A box set show selected from some of the many such collections I own. Song clips follow my full track-by-track tales, after the list below.

1. Aerosmith, Rattlesnake Shake (live radio broadcast WKRQ Cincinnati, 1971) . . . from Pandora’s Box.

2. Whitford/St. Holmes, Sharpshooter . . . from Pandora’s Box/Whitford St. Holmes album, 1981.

3. Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, Two Men Talking . . . From An American Treasure box set, outtake from the Hypnotic Eye (2012 release) album sessions.

4. The Rolling Stones, Strictly Memphis . . . driving, funky outtake from Dirty Work album sessions, Mick Jagger/Bobby Womack lead vocal duet issued on Great Dane Records bootleg box set Hot Stuff Volume 2, In Studio 1962-1989.

5. Led Zeppelin, Baby Come On Home . . . previously unreleased track until Boxed Set 2, 1993.

6. Faces, Dishevelment Blues . . . from Five Guys Walk Into A Bar . . .

7. Taste, Railway and Gun . . . from I’ll Remember box, Take 2 remix of On The Boards album track.

8. AC/DC, Down On The Borderline . . . from Backtracks, B-side of 1990 single Moneytalks from The Razors Edge album.

9. The Kinks, Afternoon Tea . . from 2014 release The Anthology 1964-1971; slightly longer remix of song originally released on Something Else album, 1967.

10. Jimi Hendrix, Shame Shame Shame . . . from West Coast Seattle Boy: The Jimi Hendrix Anthology

11. Little Feat, Wait Till The Shit Hits The Fan . . . from Hotcakes and Outtakes: 30 Years of Little Feat, outtake from Little Feat (first album) sessions.

12. The Police, Fall Out . . . from Message In A Box: The Complete Recordings, first Police single, 1977.

13. Bruce Springsteen, Because The Night (live) . . . from Live 1975–85, co-written with Patti Smith. Originally recorded in 1977 and targeted for Springsteen’s Darkness On The Edge Of Town album, it was given to Smith and first appeared in studio version and became a hit from her 1978 album Easter.

14. Bob Dylan, Catfish . . . A salute to then star baseball pitcher Jim (Catfish) Hunter, an outtake from the Desire album sessions first appeared on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991.

15. Janis Joplin/Big Brother and the Holding Company, Road Block (live at 1967 Monterey Pop Festival) . . . from Janis boxed set, 1993, previously unreleased to that point.

16. Jethro Tull, The Chateau D’Isaster Tapes (a. Scenario b. Audition c. No Rehearsal) . . . from 20 Years of Jethro Tull The Definitive Collection, 1988, from the original scrapped A Passion Play album sessions.

17. Eric Clapton with Santana, Eyesight To The Blind/Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad? (live) . . . From Crossroads 2 (live in the seventies).

My full track-by-track tales:

1. Aerosmith, Rattlesnake Shake (live radio broadcast WKRQ Cincinnati, 1971) . . . from Pandora’s Box. A Fleetwood Mac track written by Peter Green for his last album with the Mac, 1969’s Then Play On. I think it’s improperly credited to Nanci Griffith and Jimmie Dale Gilmore; it says Griffith/Gilmore in the box set booklet but it’s the Mac song, unless Green stole it and credited it to himself but I can’t find any crediting other than Green. In any event, it was done before a live radio studio audience before Aerosmith had an album out. That came two years later with the band’s debut record in 1973. Aerosmith’s roots go back to 1964 when the eventual unit was playing in different outfits before singer Steven Tyler discovered guitarist Joe Perry and bass player Tom Hamilton playing in the Jam Band in the Boston area, sought them out and the rest is history.

2. Whitford/St. Holmes, Sharpshooter . . . Aside from a couple Joe Perry Project albums I bought on a 2-fer compilation years ago, while I like and have forever been into Aerosmith, not enough to have followed all their various offshoot or solo projects. So I only discovered this hard rocking boogie tune from 1981’s Whitford/St. Holmes album via Pandora’s Box when I bought the box upon its release in 1991. The Whitford/St. Holmes album, Aerosmith guitarist Whitford working with Ted Nugent collaborator Derek St. Holmes, came during a period where Aerosmith was in tatters with both Perry and Whitford having quit the band. Singer Steven Tyler held the mother ship together with replacement players Jimmy Crespo and Rick Dufay for the I think creditable though critically-panned Rock In A Hard Place album in 1982 – the killer song Lightning Strikes alone makes that record worthwhile. And soon enough, the original boys were back together.

3. Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, Two Men Talking . . . An outtake from the Hypnotic Eye (2012 release) album sessions that was released on the An American Treasure box set in 2018. Nice guitar groove with perfectly placed spices of piano. According to the American Treasure liner notes, The Heartbreakers had played the song live but never could get it to work, to their satisfaction, in studio. Then, one day, they did and Petty fans are appreciative.

4. The Rolling Stones, Strictly Memphis . . . a driving, funky outtake from the Dirty Work album sessions, arguably worthy of making the album but it didn’t. It’s a Mick Jagger/Bobby Womack of soul/funk/R & B/rock fame lead vocal duet issued on the Great Dane Records 4-CD bootleg box set Hot Stuff Volume 2, In Studio 1962-1989 that I picked up somewhere along the line. Good sound, too, which is always a risk with bootlegs but I’ve been fortunate for the very most part with such releases over time. I love bootleg label names like Great Dane Records and another, The Swingin’ Pig Records, which did lots of Stones, Led Zeppelin and Beatles bootlegs, among others.

5. Led Zeppelin, Baby Come On Home . . . from Boxed Set 2, a blues/soul track co-written (and actually, un-Zep like because it was actually co-credited to) by Bert Berns, whose name might not ring a bell but whose songwriting/co-songwriting credits on songs made famous by other artists should: Twist and Shout, Here Comes The Night, Hang On Sloopy, Piece of My Heart, Cry To Me, Everybody Needs Somebody To Love, Baby Let Me Take You Home, Cry Baby . . . As for the Zep set, the track was arguably the selling point of the band’s second box set back before one could access pretty much anything on the web; the box was issued in 1993, three years after the first such compilation issued by the band. Any Zep fan worth their salt already had all the individual studio albums but may have bought the box sets anyway, for tracks like this, and for the different sequencing of songs which I recall, and I agree, a reviewer saying somehow made it appear as if one were hearing stuff you knew and had heard before, yet in a different enough way as to make it sound fresh.

6. Faces, Dishevelment Blues . . . from Five Guys Walk Into A Bar . . . A box set title, Five Guys . . . and yes, the ellipsis (three dots) is part of the title, one that perfectly sums up the Faces’ ramshackle, rowdy, booze-soaked approach to music and life and what endeared the band to so many. Not to mention, they were damn good musically in their raunch and roll way. This is a Led Zeppelin-like blues track that, apparently, was a throwaway Faces had no intention of releasing. According to one Faces-related website: “When asked for material for a promo-flexi-disc by the New Musical Express, the Faces couldn’t be bothered to write a new song, instead tossing the magazine this one-off atrocity of a languid, idle, drunk, badly recorded blues rock track, thinking ‘they wouldn’t have the balls to use it’, as keykboardist Ian McLagan puts it.”

Atrocity, languid, idle, hell, I like it! Perfect title, too. It is disheveled. That’s why it’s good.

7. Taste, Railway and Gun . . . from the I’ll Remember box, Take 2 remix of On The Boards album track. Not all that much different from the album, about a minute longer, typically fine guitar from Rory Gallagher. What more could you ask for?

8. AC/DC, Down On The Borderline . . . from Backtracks, it’s the B-side of 1990 single Moneytalks from The Razors Edge album.

9. The Kinks, Afternoon Tea . . from 2014’s 5 -CD release The Anthology 1964-1971. This is a slightly longer remix of a song originally released on the Something Else album, 1967. A typically appealing ‘very British’ type Kinks song of that period of their existence.

10. Jimi Hendrix, Shame Shame Shame . . . from West Coast Seattle Boy: The Jimi Hendrix Anthology. Something of a funky jam session while Hendrix was trying to refine the song Room Full Of Mirrors to his exacting specifications, resulting in a sort of jam/combination track although I’m just playing the specific Shame Shame Shame portion which is a stand-alone song in itself. Not exacting, not perfect, but sometimes it can be best to just let ‘er rip as one finds the right feel for a song. No, er, shame in that.

11. Little Feat, Wait Till The Shit Hits The Fan . . . from Hotcakes and Outtakes: 30 Years of Little Feat, a box set that by all accounts is out of print, and absurdly expensive online, so I’m glad I got it ages ago. This is an outtake from the Little Feat (first album) sessions. Recorded in 1970, the band’s debut record came out in 1971.

12. The Police, Fall Out . . . from Message In A Box: The Complete Recordings. The first Police single, 1977. Punk rock aggressive track, short (2 minutes) and sweet, notable because it featured guitarist Henry Padovani, a short-term member of The Police who later became part of Wayne County and The Electric Chairs. Padovani was replaced in The Police by Andy Summers who for a brief time was second guitarist in the band, alongside Padovani, before The Police settled on their trio lineup.

