exist. So what I've done is take versions other than the ones on that original album and removed the crowd noise to make them sound like studio tracks. I carefully chose versions that didn't have a lot of cheering over the music to better make it sound like studio versions. I did the same with the fourth song and fifth songs, though they are much less known since the band played they very rarely and they didn't make it on "At Fillmore East."

The sixth song, "Blue Sky," is a different case. This is one of the band's most famous songs, and it would appear on the 1972 album "Eat a Peach." However, this is a special version because it's a live performance, at excellent soundboard quality, that was played while Duane Allman was still alive. So I figured this version is significant enough to merit inclusion.

The bonus track is a similar case in that it's a live recording with excellent sound quality, and with Duane Allman playing a key role. But the song, "Dreams," is one where there are lots of other live versions with Duane on it, so it's not so special. Thus, I only made it a bonus track.

If you add up all the songs not including the bonus track, it's 43 minutes of music, which was a typical album length for that era.

01 One Way Out (Allman Brothers Band)
02 Hot 'Lanta [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
03 Done Somebody Wrong (Allman Brothers Band)
04 You Don't Love Me (Allman Brothers Band)
05 Soul Serenade [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
06 Blue Sky [Live] (Allman Brothers Band)

Dreams (Allman Brothers Band)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16122196/TALLMNBB1971_OneWyOt_atse.zip.html

Regarding the album cover photo, I don't know where or when it comes from. However, the photo shows the band members in their 1969 to 1971 heyday when Duane Allman was in the band.

The Allman Brothers Band - Stormy Monday - Non-Album Tracks (1970)

First things first: who had the "brilliant" idea to have the Allman Brothers Band pose completely naked for a photo shoot? (In the photo I've used for the cover art, their private parts are strategically hidden, but that's not the case in some other photos from that shoot.) Somehow, I don't think that would fly today, at least for their type of music. But those definitely were different times. I suspect a lot of mushrooms were consumed. Anyway...

As I do with my stray tracks albums, I've collected all the songs I could find that didn't appear on studio albums at the time. A couple of songs here should be very familiar to fans of the band: "Statesboro Blues" and "Hoochie Coochie Man." Both of those have featured on popular live albums. But I've included them because they never were on any studio albums. "Statesboro Blues" is a studio version. For "Hoochie Coochie Man," I took a lesser known live version and removed the audience noise.

All the other songs are much less known, I'd imagine. "One More Ride" is an original (cowritten by Gregg Allman and Dickey Betts). It was never played live, and only an instrumental version has been officially released. I've edited the song, added the vocals from a muddy sounding bootleg version with vocals to the instrumental version. However, some people might not like what I did, or don't mind the muddy sound. So I've included the muddy version as a bonus track. It's three minutes longer, with a drum solo and then a second guitar solo. But the edited version I've put as the first track features a different guitar solo.

The remaining three songs are cover versions that the band occasionally did in concert. "Call It Stormy Monday" and "I'm Gonna Move to the Outskirts of Town" are well known blues songs, and I was able to find versions with excellent sound. (I removed the audience noise, as I often do.) "Oh Pretty Woman" is much less known. Note that this is NOT the huge Roy Orbison hit "Oh, Pretty Woman" with a comma after the "Oh." Instead, it's a song by Albert King. Unfortunately, the band played this very rarely (with bassist Berry Oakley on vocals, as he is on "Hoochie Coochie Man), and the best version I could find only has decent sound, from an audience bootleg. But I still think it's worth inclusion, since the band didn't play that many different songs back in 1970.

This album is 38 minutes long, not including the bonus track.

01 One More Ride [Edit] (Allman Brothers Band)
02 Statesboro Blues (Allman Brothers Band)
03 Oh Pretty Woman (Allman Brothers Band)
04 Hoochie Coochie Man (Allman Brothers Band)
05 I'm Gonna Move to the Outskirts of Town (Allman Brothers Band)
06 Call It Stormy Monday (Allman Brothers Band)

One More Ride [Long Version] (Allman Brothers Band)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15285353/TAllmanBB_1970_StrmyMondy_atse.zip.html

The naked photo used for the cover art (discussed above) comes from some album art by the band in 1970. But they didn't use it as the cover art, so I figure it's fair game to use here. I stole the text for the band name from the "Beginnings" compilation album.

