Main menu
Fretplay home Submit tabs

The Allman Brothers Band
The Allman Brothers Band tabs The Allman Brothers Band discography

Channels
Guitar channel Bass channel Guitar videos Reviews

Message Forum
Guitar forum Bass forum Bands and artists Promote your band Recent discussions All categories

Fretplay.com

The Allman Brothers Band guitar tabs

CD reviews

Eat a Peach

The Allman Brothers Band - Eat a Peach Audio CD

A fair review of the The Allman Brothers Band "Eat a Peach" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all The Allman Brothers Band reviews here, or go back to the The Allman Brothers Band tabs.

Band: The Allman Brothers Band
Title: Eat a Peach
Rating:

Release Date: 2006-05-23
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Ain't Wastin' Time No More 2: Brers in A Minor 3: Melissa 4: Mountain Jam [Live] 5: One Way Out [Live] 6: Trouble No More [Live] 7: Stand Back 8: Blue Sky 9: Little Martha 10: Statesboro Blues [Live][#] 11: Don't Keep Me Wonderin' [Live][#] 12: Done Somebody Wrong [Live][#] 13: One Way Out [Live] 14: In Memory of Elizabeth Reed [Live][#] 15: Midnight Rider [Live] 16: Hot 'Lanta [Live][#] 17: Whipping Post [Live][#] 18: You Don't Love Me [Live][#]

EAT A PEACH DONE RIGHT ! (crisp digital remastering and historic final Fillmore East performance make the Deluxe Edition deluxe)

The double-album was "Dedicated to a Brother" and included songs recorded by the band after the accident, recent studio recordings made with Duane before, and unreleased live performances with Duane from the Fillmore East. The Allman Brothers Band originally released Eat A Peach about four months after Duane Allman was killed in Macon, Georgia when a commercial truck made a left turn in front of his Harley-Davidson Sportster motorcycle on October 29, 1971.

This 2-disc Deluxe Edition of Eat a Peach (2006) features an updated digital remastering of that original album plus the ABB's show-closing performance at the Fillmore East's final night on June 27, 1971 (owner Bill Graham insisted that they be the final act).

The remastering job done by Suha Gur at Universal Mastering Studios on both of these discs is nothing short of perfection. I'm a long-time fan of the Allman Brothers (even back before this album), and have owned Eat A Peach on vinyl, 8-track tape, cassette tape and (including this version) three different editions of the CD. I know this album, and this is definitely the way to go here.

The original album is a classic, and essential just on it's own; the 34-minute Mountain Jam (the Allmans at their very best!), One Way Out, Melissa, Ain't Wastin' Time No More, Blue Sky, Stand Back, Les Brers In A Minor, Trouble No More, Little Martha. Great stuff!

Every fan of the ABB knows the original Eat A Peach, but most of the material (all but 2 songs) on disc 2 was previously unreleased. The recording also has a special connection with Eat A Peach; the great performance of One Way Out that was a part of this show is the same version that has been on Eat A Peach all of these years (the song is featured in it's rightful place on both discs here, and I'm not complaining!). This performance of Midnight Rider is also on Duane Allman - An Anthology, Vol. 2.

The June 27, 1971 performance is a good one, too. No, it's not as epic as the At Fillmore East performances from March of 1971 (Mountain Jam and Trouble No More on disc 1 are from those shows), but it's a solid and thoroughly entertaining concert in it's entirety. There's really nothing new as far as the song selection, but it does offer a different performance by the band; and being the last concert ever at the Fillmore East, it has historical significance.

The Eat a Peach Deluxe Edition package was thoughtfully assembled with care and respect for the legend of the original album, and includes the appropriate cover art and an enjoyable booklet. With the exquisite new digitally remastered sound and final Fillmore East concert disc, this Deluxe Edition of Eat a Peach is the one to own.

.