13. Bruce Springsteen, Because The Night (live) . . . from Live 1975–85, co-written with Patti Smith. Originally recorded in 1977 and targeted for Springsteen’s Darkness On The Edge Of Town album, it was given to Smith and first appeared in studio version and became a hit from her 1978 album Easter. I first cottoned to the song – which prompted me to investigate Patti Smith’s music and glad for it – when a bar band played it, during my college days.

14. Bob Dylan, Catfish . . . A salute to then star baseball pitcher Jim (Catfish) Hunter. It’s a bluesy, acoustic outtake from the Desire album sessions that first appeared on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991. That amazing series, to Dylan fans like me at least, is now at Volume 17 covering the various stages of his career, both in studio and live, although a 2023 article in Rolling Stone magazine suggested the series might be petering out. That said, a multi-disc expanded version of the Bob Dylan at Budokan live album from 1978 recently came out, although it wasn’t labelled as a “bootleg series’ release.

15. Janis Joplin/Big Brother and the Holding Company, Road Block (live at 1967 Monterey Pop Festival) . . . from the ‘Janis’ boxed set, 1993, previously unreleased to that point. Funky sort of jam essentially just repeating the song title and yet . . . it works.

16. Jethro Tull, The Chateau D’Isaster Tapes (a. Scenario b. Audition c. No Rehearsal) . . . from 20 Years of Jethro Tull The Definitive Collection, 1988, the song is from the original scrapped A Passion Play album sessions. The A Passion Play sessions at first did not go well but are an interesting insight into the creative process. It was 1972 and Tull went into the studio to record the followup to Thick As A Brick but after a time, realized it wasn’t working. So they ditched what they were doing and eventually started again, and out came the official A Passion Play album, released in 1973. But those initial tapes were left behind, eventually surfacing on this track on the 1988 boxed set 20 Years Of Jethro Tull and then in full bloom in 1993 on the fine 2-CD compilation Nightcap: The Unreleased Masters 1973-1991. The Nightcap release included, on CD 1, the Chateau d’Isaster Tapes, the entire originally planned album of songs that morphed into A Passion Play. As with Dylan’s Bootleg series, and those of others, you could include Tull (which has a second boxed set I didn’t touch on today) among those bands with an amazing amount of obscure/previously unreleased/relatively unheard gems.

17. Eric Clapton with Santana, Eyesight To The Blind/Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad? (live) . . . From Crossroads 2 (live in the seventies). Clapton enjoyed success with his then (1988 release) careeer-spanning box set Crossroads. It wasn’t the first such release. To my knowledge and research, Bob Dylan’s 1985 release Biograph started the box set trend at least among musicians of 60s and 70s vintage but Clapton’s was the one that really set things afire. In any event, in 1996 Clapton went back to the box, so to speak, issuing Crossroads 2, this time entirely live tracks. And what a collection, including this 24-minute but never remotely boring combination Sonny Boy Williamson/Clapton track performed with the Santana band – it could easily be seen as a Santana song – which was opening for Clapton and invited onstage for encores like this, on Clapton’s 1975 American tour.

My track-by-track tales follow the bare-bones list.

1. R.E.M., The Wake-Up Bomb
2. ZZ Top, Bedroom Thang
3. Talking Heads, Popsicle
4. Midnight Oil, No Time For Games
5. Roxy Music, Beauty Queen
6. Judas Priest, Never Satisfied
7. Joe Jackson, We Can’t Live Together
8. The Stone Roses, Love Spreads
9. The Rolling Stones, Dirty Work
10. Jason and The Scorchers, 19th Nervous Breakdown
11. Stray, All In Your Mind
12. Steve Earle, Snake Oil
13. AC/DC, Spoilin’ For A Fight
14. Paul McCartney/Wings, Soily (live, from Wings Over America)
15. Leslie West, Blind Man
16. Queen, The Hitman
17. Guns N’ Roses, Locomotive (Complicity)
18. Grateful Dead, Terrapin Station
19. Alvin Lee, Can’t Stop
20. Black Sabbath, Into The Void

My track-by-track tales:

1. R.E.M., The Wake-Up Bomb . . . 8 a.m. on a Saturday, the show’s starting, rise and shine, here’s your alarm clock. From the band’s New Adventures In Hi-Fi album, released in 1996. It was the last with the band’s founding drummer Bill Berry, who retired in 1997, became a farmer, then returned to the music industry in 2022 by forming the band The Bad Ends with various musicians from Atlanta and R.E.M.’s original home base in Athens, Georgia. The Bad Ends’ debut album, The Power and the Glory, was released in early 2023.

2. ZZ Top, Bedroom Thang . . . Sticking with the bedroom and what might happen there. From ZZ’s first album, called – wait for it – ZZ Top’s First Album.

