Pubdate: Thu, 25 Dec 2008
Source: New Haven Advocate (CT)
Copyright: 2008 New Mass Media, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.newhavenadvocate.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/291
Author: Sean Corbett

GREGG ALLMAN ON HAMMOND, TAPE AND SHROOMS

Gregg Allman Talks (And Laughs) About Music And A Bunch  Of Other
Stuff

8 p.m. Dec. 30. Ridgefield Playhouse, 80 East Ridge  Rd., Ridgefield.
(203) 438-5795,  ridgefieldplayhouse.com.

I've got Gregg Allman on the line and he's telling me a story about
the time he and the rest of the Allman Brothers Band lived together
and ate psilocybin tablets (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms)
every day for eight weeks.

Suddenly I realize that he misunderstood my question. It's not that I
don't want to know about the drug-filled life of a rock star, but I
haven't asked about it yet.

He's calling from his home studio in Savannah, Ga., and I can hear
him greeting his band mates - "Hey good mornin,' come on in, have
some coffee." And he turns back to the phone, "Sorry, man, we're all
still wakin' up," he says, laughing.

The Allman Brothers Band has been around since 1969, but they're not
washed up, as dreadfully old and rehearsed as the Rolling Stones or
as defunct as Pink Floyd. The Allmans are still a fully functional
rock band with a new power from lead guitarist Warren Haynes and a
Zen smoothness that Duane Allman once possessed, but which now
resides in the form of blues slide guitarist Derek Trucks.

But it's Gregg's fingers tickling the keys of that Hammond organ that
have really set the tone for the band over all these years. I wanted
to know when Gregg realized he and the Hammond would become
inseparable forever. And so he told a little story about the first 
concert he ever saw, at the Nashville Municipal Auditorium, when he
was nine. He's filled the auditorium 12 times himself.

"It was headlined by Jackie Wilson. I was in the cheap seats, with a
big post in front of me. Spent half the night rubber-necking around
it." He laughs again. "Next up was Otis Redding. After him was a guy
named B.B. King, who had a dude with a big old pompadour playin' a 
big piece of furniture, a Hammond organ. And he had a big ol' James
Brown haircut with a little peroxide in it that turned it flaming
red, man. And that just knocked me out. And the sound that was comin'
out of  that damn Hammond with those three horn players, ain't 
nothin' like it."

I didn't know what to expect from a Gregg Allman conversation. I'd
grown up listening to his music with my mom and dad and had only
heard him sing. I knew he'd been on the road for about 40 years
straight, though, and figured he must have some great stories.

I tell Gregg how I listened to an original print of the Allman
Brothers Band's 1972 album Eat a Peach the night before to prepare
for our conversation. It was the last studio album his brother
[guitarist] Duane performed on. He didn't live long enough to see its
success. It's only got eight songs on it, plus a two-part "Mountain 
Jam," but it takes up four sides of vinyl. That means you can't just
sit there and listen. You need to become an active participant. I've
listened to vinyl for about  two years, but I already know there's
something special about getting up to flip the record.

Gregg agrees. Little did I know, talking about vinyl, film and
anything else analog is just about his favorite thing to do.

"Those things have a certain warmth that comes through 'em," he says.
"Like yesterday, I did this photo session. And this cat, he was using
film, you know? I  noticed it right away and I said, man, that is
great. You got to be all right. He was from Rolling Stone, but..."
And he laughs again. I never got to ask him what he meant by "but,"
but I think we all know.

"Yeah, man, you know we still record on tape," he says, "And then mix
down digitally with Pro Tools. It's a lot faster that way. Even with
[producer Tom] Dowd, the last thing we worked on [Shades of Two
Worlds in 1991],  he called us 'damned analog assholes.' And we said, 
'No, man, we just want to record it analog.' And he says, 'What about
the tape-stretches?' And I said,  well, tape stretches! Tape slows
down sometimes. Matter of fact, I can play you some Sam & Dave song -
I tell  ya what, I can give you the title of the song: 'When 
Something's Wrong With My Baby.' That sucker slows down. You know,
put a click track on that, man. But I'm tellin' ya, there ain't a
more soulful tune, a song with more feeling in it, that's ever been
over the  airwaves."

I wanted to get back to Eat a Peach. The art on the inside cover of
that album is spectacular. It's a psychedelic landscape filled with
mythical characters doing various mythical farming activities that
result in shroom collection, and they're all living together in the
mountains. I wanted to see what Gregg had to say about it, if he even
recalled it. I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

"I'm sitting here looking at just what you're talking about," he
says. "We make blankets like that. They're knitted and I thought the
colors could have been much, much brighter. Cuz that's, I mean,
there's a lot of stuff goin' on. But everything is there. Everything
is intact. All the creatures are there. We've got the hamburger
house and the guy with the shroom and at times, man, we had named all
these dudes."

"Oh, so you guys were pretty into that art, then?" I  ask.This is
where I think he heard, "So, you guys really took a lot of shrooms,
huh?"

"Oh man, you mean like, psilocybin?" he says. "Well, mushrooms were
our logo and this guy came by from the University of Florida. And I
guess he was going to school to become a chemist. I'm not gonna give
any  names, but...." Another laugh.

"Anyway, he had taken the essence of psilocybin and extracted it from
the mushroom and put it into tablets. So happens, he had a shopping
bag full of 'em.

"And so for about eight weeks ... we'd get up in the morning, we'd
have some breakfast and we'd take one of these red things that this
guy had bestowed upon us, which were absolutely pure and organic. And
I mean they weren't at all like LSD. I mean it wasn't raining fire, 
it wasn't, we weren't seein' God's eyes all over the place. It's just
a little further than reefer.

"We'd start playin' and the next thing we know it'd be dark!
[laughter] Man, we went some places [big laughter]. Then we finally
got a four-track Sony reel-to-reel and we started recording all
these, ah, [laughter] days that we played and I'm still trying to 
locate those tapes.

"And it's not like this is going to be any great search by my people,
but I've just kind of been lookin' here and lookin' there and kind of
wondering, well, where would they have gone?"
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