The Allman Brothers Band

Induction Year: 1995

Induction Category: Performer

Inductees: Duane Allman (guitar; born November 20, 1946, died October 29, 1971), Gregg Allman (vocals, organ, piano; born December 8, 1947), Dickey Betts (guitar, vocals; born December 12, 1943), Jai Johanny “Jaimoe” Johanson (drums; born July 8, 1944), Berry Oakley (bass; born April 4, 1948, died November 11, 1972), Butch Trucks (drums; born May 11, 1947).

As the principal architects of Southern rock, the Allman Brothers Band forged this new musical offshoot from elements of blues, jazz, soul, R&B and rock and roll. Along with and , they help advance rock as a medium for improvisation. Their kind of jamming required a level of technical virtuosity and musical literacy that was relatively new to rock & roll, which had theretofore largely been a song-oriented medium. The original guitarists in the Allman Brothers Band - Duane Allman and Dickey Betts – broke that barrier with soaring, extended solos. Combined with organist Gregg Allman’s gruff, soulful vocals and Hammond B3 organ, plus the forceful, syncopated drive of a rhythm section that included two drummers, the Allman Brothers Band were a blues-rocking powerhouse from their beginnings in 1969.

The group’s marathon concerts, best captured on the classic The Allman Brothers Band At Fillmore East (1971), are the stuff of rock legend. Surviving ups and downs, including the deaths of several members, the Allman Brothers rank among rock’s greatest performing entities. Moreover, their success paved the way for other bands from the South, including , the Marshall Tucker Band, and the Charlie Daniels Band. To date, the Allman Brothers Band have had ten gold albums, four of which have been certified platinum (At Fillmore East, Eat a Peach and Brothers and Sisters) or multiplatinum (A Decade of Hits).

The group formed around the nucleus of Gregg and Duane Allman. Younger brother Gregg initially taught and encouraged Duane to pick up the guitar. With Duane dropping out of school in order to master the instrument, the brothers played in bands around Daytona Beach, Florida, as far back as 1961. They formed the Allman Joys in 1965, combining the Southern blues and soul influences that they’d grown up hearing with the with rocking new sounds of the British Invasion bands (especially ). Evolving into the Hourglass, the brothers and their bandmates recorded a pair of albums in Los Angeles for the Liberty label, one of which (Power of Love, 1968), foreshadowed the sound that would fully emerge with the Allman Brothers Band.

The Allman Brothers Band evolved out of jams in Jacksonville, Florida, involving Duane and members of the Second Coming (guitarist Dickey Betts, bassist Berry Oakley) and the 31st of February (drummer Butch Trucks). Another drummer, Jai Johanny Johanson (a.k.a. “Jaimoe”), was a veteran of the soul-music circuit, having played with and others. A magical five-hour jam among the musicians at Trucks’ house cemented the union and prompted this remark from Duane Allman: “Anybody who doesn’t want to be in my band is going to have to fight his way out the door.” Gregg was summoned back from California, where he was unhappily fulfilling a contractual obligation as a solo artist. The Allman Brothers Band were officially formed in March 1969 and signed to Phil Walden’s fledgling Capricorn label, which became the main driving force of the Southern-rock insurgence of the Seventies.

During the early stages of the Allman Brothers Band, Duane also worked as a session musician at Fame Recording Studios, where he acquired a reputation as the guitar player in the South. During 1969 and 1970, his blazing fretwork graced records by the likes of , , and Clarence Carter. His contributions to the double album Layla...and Other Assorted Love Songs, by Derek and the Dominos (led by ), cannot be overestimated. , producer and vice-president of Atlantic Records, had this to say about Duane Allman’s prowess as a sideman: “He was a complete guitar player. He could do everything: play rhythm, lead, blues, slide, bossa-nova, with a jazz feeling, beautiful light acoustic – and on slide guitar he got the touch. Duane is one of the greatest guitar players I ever knew and one of the very few who could hold his own with the best of the black blues players.”

