Beginnings

Brothers - Red dirt Georgia. Humid mean heat. Stock car rumbling

from twin Les Paul Gibson guitars. Sighing and crying and sliding

all over some new atmosphere.

A bordello red Hammond B-3 organ with spinning Leslie horns.

Supple gulf stream running warm and strong underneath.

Double drums - dexterous, light and polyrythmic. A thunder

of butterflys. Four hands and Feet dancing and prancing with

each other.

And one strong horse out front leading the way - riding the

bottom land with unerring steps. That steady rolling

bass vibration.

Midnight cemetery and voodoo drugs. Tempting ghosts, sprawled

across gravestones - stoned, drunk on cheap wine and in high

rut with young sirens. Straddling tombstones, Picking guitars

and wailing blues filled howls at a demon ruled moon.

One grave name honored by these blues temple acolytes.

A common psyche defined and a pact sealed with a flesh

and blood tattoo of their potion. Mushrooms swallowed

with abandon to fuel psychedelic revels. Some great

fusion of their heartbeats. Does 'Elizabeth Reed' know

what dirty Dixie dreams these young outlaws had on

those hot moonlit nights?

They were a six strand wire - one plugged straight into

the spine of Robert Johnson's ghost. That same bargain

made - trade me the magic for the dark road.

Flowing straight out of Delta Blues. All along the way

picking up strains of jazz and rock, a big bowl of

gumbo - pungent with all the strains of purely American

music. Every composition a melding of classical with it's

precise arrangements and movements. Wedded to high wire

walking on free swinging bebop improvisation.

The Great Jacksonville Jam. After which the alpha male

declared them his band. Daring a fight to any who refused.

All six strings bending and resonating for hours. Smashing

walls, soloing, rocking hard and growling. Birds in formation

flying high and wheeling in formation as one - some kind of

group mind at play. No need for thought or spoken instruction.

All instinctual vibrations locked into that deep groove.

So the troubadors took to the road. Conviction every night in

countless roadhouses, bars and honky tonks. Searching for the

sound - every night a fresh palette to paint some new sonic

masterpiece, lost to the echoes of ringing amplifiers.

Refinement and a fresh new map each time a curtain opened.

Daring a young, smart audience to embrace the experiment.

And the road would go on forever. Midnight riders criss-crossing

America. Leaving behind magic potions bubbling deep in the

village wells.

Until finally they arrived in the great city with the great stage.

All cylinders firing - ready to blast off the line and inform those

judges of culture that there was indeed some new magic for

those attending these temple rites.

A venue fitted with all the best tools of the trade. This showcase

demanding high art every night. Imperious arbiters of taste quick

to pass judgement on any so bold to trod the boards of the

sacred hall.

This first night some great epiphany played itself out. A validation

of this strange brew. Some mystic strain of pure and spiritual

sound new in the land. All born of the moment - it was jazz

and blues and rock and aboriginal surfing with the gods. The

brightest of the scribes present would ensure a return visit and

promise to record every note. Hoping to catch lightning in a bottle.

But luck would not be necessary, these alchemists had the

ingredients locked in their souls. And so those present stumbled

into the streets as if moon struck.

The Allman Brothers Band had graced the stage of Fillmore East.

Leaving behind an olympian footprint, one yet to be filled.