The Allman Brothers Band - One More Ride (Edited Song) (1970)

Here's something I'm pretty psyched about. I feel like I've created a "new classic Allman Brothers Band song from their heyday! Maybe not, but I'd be curious what you think.

I don't know anything about this song except that it was co-written in 1970 by band members Gregg Allman and Dickey Betts. It first appeared as an instrumental just under three minutes long on the 1988 box set "Dreams." Then an instrumental "remix" just under four minutes long appeared as a bonus track on a "super deluxe" edition of the "Idlewild South" album in 2015.

Yet there's another version of the song available only as a bootleg that's seven minutes long, and it has vocals by Gregg Allman, with perfectly good lyrics! So it's not really meant to be an instrumental after all. If you listen to the instrumental versions, there are long stretches where not much is happening, for instance no soloing. Clearly, those are the parts where the vocals were supposed to go.

Normally, I would just put the superior version with vocals on one of my stray tracks compilations. But unfortunately, the sound quality for that version sucks. It sounds really muddy and muffled. That's probably why that version is hard to find even on bootleg. So I decided to try to merge the two versions together.

First, I used a sound editing program to try to reduce the muddiness of the vocal version. I only had limited success, since I'm far from an expert in this kind of thing, and there's usually only so much even experts can do. But I think it helped some. Then I patched the vocal parts into the longer of the two instrumental versions. I had a hard time getting the timing just right, because there were slight changes in the speed of the song as it went along, in both versions, since they were recorded by fallible human beings many years before most recordings became computerized and the variability of drumming was lost in favor of metronome-like consistency (and soullessness). Still, after a lot of tinkering, I think I got pretty close on the timing.

I also had to put an instrumental version of the verse at the start of the song, because otherwise the vocals came in when the intro drumming bit was still going on, and it didn't sound good. I think this change works out fine, because there's a little guitar riff going on that keeps the instrumental version of the song interesting.

The end result doesn't sound perfect by any means, but hopefully it's close enough for horseshoes. One can clearly hear the change in sound quality each time the vocals come in. But I feel it's better to have it like that than have the whole song in poor sound quality.

By the way, the unreleased version is longer than the others in part because it has a drum solo in the middle that lasts for about two minutes. I don't think it's a big loss missing that, since most people aren't fans of drum solos (including myself). In fact, I think the song works a lot better here at four minutes long. It could and should have been played on the radio.

I've put the song on a stray tracks album for the band. Here's the link:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-allman-brothers-band-stormy-monday.html

I really like the vocal version of this song. I could totally imagine it being a regular concert staple for the band. I am baffled why the vocal version has been left officially unreleased until now. Surely the professionals could do a good job (better than mine!) improving the sound quality of that version, if there's a problem with it. But I think it's much more likely that there's no problem if one works from the master recordings, and it's the usual bootleg copy-of-a-copy-of-a-copy problem that created the poor sound. So I don't see any excuse.

As mentioned above, a "super deluxe" version of "Idlewild South" has been released in recent years and the vocal version wasn't included on that, A box set of Duane Allman's guitar playing, "Skydog," was also released in recent years, and it wasn't included on that either, even though it features a very nice Duane Allman guitar solo. So I think the odds are low that that version will ever be officially released.

It's very baffling that this song slipped through the cracks, especially since the Allman Brothers Band were not prolific songwriters. It's not like the lyrics are objectionable, or it sounds too much like some other song, or it's a poor performance, etc... And I don't think the song was ever played live, either with vocals or as an instrumental. But at least there's this.

I put this together while I was working on posting another album of Allman Brothers Band stray tracks soon. I imagine I'll include this edit on that once I have that ready, unless I get feedback that I screwed this up somehow.

Duane Allman - Dimples - Non-Album Tracks (1969)

Duane Allman... SINGS! Wait. What?!

This is a very strange album. Duane Allman is considered one of the greatest guitar players of all time, especially when it comes to slide guitar. But he's about as well known for his singing as Bob Dylan is known for his lead guitar playing, meaning not at all. And yet, in early 1969, shortly before the Allman Brothers Band (ABB) formed, Duane Allman attempted to record a solo album in which he would sing all the songs. This is my attempt to recreate that album.