Duane was also the linchpin of the Allman Brothers Band, lighting a fire under the other members. In Gregg’s words, “My brother was one of the most intense people I’ve ever met. When he was playing, he just pulled it out of you. I don’t care if you were dog-tired or half asleep, something happened...it was like he demanded it from you.”

The group’s first two studio albums - The Allman Brothers Band (1970) and Idlewild South (1971) - contained classic songs like “Dreams,” “Whipping Post,” “Midnight Rider” and “Revival.” Both were hard-hitting announcements of the Southern-rock sound. However, it was in concert that the band burned brightest. Led by Duane Allman’s searing guitar, the Allman Brothers Band’s live shows left devoted fans in their wake. The March 1971 concerts recorded for At Fillmore East in New York caught them at their peak. Sadly, the Allman Brothers Band was dealt a catastrophic blow when Duane Allman was killed in a motorcycle crash in Macon, Georgia, on October 29, 1971. A year later, on November 11, 1972, bassist Berry Oakley died under eerily similar circumstances only a few blocks from where Duane’s accident had occurred.

However, the group regrouped and persevered. Duane was not immediately replaced; instead, a second keyboardist, Chuck Leavell, added a jazzy new dimension. Oakley was replaced by bassist Lamar Williams. As a testimony to the Allman Brothers Band’s resilience, the group’s most commercially successful albums came in the wake of their tragic losses. The double album Eat a Peach (1972), which included Duane’s last three studio performances, reached #4, and 1973’s Brothers and Sisters was #1 for five weeks. Guitarist Dickey Betts moved to the forefront, opening up the band’s sound with the country-rock approach of “Blue Sky” and “Ramblin’ Man,” and with the lengthy instrumental pieces he composed, including “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed,” “Les Bres in A Minor” and “High Falls.” The Allman Brothers Band’s pinnacle of popularity came on July 28, 1973, when they performed on a bill with and at the Grand Prix Racecourse in Watkin’s Glen, New York, before 600,000 rock fans.

In the mid-Seventies, the road got rocky again for the Allman Brothers Band. Internal dissension and substance-abuse problems triggered a two-year hiatus in the mid-Seventies. However, a joint appearance between the Gregg Allman Band and the Dickey Betts Band in August 1978 led to a full-fledged reunion and the release of Enlightened Rogues in 1979. The reformed Allman Brothers Band reverted to their classic dual-guitar lineup with the addition of Dan Toler on guitar. In 1980, Dan’s brother, Frankie Toler, would replace Jaimoe on drums. This lineup moved from Capricorn to Arista Records, where they released the albums Reach for the Sky and Brothers of the Road.

The Allman Brothers Band disbanded again in 1982. In 1989, the box set Dreams was released, and the group reunited again for what turned out to be one of the most productive chapters in its storied history. The addition of guitarist Warren Haynes and bassist Allen Woody revitalized the band, leading to some of the strongest playing that had been heard since the days of Duane Allman and Berry Oakley. In fact, the most stable lineup in the Allman Brothers Band’s history crystallized in 1991 as a septet comprising Gregg Allman, Dickey Betts, Butch Trucks, Jaimoe, Warren Haynes, Allen Woody and percussionist Marc Quinones. Haynes came closer than any other player who passed through their ranks to capturing Duane Allman’s passion and technique. The Allman Brothers Band released two of the most inspired studio albums of their entire career - Shades of Two Worlds and Where It All Begins – in the early Nineties. This lineup’s six-year run ended with the departure of Haynes and Woody, who devoted themselves full-time to their band Gov’t Mule.

In 1999, the Allman Brothers Band celebrated their 30th anniversary with an 18-night stand at New York’s Beacon Theatre. To this day, they remain an incendiary performing unit for whom (to quote a line from “Midnight Rider”) “the road goes on forever.”

TIMELINE

December 12, 1943: Forrest Richard “Dickey” Betts, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in West Palm Beach, Florida.