3. Talking Heads, Popsicle . . . More bedroom activity. Listen to/read the lyrics. As for the music, it’s a funky piece recorded during sessions for 1983’s Speaking In Tongues album but not officially released until the 1992 compilation Popular Favorites 1976–1992: Sand in the Vaseline.

4. Midnight Oil, No Time For Games . . . “Let’s rock!” is how lead singer Peter Garrett introduces the song, shortly after the opening guitar riff. Then, they rock. Early Oils, from their 1980 EP, Bird Noises.

5. Roxy Music, Beauty Queen . . . A somewhat spooky ballad with touches of progressive and art rock. But that’s Roxy Music for you, an often intoxicating listen. This one’s from the band’s second album, 1973’s For Your Pleasure. It’s the second and final one to feature synthesizer and sound effects specialist Brian Eno – who went on to work with and/or produce such artists as David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, U2 and Talking Heads among many others – as a member of the band.

6. Judas Priest, Never Satisfied . . . Early Priest, from the first album, Rock A Rolla, released in 1974. It’s heavy, but more blues-rock heavy than the fully metallic direction the band later took.

7. Joe Jackson, We Can’t Live Together . . . “We can’t live together, but we can’t stay apart.” Which might sum up some if not many relationships. This one’s from Big World, an atypical, perhaps, live album JJ released in 1986. What differentiates the record from most live albums is you don’t hear much if any applause or crowd reaction. Jackson’s band had road-tested the material in rehearsals and club gigs but as stated in the album’s liner notes, once recording day came, the audience at the Roundabout Theatre in New York City was asked to keep as quiet as possible, with the band recorded directly, no mixing or overdubbing possible as is the usual case in how most albums are put together.

8. The Stone Roses, Love Spreads . . . I don’t listen to The Stone Roses much. When I do, it’s this song, one of those cases when a good song is a good song is a good song no matter who it’s by or whether you’re a particular fan of a band or artist. Infectious guitar riff. Yet while it was a big hit in some places, like home base the UK where it was the band’s highest-charting single at No. 2, it didn’t do huge business in many other places, like Canada, where it topped out at No. 67, No. 55 in the US.

9. The Rolling Stones, Dirty Work . . . Rocking title cut, biting lyrics, from the band’s 1986 album. It was critically panned, the band was on the verge of breaking up during the so-called “World War III” period when chief songwriters Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were at odds, even some fans (I think overly influenced by critics’ reviews) dismiss it without perhaps really listening to it. It is an ‘angry’ album, as I recall at least one critic, Peter Goddard of the Toronto Star, terming it when it came out, but he was talking about the music, not band relationships, in his positive review. He was right. It is ‘angry.’ And aggressive. That’s also why it’s good, critics be damned. But to each their own, of course, in a subjective situation like rating music.

10. Jason and The Scorchers, 19th Nervous Breakdown . . . Scorching, er, cover of the Rolling Stones’ 1966 hit single. The Scorchers’ version was released on their 1986 album Still Standing.

11. Stray, All In Your Mind . . . I’ve told this story before, but was long ago so I’m going to repeat myself. Years back, a friend sends me a message on Facebook. “You have to get this!” “This’ being a CD compilation called I’m A Freak Baby: A Journey Through The British Heavy Psych & Hard Rock Underground Scene 1968-72. So I got it, and the two subsequent releases in the series that started with the debut compilation in 2016, and I’ve done shows using those compilations and will again. The first compilation is how I got into Stray, to the extent that I quickly bought a 2-CD compilation of theirs. Initially active from 1966-77, Stray had a couple reunions during the 1980s and 1990s and at last look, reunited again in 2023 – with all the original members, which is maybe surprising these days – with a new album, About Time. They’ve picked up where they left off with their hard rocking psychedelic and sometimes progressive sound. Iron Maiden covered All In Your Mind as the B-side of its 1990 single Holy Smoke from Maiden’s No Prayer For The Dying album.

12. Steve Earle, Snake Oil . . .From Copperhead Road, the 1988 album (and title cut hit single) that brought Earle’s music to a wider audience. Earle called the album the first blend of heavy metal and bluegrass. A good rocker, Snake Oil, with a fun part coming at the very end: “I knew there was a first-taker on this album somewhere!’ Earle exclaims.

13. AC/DC, Spoilin’ For A Fight . . . Typical AC/DC, nice guitar licks, great opening riff, the usual formula which, as I’ve said before, AC/DC does so well so, why change? That’s the magic, at least if you like the band. If you don’t, then it’s the same old thing, and I can see it, but the band’s in on the joke. “I’m sick to death of people saying we’ve made 11 albums that sound exactly the same,” guitarist Angus Young said some years ago. “In fact, we’ve made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.” Which is not really true, of course, if you listen. This one’s from the 2008 album Black Ice, which topped charts worldwide.

