Episode Overview
As a teenager in Sarasota, Richard Price began following Dickey Betts. He was there as Dickey and Berry Oakley joined forces in the Second Coming. When the Second Coming relocated to Jacksonville, Price’s band the Load did likewise. In Jacksonville, Richard was eyewitness to an extraordinary burgeoning musical connection between Dickey and Duane Allman and the birth of the Allman Brothers Band.
Our Crossroads
Our most direct crossroads are the Allman Brothers Band. We’re also Southerners, Floridians to be exact. Both of us are musicians. We are also archivists and storytellers. I’ve been following Richard’s efforts to keep the memory of the Jacksonville Jams alive for a long time. He’s quoted pretty extensively in Play All Night, so it was particularly cool to sit with him at the crossroads.
The Conversation
Dickey Betts. The story begins with Dickey, who was seven years Richard’s senior. The underage Price shares the lengths he went to see Betts, including once scaling a tree. He shares Dickey’s band lineage up to forming what eventually became the Second Coming with his wife Dale Betts, guitarist Larry “Rhino” Reinhardt, and Berry Oakley. Rhino left the Second Coming because his and Dickey’s styles clashed. With Duane, it was the exact opposite.
Alan Facemier. I talk a lot about the importance of the non-musicians in any music story. Facemire was not only the Second Coming’s manager, he was also a dedicated archivist. In addition to overseeing the Second Coming’s lone single, “I Feel Free” b/w “She Has Funny Cars”—he regularly recorded shows. It’s his recording that has long circulated (with an incorrect 3/30/69 date1) that includes Duane singing “Hey Joe” and a couple of jams.
The Birth of the Allman Brothers Band. Duane and Jaimoe arrived in Jacksonville March 2, 1969.2 On March 23, Duane called a “secret meeting” at the Gray House: a jam with Berry, Dickey, Butch, Jaimoe, and Reese Wynans on keys. That same day, Duane called Gregg in L.A., “I need you to round it all up and send it in some sort of direction.” Gregg arrived three days later, songs at the ready.3
Drug bust and a move to Macon. Sometime in April, the police showed up at the Gray House as Dickey was cleaning a pile of reefer on the coffee table. Richard tells the story of Dickey’s hasty escape through a window, weed in hand. The local authorities agreed to drop the charges if the band left town. Within a matter of days, the Allman Brothers Band relocated permanently to Macon.
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Here’s “Don’t Want You No More” from that same bootleg, with vocals and close 9 minutes long.
People remembered the date because it was the day after Jim Morrison got arrested in Miami for flashing his unit onstage in Miami.
Richard says they adopted “Melissa” right away. I’d never heard that but it does make sense, as it was a song Butch had recorded with Duane and Gregg in 1968.