Duane Allman was not a bad singer, mind you. It's just that his voice was merely serviceable, while his brother Gregg had a remarkably expressive and bluesy voice. So of course it made sense to have Gregg Allman sing everything when the two of them were in the ABB together. But in early 1969, Gregg was spending many months in Los Angeles and Duane was busy working as a studio musician in Alabama. Duane was so impressive that he was offered a chance to record a solo album.

He did some work on the album, but either never finished it or didn't bother to release it. (Presumably, when Gregg moved back to the South in mid-1969 and musically linked up with Duane, Duane's solo album became moot.) Officially, only three songs have been released from it: "Happily Married Man" (which he wrote), "Goin' Down Slow," and "No Money Down." I've included two more here, from bootleg: "Steal Away" and "Dimples."

I've included another, "Down Along the Cove" only as a bonus track, because it's an instrumental meant to highlight his guitar soloing, but his guitar is buried so low in the mix as to be nearly inaudible, so I find it a very frustrating listen.

On top of that, it's known he recorded the songs "Bad News" and "Neighbor, Neighbor," but recordings of those haven't even been bootlegged (if they still exist at all).

The five songs that actually come from his planned solo album only total 23 minutes in length, which is too short for me to call an album. So I've added in some more songs to flesh it out. Duane very rarely sang lead vocals with the ABB, but he did on occasion. I've included two of those: "Hey Joe" and "Dimples." (That's the second version of "Dimples" on this album, but they're different enough for me to include both, especially since the live version has a lot more of his guitar soloing.)

I've also added two more songs that are instrumentals prominently featuring Duane's guitar: "The Weight" and "Going Up the Country." Happily, both of these were also recorded in early 1969, so I think they fit in well.

Finally, as a bonus track, I've added in a practice version of Boz Scaggs singing "Loan Me a Dime" with Duane on lead guitar. If you haven't heard the officially released version of this on Scagg's 1969 album, stop what you're doing and give it a listen immediately. It's 12 minutes long, and the vast majority of that is some of the best guitar soloing of Duane's career. This version is only five minutes long, and it's a more acoustic version, with a lot less soloing. But it's still interesting, and I'm including it mainly because it's officially unreleased and very hard to find.

So this is a strange album, for sure. It has more of Duane singing than him playing guitar solos, which is really weird. Furthermore, a lot of what I put on this wouldn't have actually been on Duane's solo album, if it ever was completed. But still, I think it's an interesting part of ABB history, and it makes a good listen.

01 Dimples (Duane Allman)
02 Happily Married Man (Duane Allman)
03 The Weight [Instrumental] (King Curtis with Duane Allman)
04 Steal Away (Duane Allman)
05 Goin' Down Slow (Duane Allman)
06 No Money Down (Duane Allman)
07 Going Up the Country [Instrumental] (Duck & the Bear [Johnny Sandlin & Eddie Hinton with Duane Allman])
08 Hey Joe (Allman Brothers Band & the Second Coming)
09 Dimples (Allman Brothers Band)

Down Along the Cove [Instrumental] (Duane Allman)
Loan Me a Dime [Rehearsal Version] (Boz Scaggs)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15123724/TAllmanBB_1969-1970_DuaneADimpls_atse.zip.html

I'm not sure where the photo comes from that I used for the album cover here. But good color photos of Duane are few and far between, and this is a very good one.

The Allman Brothers Band - One More Ride - Band Demos (1969-1970)

I've posted three albums of music by Allman Brothers Band (ABB) members before they officially became the ABB in mid-1969. Now I can more on to posting actual ABB music.

There seemingly are a million official live ABB albums and a billion live ABB bootlegs, but there's a relatively small amount of studio outtakes. So I'm surprised that I'm able to make this album. I'm also surprised that so many of the songs here are officially unreleased (and also rarely seen on bootlegs).

The first four songs on this album are 1969 band demos for the first ABB album, simply called "The Allman Brothers Band." The rest are band demos for the second album, "Idlewild South." Although it should be noted that the last two songs, "Statesboro Blues" and "One More Ride," didn't appear on that album.

