Thirty+ years of fandom, thousands and thousands of hours of listening, hundreds of ABB & related shows, hours talking with friends, hundreds of thousands of words written: 85,000 in Play All Night, 144,000 in my Ph.D. dissertation, and tens of thousands more here on Substack and across the interwebs…
And never.
Not one time.
Have I listened to Reach for the Sky or Brothers of the Road in their entirety.
I finally listened this past week.
I’ve been talking recently about Duane’s poor artistic decision to include Juicy Carter in the recording of At Fillmore East. Fortunately, Tom Dowd was there to talk Duane out of using Juicy for the Saturday shows, which comprise the majority of the album.
No one was there to stop them when the band made its worst artistic decision: signing to Arista Records.
I took the Arista plunge at the behest of Scott Soriano/Soriano’s Circus, who publishes Record Time. I just turned in my piece to him five minutes ago. I don’t even know if he’s going to like it.1
The records are ABBsolutely as bad as advertised.
The band made a series of horrible decisions in 1980/81–adding the keytar/Mike Lawler, updating their sound with disco, signing away artistic control to Clive Davis of Arista.
And the most egregious of all: kicking Jaimoe out of the band.
All of these factors result in these two truly terrible albums.
You don’t need to listen to the Arista albums.
I’ve done the work.
I have suffered for you, suffered mightily for Mushroom Nation, to let you know…
Avoid these records.
They are awful.
Lagniappe
Unlike Brothers of the Road, Reach for the Sky has some redeeming qualities. Two songs are somewhat salvageable.2
One is “From the Madness of the West,” the Dickey instrumental. I don’t necessarily care for it. It’s way too speedy for me.
But it favors two instrumentals I do love: “Pegasus,” from Enlightened Rogues and “True Gravity,” from Seven Turns.
It’s also got the only formally composed drum part in Allman Brothers history. Butch wrote the drum jam, but was not given any songwriting credit.3
An unpolished gem on an otherwise forgettable album, “From the Madness of the West” is easily forgotten.
Except for my boys Steeln’ Peaches out of Orlando. Incredible Allman Brothers’ tribute band that wails on “From the Madness of the West.”
Dig it:
The Allman Brothers version?
It has a synth solo.
Enough said.
More at longlivetheabb.com
The Arista records have given me a fair amount of fodder. Here’s a sampling:
This season, give the gift of rock
Play All Night! Duane Allman & the Journey to Fillmore East
MERCH
These are all one-of-a-kind, unique-to-me designs.
Hat and shirt adapted from an original Fillmore East sessions ad, I moved the ABB to the top of the bill, a spot they earned that weekend.
Long Live the ABB shroom #1
Jimmy Carter in an Allman Brothers shirt
Until next time.
He did.
Stay tuned, all will be revealed in Record Time #4.
Something he lamented later in life, admitting, “I knew better.”