July 8, 1944: Jai Johanny “Jaimoe” Johanson, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

November 20, 1946: Howard Duane Allman, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in Nashville, Tennessee.

May 11, 1947: Claude Hudson “Butch” Trucks, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in Jacksonville, Florida.

December 8, 1947: Gregory Lenoir Allman, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in Nashville, Tennessee.

April 4, 1948: Raymond Berry Oakley, of the Allman Brothers Band, is born in Chicago, Illinois.

March 25, 1969: The Allman Brothers Band comes together in Jacksonville, Florida.

November 8, 1969: The Allman Brothers Band’s self-titled debut is released on Capricorn Records.

1970: releases “Layla and Other Love Songs” featuring Duane Allman.

March 12-13, 1971: The Allman Brothers Band are recorded at Bill Graham’s Fillmore East, and the best performances are culled for the double-album classic ‘The Allman Brothers Band at Fillmore East.’

October 29, 1971: Duane Allman, guitarist and founder of the Allman Brothers Band, dies when his motorcycle avoided a truck in Macon, Georgia.

February 12, 1972: ‘Eat a Peach,’ by the Allman Brothers Band is released. Mixing live and studio material, it features the last studio recordings by Duane Allman.

November 11, 1972: Bassist Berry Oakley of the Allman Brothers Band dies in a motorcycle accident three blocks from where Duane Allman’s fatal crash occurred a year earlier.

July 28, 1973: , , and the Allman Brothers Band perform for a crowd of 600,000 (larger by half than Woodstock!) in upstate New York at the Watkins Glen “Summer Jam.”

August 25, 1973: ‘Brothers and Sisters,’ by the Allman Brothers Band, is released. It is their highest charting (#1) and longest charting (56 weeks) album.

November 3, 1973: “Ramblin’ Man,” by the Allman Brothers Band, reaches #2. It is the highest-charting single of their career.

May 12, 1976: The Allman Brothers Band dissolves acrimoniously, albeit temporarily.

August 16, 1978: Gregg Allman joins the Dickey Betts Band onstage at a concert in New York’s Central Park, paving the way for an Allman Brothers Band reunion.

February 13, 1979: The reconstituted Allman Brothers Band release ‘Enlightened Rogues,’ their first studio album since 1975’s ‘Win, Lose or Draw.’

January 23, 1982: The Allman Brothers Band are the musical guests on ‘Saturday Night Live.’ It is their last performance for four years.

May 14, 1989: ‘Dreams,’ the Allman Brothers Band’s career-spanning box set, is released.

June 1989: Joined by new members Warren Haynes (guitar) and Allen Woody (bass), a recharged Allman Brothers Band hits the road.

June 19, 1991: The Allman Brothers Band release ‘Shades of Two Worlds,’ one of the strongest albums of their career.

April 26, 1994: ‘Where It All Begins,’ another solid album of new material from the Allman Brothers Band, is released.

January 12, 1995: The Allman Brothers Band is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the tenth annual induction dinner. Willie Nelson is their presenter.

March 16, 1999: The Allman Brothers Band kick off their 30th anniversary tour with 18 nights at New York’s Beacon Theater.

August 26, 2000: Allen Woody, bass player for the Allman Brothers Band and Gov’t Mule, dies

November 14, 2000: The Allman Brothers Band’s ‘Peakin’ at the Beacon,’ a live album recorded at New York City’s Beacon Theater, is released.

Essential Readings

Southern Rockers: The Roots and Legacy of Southern Rock
Marley Brant. Watson-Guptill Publications, 1999.

“The Allman Brothers Story.”
Cameron Crowe. Rolling Stone (December 6, 1973): 46-54.

Midnight Riders: The Story of the Allman Brothers Band, Vol. 1
Scott Freeman. New York: Little, Brown & Co., 1996.

“The Allman Brothers Band: Macon Dreams Come True.”
Joanne Zangrilli. Goldmine (July 28, 1989): 7-20+.

Little Richard's Black Jacket With Appliques

Photo by Design Photography