These demos generally sound very good, to the point that it's hard to notice which three of the songs have been officially released. The demo for the song "Revival" didn't sound as good, plus that version is very similar to the released album version, so I've only included that as a bonus track. Another demo, "Leave My Blues at Home," sounded even worse, so I didn't even include that as a bonus track.

Generally speaking, the versions here are fairly close to the ones that made the albums. But sometimes there are important differences, and the solos are different. Of course, the ABB are renowned for their live performances, but I think it's worthwhile to hear how the studio versions of these songs came to be.

01 Don't Want You No More [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
02 It's Not My Cross to Bear (Allman Brothers Band)
03 Trouble No More (Allman Brothers Band)
04 Dreams (Allman Brothers Band)
05 Don't Keep Me Wondering (Allman Brothers Band)
06 Midnight Rider (Allman Brothers Band)
07 In Memory of Elizabeth Reed [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)
08 Hoochie Coochie Man (Allman Brothers Band)
09 Statesboro Blues (Allman Brothers Band)
10 One More Ride [Instrumental] (Allman Brothers Band)

Revival (Allman Brothers Band)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17187623/TALLMANBB1969-1970OneMorRideBandDmos_atse.zip.html

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/75rMVCMk

I used a 1970 concert poster as the basis for the album cover. But I realized the photo used on the poster was exactly the same as the one on the "Idlewild South" album, so I replaced it with another photo of the band, from 1969. Over a year later, I got a good program for colorizing (Pixbim), so I colorized it.

UPDATE: On October 1, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program.

The Allman Brothers Band (31st of February) - Morning Dew - Non-Album Tracks (1968-1969)

Here's the last of three albums dealing with the careers of Gregg and Duane Allman before they started the Allman Brothers Band in mid-1969.

The previous album I posted was the second Hour Glass album, "Power of Love." Hour Glass, which was mainly Gregg and Duane, broke up after the album came out and was generally ignored. Instead, they soon hooked up with the 31st of February, a band made up of Scott Boyer, David Brown, and Butch Trucks.

The 31st of February had already released an album to very little notice. Boyer was the band's chief guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. He was  talented too. He and Brown would later play in the band Cowboy, whose best known song written by Boyer is "Please Be with Me," covered by Eric Clapton and many others. But Gregg and Duane were so talented that they basically took over the band. The five of them began working on a second 31st of February, with Gregg singing most of the songs and Duane dominating the guitar soloing.

However, in order to get himself and Duane out of their Hour Glass record contract, Gregg had promised to record a solo album for that record company. He went to Los Angeles to do that, so the 31st of February album was never quite finished. The songs "It's Not My Cross to Bear" and "Southbound" included here come from his solo album project, which also was never finished. (By the way, "Southbound" is a totally different song than a later Allman Brothers Band song with that title. "It's Not My Cross to Bear" is a song the Allman Brothers Band would later do, though this is a more stripped down demo version.)

In 1972, after Duane died and the Allman Brothers Band became huge, the second 31st of February album was finally released under the name "Duane and Gregg." At the time, it was seen as kind of a cheap cash grab, and that's true. But that doesn't take away from the fact that the music on it happens to be really good. In fact, it's almost like a lost Allman Brothers Band album. For instance, it contains an early version of "Melissa" that isn't very different from the classic Allman Brothers Band version. And personally, I think their version of the folk classic "Morning Dew" should have been a big hit. It also contains other songs that show of Gregg's songwriting skill, for instance "God Rest His Soul," which was his reaction to the death of Martin Luther King, Jr.

So far, all the songs mentioned above have been officially released, though hard to find. The last two songs on this album are still unreleased. They might or might be called Allman Brothers Band performances, depending on how you look at it.

In early 1969, with Gregg still in L.A., Duane hooked up with drummer Jaimoe and bassist Berry Oakley, crossing paths with them due to Duane's extensive work as a session guitarist. The three of them moved to Jacksonville, Florida, and reconnected with Butch Trucks, the drummer for the 31st of February, who had joined a band there called the Second Coming. That band was led by guitarist Dickey Betts. All of these people began jamming together, often on the concert stage. Basically, it was the Allman Brothers Band minus Gregg and plus a couple others, though they still called themselves the Second Coming.