14. Paul McCartney/Wings, Soily (live, from Wings Over America) . . . The band is on fire on this rocker. In fact, it’s prompted me to pull the full album out and listen to it. Again.

15. Leslie West, Blind Man . . . Heavy, bluesy rock from West’s 1969 album, titled Mountain, after which West and bassist/producer Felix Pappalardi formed the band Mountain, of Mississippi Queen, etc. fame.

16. Queen, The Hitman . . . A rocker from Innuendo, the 1991 album that harkened back to the band’s 1970s sound and was the last recorded by Queen while singer Freddie Mercury was still alive.

17. Guns N’ Roses, Locomotive (Complicity) . . . Epic near-nine-minute track from the Use Your Illusion II album, released with its companion piece Illusion I on Sept. 17, 1991. A riff rocker, fine guitar solos by Slash eventually settling into a piano-led coda.

18. Grateful Dead, Terrapin Station . . . Multi-part, 16-minute plus suite and title track from the Dead’s 1977 album. Usually, they’d take a three-minute studio cut like Dark Star and extend it in concert to 23 minutes, as the band did on 1969’s Live/Dead, which turned that song into one of their signatures after the 1968 studio single stiffed. For Terrapin Station, they figured, why wait for the concert, let’s extend it in studio.

19. Alvin Lee, Can’t Stop . . . Nice groove tune from the late great Ten Years After axeman, issued on his 1981 album RX5 under the moniker of The Alvin Lee Band.

20. Black Sabbath, Into The Void . . . There’s the Tony Iommi guitar riffs, Geezer Butler bass lines and Bill Ward drumming that hit you on, especially, the early Black Sabbath stuff like this one from 1971’s Master Of Reality album. Then on some songs in particular, like Into The Void, there’s Ozzy Osbourne’s vocals, often coming in seemingly sideways from parts unknown is how I’d describe it. Creepily effective.

A tribute set to guitarist/singer/songwriter Dickey Betts of The Allmans Brothers Band fame, who died last Thursday, April 18, at age 80. All songs written and/or sung by Betts, credited as Richard Betts on his first solo album, 1974’s Highway Call. My track-by-track tales follow the bare-bones list.

1. The Dickey Betts Band, Rock Bottom
2. The Allman Brothers Band, Nobody Knows
3. The Allman Brothers Band, Blue Sky
4. The Allman Brothers Band, Revival
5. Dickey Betts & Great Southern, Bougainvillea
6. The Allman Brothers Band, Pony Boy
7. The Allman Brothers Band, Louisiana Lou and Three Card Monty John
8. The Allman Brothers Band, Les Brers In A Minor
9. The Allman Brothers Band, Pegasus
10. The Allman Brothers Band, Seven Turns
11. Richard Betts, Hand Picked
12. The Allman Brothers Band, No One To Run With
13. The Allman Brothers Band, Southbound
14. The Allman Brothers Band, High Falls
15. Richard Betts, Long Time Gone
16. The Allman Brothers Band, Can’t Take It With You
17. The Allman Brothers Band, In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed (from Play All Night: Live at the Beacon Theatre 1992)

My track-by-track tales:

1. The Dickey Betts Band, Rock Bottom . . . Appropriately titled rocker from Betts’ 1988 album Pattern Disruptive which brought Warren Haynes, Betts’ guitar foil on the record, into The Allman Brothers Band family. Haynes later joined the Allmans, with Betts quoted in a book on the band, One Way Out, as saying that with Haynes, he achieved a level of guitar interplay he had once shared with Duane Allman in the early days of the Brothers. Speaking of Duane Allman, the ace axeman was once quoted as saying about Betts: “I’m the famous guitarist, but Dickey’s the good one.” They were both amazing, of course. Drummer Matt Abts, part of the Betts band on Pattern Disruptive, later co-founded Gov’t Mule with Haynes and that Allmans offshoot continues to this day.

2. The Allman Brothers Band, Nobody Knows . . . From the latter-day version of the Allmans, featuring Haynes. A 10-minute piece from 1991’s Shades Of Two Worlds album, it’s yet another example of the Allmans’ magic – they can go on for 10, 20 minutes (just wait until later in the set) or more and it’s never boring. As their longtime producer Tom Dowd was once quoted as saying, and it really applied to all versions of the band: “Here was a rock and roll band playing blues in the jazz vernacular.” Perfectly put.