Don't be Fooled by Southern Rock Title
Don't be fooled by the "southern rock" title given to the Allman Brothers because they really aren't. Simply put, Eat a Peach is one of the greatest albums released by one of the most talented bands of all time. The best way to describe them is a blues,jazz band that jams. Don't get me wrong I love Southern Rock like Skynyrd and Molly Hatchet but the Allman Brothers are in a different league. They don't just play pop/rock radio hits but amazing jazz jams. Just because they have some roaring guitars and southern voices people automatically consider them southern rock.
Mountain Jam is the best song and defines what the Allman Brothers are all about. Eat a Peach is the perfect Brothers album because it has all the jamming of "Fillmore East" and all the radio friendly hits of "Brothers and Sisters" and "Beginnings". Fall in love with the Allman Brothers Band with "Eat a Peach"! If you're a fan of music you will buy this album.
.

Deluxe editions can be a mixed blessing. Sometimes they actually diminish the impact of the orginal album by burdening it...
. . with everything from mediocre live recordings to outtakes which should have remained outtakes. Or the record company tries to make you buy some stuff that you already own by packaging it differently.

Not here, though. This deluxe edition doubles the nine tracks found on the original 1972 issue of "Eat a Peach", adding a June 27th, 1971 performance from Fillmore East, the band's last at that particular venue prior to the tragic death of Duane Allman just four months later.
The original nine-track "Eat A Peach" was released as a double LP, gathering a handful of live recordings from the Fillmore sessions which had previously spawned the band's classic "Live at Fillmore East" album, and putting them together with a round of studio tracks. The latter were recorded both before and after the death of the older Allman brother, so only three of them features Duane.

Disc one, as it has now become, includes Gregg Allman's "Ain't Wastin' Time No More", one of the singer's best compositions, filled with hooks and sizzling slide guitar lines. And we also get the wonderful, mellow "Melissa", and a fine little instrumental duet between Dickey Betts and Duane Allman, the acoustic "Little Martha".
The remaining studio tracks, recorded before the death of Duane Allman and featuring his lead guitar playing, includes the dense, powerful blues-rocker "Stand Back", penned by Gregg and bassist Berry Oakley, and sees Dickey Betts emerging as a singer and songwriter, contributing the melodic folk-country-hybrid "Blue Sky".

The live material is dominated by the sprawling 33-minute "Mountain Jam", recorded live at Fillmore East and based around Donovan Leitch's theme from "First there is a Mountain", the same one found on the expanded deluxe edition of "Live at Fillmore East", by the way.
A great, punchy cover of Rice Miller's "One Way Out" is one of the highlights, as well as the ABB's gritty rendition of the prewar blues "Trouble No More". Great stuff!
But it is obviously disc two that long-time fans will be looking forward to with the most anticipation. A previously unreleased concert recording featuring Duane Allman. . . well, not quite unreleased, since two of these nine numbers were originally issued back in 1972, one of them on the Duane Allman anhology ("Midnight Rider"), and one on the original "Eat a Peach" ("One Way Out"). But here we get the full 76 minutes, from the opening "Statesboro Blues" to the closing 17-minute "You Don't Love Me".

So, it is worth shelling out again if you already have the original? Well, more casual listeners should make sure that they have the deluxe edition of "Live at Fillmore East" first and foremost. But the diehards will be all over this one for sure no matter what I say.
Musically the first few performances aren't quite as tight as on "Live at Fillmore East" or on the equally wonderful "Atlanta International Pop Festival" album. They're not sloppy, nor lazy, nor even sub-par, really, but with such great live material already out there you tend to get spoiled a little bit, right?
Still, they're excellent performances in their own right, and singer/organ player Gregg Allman is in top form. We get tough, powerful renditions of "Don't Keep Me Wonderin'", the instrumental "Hot 'Lanta", and Elmore James' stuttering, riff-driven "Done Somebody Wrong", filled with sizzling slide guitar, and this dense medium-length "Liz Reed" is all bubbling organ and energetic, even symbiotic interplay between the two co-lead guitarists. It's as though the band gets tighter and deeper into the groove towards the end, and this exceptionally long "You Don't Love Me" is one of the finest ABB jams I've ever heard. Dickey Betts and Duane were always something to behold, but this is just about as good is I've ever heard them.