The last two songs here come from these jams. A popular bootleg lists them as being recorded on March 26, 1969. But apparently that's not true, and that bootleg is a compilation of a bunch of different performances from March. In any case, "Born in Chicago" features Dickey Betts on vocals, and "Hey Joe" is a rare example of Duane Allman singing lead vocals, with a lot of his lead guitar. Luckily, the band was recording itself on a regular basis in order to listen to what they'd done and improve, so these songs are in excellent soundboard quality.

At the tail end of March, Gregg finally returned from L.A. (having finally gotten out of his record contract). and joined in with the jam sessions. The musical chemistry was obvious from the very start, so Gregg, Duane, Jaimoe, Butch Trucks, Berry Oakley, and Dickey Betts formally became the Allman Brothers Band.

01 Morning Dew (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
02 God Rest His Soul (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
03 Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
04 Melissa (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
05 I'll Change for You (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
06 Back Down Home with You (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
07 Well I Know Too Well (31st of February with Duane & Gregg Allman)
08 It's Not My Cross to Bear [Demo] (Gregg Allman)
09 Southbound (Gregg Allman)
10 Born in Chicago (Allman Brothers Band & the Second Coming)
11 Hey Joe (Allman Brothers Band & the Second Coming)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17175731/TALLMANBB1968-1969MrningDw_atse.zip.html

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/bYu4ciaW

Unfortunately, I don't know it any photo exists of the 31th of February that includes Gregg and Duane Allman. The band's second album that got released as "Duane and Gregg" just has a drawing of those two on the cover. So I used a photo of those two, taken shortly after the Allman Brothers Band was formed in mid-1969. Duane is the one with a mustache and partial beard, and Gregg has his hair hanging over his eyes. I colorized it.

UPDATE: On September 29, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program.

The Allman Brothers Band (Hour Glass) - Power of Love - Alternate Version (1968)

A few days ago, I posted a compilation of the best of the very start of the musical careers of Duane and Gregg Allman of the Allman Brothers Band. That covered the years 1965 to 1967, and frankly, it's probably only for completists. The two of them were still finding their musical identity and developing their skills.

But this album is different. The two of them take a giant leap. This still isn't the Allman Brother Band with its impressive long soloing, but it's a really solid album for 1968.

Hour Glass basically was Duane and Gregg Allman, with some other musicians who have since faded into obscurity. The band put out two albums, "Hour Glass" in 1967 and "Power of Love" in early 1968. The first album was kind of a disaster, because the record company manipulated the band, trying to push them into a poppy Motown sound. All but one of the songs on that album were covers, and nearly all of them didn't suit them and were badly produced.

But "Power of Love" is a very different story. The band was given much more creative freedom. Most importantly, seven of the 12 songs on the album were written by Gregg Allman. I've included the best eight songs from the album here, plus one bonus track, and six of those nine songs are written by him. In my opinion, Gregg Allman was an excellent songwriter, but not very prolific. So this is a bounty of little-known original songs by him.

I think this Hour Glass album is often disregarded, because most of the people who would want to hear it are Allman Brothers Band fans, and this still isn't the full Allman Brothers Band sound yet. Even though it's getting closer, it's still made up of short, poppy songs, with little room for Duane Allman to show off his guitar skills.

That said, I think the album is greatly improved by removing the weaker songs and replacing them with some other Hour Glass tracks. Apparently, the band was very different in concert, sounding much more like what the Allman Brothers Band would become, with longer, bluesy performances. Unfortunately, I don't think any recordings of their concerts have survived. But these extra songs are more in that vein, especially a medley of B. B. King songs ("Sweet Little Angel - It's My Own Fault - How Blue Can You Get").

This isn't the end of what Gregg and Duane did before starting the Allman Brothers Band in mid-1969. It turns out there's another album worth of good music from them from later 1968 and early 1969. That'll be the subject of my next post from them.

By the way, another pillar of the Allman Brother Band sound was guitarist Dickey Betts. But unlike the Allmans, he has almost no recorded legacy from his time before he met the Allmans and joined their band. There's only one single, released in 1968. I don't think it's very good, since it consists of covers of songs by Cream and Jefferson Airplane that don't differ much from the originals. I've added them as bonus tracks in case you're curious, but they don't fit the rest of the album here. The Allmans and Betts wouldn't even meet for the first time until 1969.