3. The Allman Brothers Band, Blue Sky . . . From 1972’s Eat A Peach, Betts’ love song to his Indigenous Canadian girlfriend, Sandy “Bluesky” Wabegijig, whom he would later marry, on of his five marriages. It was Betts’ first lead vocal performance on an Allman Brothers Band record. He originally wanted Gregg Allman, who had handled all lead vocals to that point, to sing it but was encouraged by Duane Allman to do the honors. Duane Allman’s playing on the song was one of his last performances with the band before he was killed in a motorcycle accident. Betts, well known for his many instrumental compositions with the Allmans, went on to sing many of their songs including of course Ramblin’ Man and latter day classics like Seven Turns, which I get to later in the set.

4. The Allman Brothers Band, Revival . . . The first solo songwriting credit for Betts on an Allmans album, their second studio effort, Idlewild South, released in November, 1970. It’s got that typical country-esque boogie beat inherent in many of Betts’ songs. It was also the first Allmans song to chart, albeit only making No. 92 on Billboard’s top 100.

5. Dickey Betts & Great Southern, Bougainvillea . . . Beautiful ballad/jam from Betts’ second solo album and first one co-credited to his band Great Southern. Among the players on the record are ‘Dangerous Dan’ Toler, who later joined the Allman Brothers Band for the 1979-82 period albums Enlightened Rogues, Reach For The Sky and Brothers of the Road as well as playing on Gregg Allman’s solo albums I’m No Angel and Just Before The Bullets Fly. At the top of the set, I mentioned Warren Haynes coming into the Allmans’ family via his association with Betts starting with Betts’ Pattern Disruptive album and Toler is another example typical of the Allman Brothers through their various breakups and reunions and configurations: new seeds were often planted and the branches from the parent band continued to interact and collaborate in one way or another, throughout.

6. The Allman Brothers Band, Pony Boy . . . Funky, acoustic country blues from the Brothers and Sisters album which featured Betts’ signature Allmans’ tune, Ramblin’ Man. The album was part of a period where, following the deaths of founding guitarist Duane Allman and bassist Berry Oakley, Betts assumed a huge leadership role in the band alongside Gregg Allman. He became a major songwriting contributor and, for Brothers and Sisters and its followup studio album Win, Lose or Draw – aside from occasional session players before Toler was recruited for Enlightened Rogues – Betts was the Allmans’ lone guitarist.

7. The Allman Brothers Band, Louisiana Lou and Three Card Monty John . . . A jaunty Betts-penned tune from the critically-panned 1975 album Win, Lose or Draw which even the band members themselves didn’t much like, as the band was in tatters by that point, before its first breakup. To quote drummer Butch Trucks: “Everyone was into getting f*cked up and f*cking. We were into being rock stars and the music became secondary. When we heard the finished music, we were all embarrassed.”

Gregg Allman: “Win, Lose or Draw was a perfect reflection of our situation in 1975. It was basically all over with the Allman Brothers Band.”

Yet . . . as with all great bands, the album wasn’t nearly as bad as reviewed, even by the players who made it. My opinion. It’s just that it may have not measured up to previous higher standards as determined by, who, exactly, given that any and every assessment in art is subjective. I maintain that quality bands don’t do bad albums. They do great ones, and less great ones or, at worst, average ones that lesser bands would consider their best work. The Rolling Stones and Dirty Work, for example. But that’s just me. Anyway, Win, Lose or Draw has its gems like the Muddy Waters cover Can’t Lose What You Never Had, the title cut written by Gregg Allman and this one, nice piano by Chuck Leveall coupled with Betts’ typically lyrical guitar, plus a long Betts instrumental, High Falls, that’s often overlooked among the great Betts instrumentals but I get to later in the set.

8. The Allman Brothers Band, Les Brers In A Minor . . Another epic Betts instrumental, this one from the studio portions of the half live, half studio 1972 album Eat A Peach, the last Allmans album on which Duane Allman played, although not on this track, before his death.

9. The Allman Brothers Band, Pegasus . . . Another Betts composition where words aren’t necessary. From Enlightened Rogues.

10. The Allman Brothers Band, Seven Turns . . . Title cut from the reunion album issued in 1990 and one of my all-time favorite Allmans tunes. Beautifully sung and played by Betts but what ‘makes’ it for me, and others in the band, and this is the magic of a band of brothers, is when Gregg Allman comes in on backup vocals with the “somebody’s callin’ your name’ refrain. From the book One Way Out, guitarist Warren Haynes describes how it came about, by happy accident: “Dickey, Johnny Neel (piano, keyboards, synthesizer) and I were working on the three-part harmony stuff for Seven Turns in the studio hallway and Gregg was in the lounge shooting pool. As we rehearsed the ‘somebody’s calling your name’ part, I heard Gregg answer it. I don’t even know if he did it on purpose. It wasn’t like he said “hey, check this out.” He was just singing along to what he heard us doing as he shot pool. And I said, ‘hey, listen to that. This is what we need.’ It was all very coincidental and it became one of the pinnacles of the tune, when Gregg comes in on the anwer vocal at the end of the song.”