So should those who are looking to buy "Eat a Peach" for the first time go for the deluxe edition? Definitely, unless they're on a tight budget, of course.
And those who already own the original single-CD version? Should they shell out for the deluxe edition, too?
Well. . . yeah.

Stand Back!
I put in the same quality league as stuff such as Kind of Blue, Shostakovich #5 by L Bernstein and the NY Phil, and the 1960 recording of Antiphonal Music of Gabrieli by the brass sections of the Chicago, Cleveland, and Philadelphia orchestras. Definitely top-shelf, high-quality music. This is music from a band on an incredible growth curve. I have a version of Statesboro Blues that was recorded a week after the Fillmore concerts in Atlanta -- it is even better than the classic Fillmore version. Compare the formative version of Blue Sky from the September 1971 concert to the Eat a Peach version recorded a handful of weeks later. Simply astonishing.

In all the reviews I have seen of Eat a Peach, I have never seen specific mention of the song Stand Back. This was Duane Allman's last recorded work on slide guitar. Even in comparison with the best of his earlier slide work (appropriately recognized for its brilliance) it stands as an astonishingly sophisticated bit of musicianship that gives tantalizing hints of what we have missed due to his passing. The band offers intricate rhythms, propulsive and melodic bass playing, and serious humor in the lyrics. And then there is the slide playing. A masterpiece of clearly articulated melody and tight interplay with the rhythm section, culminating in a spine-tingling bit right at 2:00 into the tune.

Touch, Tone, Technique, and Heart.

Check it out.

Eat A Peach - A Masterpiece All Over Again
The sound engineering on this CD has to be heard to be believed, but take my word for it, it is freaking excellent! Eat A Peach, when I first bought the album as a heartbroken junior in High School, was a great testament to the band and to their fallen leader, the greatest guitarist ever, Duane Allman. Man oh man oh man - THIS is the best of the best, the best remaster of the best of The Masters of American Rock/Jazz/Blues ever, The Allman Brothers Band when they were at their peak. Of course the stuff Duane played on was excellent, but what we fans were ultimately saved by were the new recordings they made without him. They were so damn good with Duane, and yet the band was still damn good without him ( or should I say, without Duane's guitar playing, for he was certainly there in spirit when they recorded these songs. ). And this superb remastering makes it all sound awesome. AND: added to all this is the second disc which features the entirety of the Brother's performance at the closing of the legendary Fillmore East. The sound quality of this disc is damned good, just a shade less than the original Fillmore recording, but hardly noticeable, I'd say. It's great to hear Duane talking between songs, great to hear his mind-altering guitar playing, great to hear Berry still playing the best bass in the world, and man does Greg sound good here. And of course Dickey Betts is awesome, and Jaimoe and Butch laying down the great double-beat. . . Jesus Christ! What a band they were! So glad they were with us while they were, but so damn sad Duane and Berry were gone so soon after these recordings. This CD is the best way to remember what was the greatest American rock band ever. Amen!
Now here are some more words a couple of months later. I now think that the second disc here sounds BETTER than the original Fillmore show. The mix is absolutely superb. Perhaps Duane and Dickey are playing a little more loosely here than on the Fillmore CD, but the overall sound here is just perfect, especially on headphones. This Deluxe Edition of Eat A Peach would definitely be on my Desert Island list. It has almost everything Fillmore has, plus the great studio songs they recorded just before and just after Duane's tragic death. I cannot recommend this CD enough - absolutely worth every penny. Listen and enjoy, rejoice and cry, it's all here. Duane Allman was a musical genius. And his band was the best this country ever produced. There's never been anything like him, or them, since. .

You can see a complete list of all The Allman Brothers Band discography, or go back to the The Allman Brothers Band tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.