A portion of the Allman Brothers Band's final concert with leader and guiding force Duane Allman is set for release on October 18th. The album — which was recorded only 12 days before Allman's deadly motorcycle crash — is titled, The Final Note, and features seven songs from the Allmans’ October 17th, 1971 concert in Owings Mill, Maryland. Jambase.com reported the tape was discovered by a young radio journalist at the time, named Sam Idas, who was at the show that night to interview the band. Duane Allman died on October 24th, 1971 at the age of 24.
Idas said in a statement, “My only intention was to record the interview. This was a brand-new cassette recorder with an internal microphone, and I had one 60-minute cassette tape. I was sitting there with the recorder in my lap, and I remember thinking 'Why don’t I try this out? I can record the concert!' It was a totally spontaneous decision. I’d been to many concerts, but this was the only time I had the thought — and the motivation — to record the show.”
Galadrielle Allman (pronounced GOLLA-dree-ELL), the daughter of Duane Allman, has published the biography Please Be With Me: A Song For My Father. She also helped compile the recent seven-disc set, Skydog: The Duane Allman Retrospective, and told us that although only two at the time of her father's death — he's still been around to help guide her along the way: “I've been sort of parented by the music. Y'know, the lessons of the music, and the spirit of it, and the passion of it, has been a hugely instructive thing in my life. So, in that way, it is him for me. I was talking about Warren Haynes about it last night, that, y'know, the leaps between '69 and '70 there's a leap between (laughs) '70 and '71 there's a huge leap. It's like what would '72 have brought him? Y'know, he was really deeply engaged in constantly learning.”
ALSO COMING. . .
Also set for release on October 16th is the Allman Brothers Band's July 19th, 2005 concert in Erie, Pennsylvania, titled Erie 2005. Allmans' manager Bert Holman said in a statement for the Erie concert: “I was feeling it while they were playing. Ultimately, I knew it had been a great night when they started coming off the stage and everyone was like, 'Man, that was a great show!' I remember (bassist) Oteil (Burbridge) and (guitarist) Derek (Trucks) particularly being pumped about it, (guitarist Warren) Haynes was pleased, and (drummer) Butch (Trucks) was just raving about how over-the-top the show was. They all told me that they needed a copy of the show, which says a lot right there.”
Around the time of the 2005 dates, the late, great Gregg Allman told us that his relationship with lead guitarist Warren Haynes remained the bedrock of the Allman Brothers Band: “He and I write really good together. I don't know what, what it is, but when I get hung up, he'll take over, and sometimes he'll get hung up and I'll take over. I'll see a piece of a thing that he's written, and vice versa. There's a strength there.”