11. Richard Betts, Hand Picked . . . Hand pickin’ indeed. Fourteen minutes of western swing, toe-tapping rockabilly instrumental from Betts’ first solo album, Highway Call, 1974, featuring fiddle player legend Vassar Clements.

12. The Allman Brothers Band, No One To Run With . . . Bo Diddley beat tune sung by Gregg Allman, originally written for a Betts solo project but shelved until polished and released on the Allmans’ 1994 studio album Where It All Begins.

13. The Allman Brothers Band, Southbound . . . Up-tempo, swinging tune from Brothers and Sisters.

14. The Allman Brothers Band, High Falls . . . Seemingly almost forgotten, or overlooked, among the band’s acclaimed instrumentals it’s nevertheless a quality composition and a centerpiece of the Win, Lose or Draw album.

15. Richard Betts, Long Time Gone . . . A Ramblin’ Man-like tune from his first solo album, Highway Call.

16. The Allman Brothers Band, Can’t Take It With You . . . Co-written by Betts and actor/sometime musician Don Johnson of Miami Vice TV show fame. From 1979’s Enlightened Rogues album. Could have been a Lynyrd Skynyrd track as it’s very much, to my ears anyway, in that style.

17. The Allman Brothers Band, In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed (from Play All Night: Live at the Beacon Theatre 1992) . . . Elizabeth Reed was the name on a tombstone Betts used to disguise a song to a girlfriend of his who was cheating on her man at the time. The original studio version appeard on the second Allmans studio album, Idlewild South, 1970, and became more well known via the live interpretation on the band’s breakthrough album At Fillmore East. But while it may seem sacrilegious in that I’ve played nothing from that seminal live album in this set, anyone who knows the Allmans knows that album and that version. Instead, I’m going with this mind-blowing 21-minute take on the tune from the latter day Warren Haynes version of the band, proving Betts’ contention that he and Haynes approached the levels of Betts and Duane Allman. The rest of the band ain’t bad, either. Only one original member left now, given Betts’ passing, that being Jai Johanny Johanson, born John Lee Johnson but best known as Jaimoe, drummer and percussionist, age 79 at this writing.

My track-by-track tales follow the bare-bones list.

1. David Bowie, Station To Station
2. Deep Purple, Fools
3. Janis Joplin, Move Over
4. The Rolling Stones, Down The Road Apiece
5. ZZ Top, Manic Mechanic
6. Humble Pie, Earth And Water Song
7. David + David, Being Alone Together
8. Styx, Miss America
9. Pearl Jam, Crazy Mary
10. The Beatles, Cry Baby Cry
11. Bob Dylan, Baby Stop Crying
12. Santana, Hope You’re Feeling Better
13. Paul McCartney/Wings, Don’t Let It Bring You Down
14. Carole King, Corazon
15. Steve Miller Band, Journey From Eden
16. The Tragically Hip, Eldorado
17. Neil Young, Eldorado
18. Van Halen, Cabo Wabo
19. Billy Joel, Stiletto
20. KC and The Sunshine Band, Boogie Shoes
21. Joe Walsh/Barnstorm, Mother Says
22. Jack Bruce, Never Tell Your Mother She’s Out Of Tune
23. Warren Zevon, My Ride’s Here

My track-by-track tales:

1. David Bowie, Station To Station . . . Enter a new, at the time, Bowie persona, the Thin White Duke, on this epic opener, the title cut to his 1976 album which represented the start of his transition towards his Berlin period of the albums Low, Heroes and Lodger.

2. Deep Purple, Fools . . . I remember when Nirvana broke big with the Nevermind album, hit single Smells Like Teen Spirit and all of that and I like Nirvana and that album and the whole Seattle scene, but some journalism critics who either should have known better or were ridiculously not well-read, musically speaking, went agog about Nirvana’s soft to hard transitions (not so much within that hit single but throughout the album it came from) within songs . . . and the rest of us were thinking, uh, ever hear Fools by Deep Purple, from 1971 (20-plus years earlier) or much of Led Zeppelin or who knows how many other bands, Jethro Tull an example, with myriad within song changes, etc?

