The Allman Brothers Band The Capricorn Years 9cd Box [japan] (2007) [flac]

Given his place in the pantheon of American rock music, Gregg Allman's solo career away from the Allman Brothers Band has been generally disappointing. Perhaps that's why it took nearly a decade between his previous album, 1997's Searching for Simplicity (its title alone indicates his frustrations) and 1988's over-produced yet underwhelming Just Before the Bullets Fly. A whopping 14 years later, Allman joins forces with roots producer to the stars T-Bone Burnett, hoping that some of the latter's mojo can rub off on a singer who is one of the great white soul and blues vocalists in rock music. For the most part it does, as the duo choose 11 relatively obscure covers from classic artists such as Bobby "Blue" Bland, Junior Wells, and B.B. King that have clearly influenced Allman's musical approach…

Two CDs. Live archive release. Long hailed as one of their best ever by the band members themselves, fans now have the opportunity to experience this spectacular show for themselves. By the summer of 2005, The Allman Brothers Band had moved into a comfort zone of stability and superb chemistry. The line-up-Gregg Allman on vocals and keyboards, drummers Jaimoe and Butch Trucks, Warren Haynes and Derek Trucks on guitars, Oteil Burbridge on bass and percussionist Marc Quinones-had been together since 2001 and had established a groove, both on and off the stage.

Four-disc collection features 36 tracks in all, culled from ABB's shows between July 25 and August 10, 2003, in Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, Darien Center, NY, Hartford, CT, Charlotte, NC, and Raleigh, NC. The 2003 lineup of the group included founding members Gregg Allman, Butch Trucks and Jaimoe, plus Warren Haynes, Marc Quiñones, Oteil Burbridge and Derek Trucks.

If truth be told, the Allman Brothers Band have always been the quintessential American rock band, shaping a rootsy mix of blues, jazz, country, and rock into an elegant, nuanced sound that single-handedly created what became known as Southern rock. Full of beautiful dual guitar leads and driven by double drummers, and possessing a lead singer who, when he was on his game, had as much soul as anyone around, the Allman Brothers Band were also an improvisational band who found all kinds of new corners in their classic catalog when they played live, no matter what the configuration of the band was at the time.

The group's follow-up to their comeback album is a major step forward, with more mature songs, more improvisation than the group had featured in their work since the early '70s, and more confidence than they'd shown since Brothers and Sisters. It's all here, from acoustic bottleneck playing ("Come on in My Kitchen") to jazz improvisation ("Kind of Bird"), with the most reflective songwriting ("Nobody Knows") in their history.

Released a year after Eat a Peach, Brothers and Sisters shows off a leaner brand of musicianship, which, coupled with a pair of serious crowd-pleasers, "Ramblin' Man" and "Jessica," helped drive it to the top of the charts for a month and a half and to platinum record sales. This was the first album to feature the group's new lineup, with Chuck Leavell on keyboards and Lamar Williams on bass, as well as Dickey Betts' emergence as a singer alongside Gregg Allman. The tracks appear on the album in the order in which they were recorded, and the first three, up through "Ramblin' Man," feature Berry Oakley – their sound is rock-hard and crisp.

The Allman Brothers Band's comeback album, and their best blues-based outing since Idlewild South that restored a lot of their reputation. With Tom Dowd running the session, and the group free to make the music they wanted to, they ended up producing this bold, rock-hard album, made up mostly of songs by Dickey Betts (with contributions by new keyboardman Johnny Neel and lead guitarist Warren Haynes), almost every one of them a winner. Apart from the rippling opening number, "Good Clean Fun," which he co-authored, Gregg Allman's contribution is limited to singing and the organ, but the band seem more confident than ever, ripping through numbers like "Low Down Dirty Mean," "Shine It On," and "Let Me Ride" like they were inventing blues-rock here, and the Ornette Coleman-inspired "True Gravity" is their best instrumental since "Jessica".