Another by the way: as I got ready to post this album, I realized that I'd mistakenly put the song "Norwegian Wood" on the 1965 to 1967 collection. I thought that was on the 1967 Hour Glass album, but it's actually on the 1968 one. So I've removed that from the zip file for that other album, and put the song here instead. By the way, that's Duane playing the sitar all over that song.

One final note, which is an interesting trivia tidbit: the original brief liner notes to the "Power of Love" album were written by none other than Neil Young! Furthermore, the notes were "witnessed and approved" by Stephen Stills. Both Young and Stills were in Buffalo Springfield at the time, they shared some concert bills with Hour Glass, and were very impressed. Young even watched an Hour Glass recording session.

01 Power of Love (Hour Glass)
02 Changing of the Guard (Hour Glass)
03 To Things Before (Hour Glass)
04 I Can Stand Alone (Hour Glass)
05 Down in Texas (Hour Glass)
06 I Still Want Your Love (Hour Glass)
07 Going Nowhere (Hour Glass)
08 Norwegian Wood [This Bird Has Flown] [Instrumental] (Hour Glass)
09 Bad Dream (Hour Glass)
10 Sweet Little Angel - It's My Own Fault - How Blue Can You Get (Hour Glass)
11 Been Gone Too Long (Hour Glass)
12 Ain't No Good to Cry (Hour Glass)

She Has Funny Cars (Dickey Betts & the Second Coming)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15123633/TAllmanBB_1968_HrGlassPowrofLove_atse.zip.html

For the album cover, I just used the cover of the "Power of Love" without any changes.

The Allman Brothers Band - Cast Off All My Fears: The Formative Years, 1965-1967

I'm a big fan of the Allman Brothers Band, so I'm going to start posting some music from them. The band formed in 1969 and released their first album that year. Not a lot of people have paid much attention to the music brothers Gregg and Duane Allman did prior to that, but actually, there's a lot of good music from their formative years.

In fact, I've found so much good music from those years that I plan on posting three albums of it. This is the first and least impressive, since they got better as they went on. But still, even this music has its charms. No, it doesn't contain the long instrumental jams the band is most famous for. But Gregg Allman was an exceptional bluesy and soulful singer pretty much from the get-go, and that shows here. And Duane Allman was already a renowned guitarist even before the Allman Brothers Band formed. In fact, the band was pressured into that name in order to try to capitalize on his fame as a highly regarded session guitarist.

All through this album, you're not going to get much of Duane Allman's famous slide guitar soloing, unfortunately. The pressure at the time was to come up with a hit, so these are all short songs. Gregg Allman was an excellent songwriter, but he hadn't hit his groove yet, and nearly all of these songs are cover versions. But still, within the context of the time, one can already see why many in the music industry could sense that Gregg and Duane Allman were destined to be stars.

All of the songs here feature both Allman brothers. The Escorts evolved into the Allman Joys, which evolved into Hour Glass. In 1967, Hour Glass released their first album, simply called "Hour Glass." Unfortunately, they were pushed to play music that didn't really fit them in search of that elusive hit. But still, there are highlights, and I only picked the good songs. I especially like "Cast Off All My Fears," which is a Jackson Browne song, written when he was still a teenager.

To be honest, even though this is all good music, most of it is derivative, as the Allmans worked on establishing their own sound. So this isn't for everybody. They'll make a big musical leap with their music in 1968.

01 Turn On Your Love Light (Escorts)
02 No Name [Instrumental] (Escorts)
03 Spoonful (Allman Joys)
04 You Deserve Each Other (Allman Joys)
05 Gotta Get Away (Allman Joys)
06 Shapes of Things (Allman Joys)
07 Crossroads (Allman Joys)
08 Lost Woman (Allman Joys)
09 Cast Off All My Fears (Hour Glass)
10 Heartbeat (Hour Glass)
11 Nothing but Tears (Hour Glass)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17175728/TALLMANBB1965-1967CstOffAllMyFears_atse.zip.html

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/vGyepKbZ

For the album cover, I tried to pick a photo that would show what Gregg and Duane Allman looked like in their early years. I used a publicity photo of the Allman Joys from 1966. The Allmans are the two blonds who are standing. Duane is the one holding the reddish guitar. This photo was black and white, but I colorized it.

UPDATE: On September 29, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program.