Warren Haynes (left) and Derek Trucks led a better-than-ever Allman Brothers Band at Red Rocks on Saturday. Photos by .
The Allman Brothers Band came to on Saturday night to celebrate their 40th year in music, and in the process proved the members are as vital as they have been at any point in their careers. For close to three hours, the band, led by guitarists Warren Haynes and Derek Trucks, put out a massive wall of sound that seemed like porn for fans of the electric guitar.
It’s no slight to former Allman Brothers guitarists Dicky Betts and the late Duane Allman to say that the current incarnation of the band might be its most formidable. Haynes has loaned his talents to many bands, including the Dead, and invariably makes them sound better. I never thought I’d see Haynes overshadowed onstage, yet as brilliant as he was Saturday night, Trucks showed that he is the fire in the Allman Brothers now.
The band has a massive light show, and when they started their opener, “Don’t Want You No More,” the words “dedicated to a brother” appeared on a screen at the center of the stage before slide shows of Duane Allman and then late bassist Allen Woody were shown.
The band really took off on a fierce “Nobody Left to Run With,” with Trucks showcasing fierce slide playing on a long solo. Though Trucks likes to build his solos to fiery crescendos, his playing is defined by a fluidity and emotional depth that ebbs, flows and climbs with stunning emotional ferocity.
Though Gregg Allman is still the lead vocalist, Haynes took many of the vocal duties Saturday, starting with a brilliant “Rocking Horse,” Haynes took a subdued solo that built in its grandeur, then Trucks took over with a jam that seemed to be going into another song entirely before winding back into the second verse. On “Soulshine,” a song Haynes wrote that he does with his band , Haynes and Trucks did call and response guitar solos on a long song-ending jam.
Trucks’ wife Susan Tedeschi shared vocals with bassist Oteil Burbridge on a cover of the Derek and the Dominos’ classic “Anyday,” then strapped on a Les Paul and ripped a solo on “Lost Lover Blues,” smiling at Trucks the whole time. Haynes stepped up on vocals again on a cover of Van Morrison’s “Into the Mystic,” then fiddler Tim Carbone, from opening act Railroad Earth, joined the band on “Come on into the kitchen.”
Trucks showed himself to be the spiritual heir to Duane on a brilliant “Dreams,” bringing the sold-out crowd to its feet with stunning slide solos and deft blues fills, finding spaces in and around the frame of Haynes dexterous singing guitar tones. The two also showed how they can work together on the set-closing “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed,” playing the main guitar riff in stereo.
It’s not often you can say band is as good or better in the twilight of their career as in their prime, but the Allman Brothers Band keeps bringing it.
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Candace Horgan is a Denver freelance writer/photographer and regular contributor to Reverb. When not writing and shooting, she plays guitar and violin in Denver band the defCATS.
is a Denver photographer and a regular contributor to Reverb.
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