3. Janis Joplin, Move Over . . . The song that arguably got me into Janis Joplin, and she was already gone, sadly, by the time of its release in early 1971; she died in October, 1970. My sister had the Pearl album, so I heard this a lot and yet again I thank my older brother and sister, by 8 and 4 years, respectively, for introducing their younger sibling to so much great music and charting at least part of my musical course. Although it’s a well-known track, or at least has come to be well known, and one written by Joplin herself (many of her hits were covers) Move Over perhaps surprisingly was not released as a single from Pearl, although it’s found its way to various compilations over the years and deservedly so. And what (another) a great name for a Joplin band: she went from Big Brother and The Holding Company to The Kozmic Blues Band to her Canadian backup band on Pearl, the Full Tilt Boogie Band.

4. The Rolling Stones, Down The Road Apiece . . . Boogie woogie early Stones written by American songwriter Don Raye. The Stones put it on their 1965 UK album The Rolling Stones No. 2, released in January, and it came out that same year on the US release The Rolling Stones, Now! back in the days when US labels bastardized releases by UK bands like the Stones and Beatles with different track listings, including singles that were never put on albums in the UK, etc. The Stones played the track on selected shows on their 1981 tour.

5. ZZ Top, Manic Mechanic . . . From ZZ Top’s 1979 album Deguello which featured hits like Cheap Sunglasses and I Thank You plus well-known songs I’m Bad I’m Nationwide. The album is front-to-back good in my opinion but I have a soft spot for this one because when my two boys were young, and getting into the music I was listening to, we formed an air guitar band and this was one of our songs. Eldest son was the singer, I was the guitarist, youngest son played drums although sometimes he and I would switch. As things have played out in reality, eldest son can play most instruments, particularly guitar, has recorded and done gigs beyond his ‘day job’, youngest dabbled in drums, I tried guitar, too lazy and unfocused to continue so I listen instead and do a radio show DJ gig.

6. Humble Pie, Earth And Water Song . . . A mostly pastoral, beautiful piece, heavy in spots, written by Peter Frampton for the Pie’s 1970 album, the band’s third, simply titled Humble Pie.

7. David + David, Being Alone Together . . . What might have been? But people go in different directions, as Davids Baerwald and Ricketts did following the release of their one and only collaboration as a duo, the 1986 arguably somewhat obscure album Boomtown although it was something of a hit at the time. It’s brilliant. I cite it and play it often, it introduced me to Baerwald’s occasional catalog since, while Ricketts went into, mostly, music production. Both guys worked with Sheryl Crow on her 1993 debut album Tuesday Night Music Club.

8. Styx, Miss America . . . Not major into Styx, got into them more, as I did with KISS, via my younger brother by 5 years who was a big fan of both bands during the 1970s. But, I will say, I like this rocking tune, a rival to Prelude 12/Suite Madame Blue as my favorite Styx track. It’s been misinterpreted over time, as it’s actually about writer James Young’s wife’s battle with an incurable disease. Miss America

9. Pearl Jam, Crazy Mary . . . From a tribute covers album of Victoria Williams songs, 1993’s Sweet Relief: A Benefit for Victoria Williams, who was stricken with multiple sclerosis. Williams, who at last look is still with us despite her ongoing health issues, does backing vocals on the song. It’s one of Pearl Jam’s finest performances, in my estimation. The album led to the creation of the Sweet Relief Musician’s Fund, a non-profit charity that provides funds from which professional musicians with medical care or financial needs can draw. There have since been two more such compilations. Among those performing on the various albums were Lou Reed, Smashing Pumpkins, R.E.M., The Jayhawks, Jackson Browne, k.d. lang and Rickie Lee Jones.

10. The Beatles, Cry Baby Cry . . . Most people know the band well enough that finding ‘deep cuts’ can be a challenge. This one’s from The White Album. To me, it’s in the vein of great John Lennon songs on that album, along with I’m So Tired and Happiness Is A Warm Gun, with Cry Baby Cry having the additional ‘oomph’ of Paul McCartney’s Can You Take Me Back coda.

11. Bob Dylan, Baby Stop Crying . . . “You been down to the bottom with a bad man, babe. But you’re back where you belong. Go get me my pistol, babe” . . . and as always with Dylan, his vocal intonations, as on this one from 1978’s Street-Legal, are the ‘thing’. People who say he can’t sing don’t get it; he’s the best Bob Dylan singer there could ever be.

12. Santana, Hope You’re Feeling Better . . . Among my favorites from Santana, a rocking cut from Abraxas; I figured it fit in well with the previous series of people crying and, hopefully, recovered from whatever trauma brought the tears on.

13. Paul McCartney/Wings, Don’t Let It Bring You Down . . . Celtic-type track co-written with Denny Laine, from the London Town album, 1978.

14. Carole King, Corazon . . . Funky, maybe uncharacteristic but intoxicating stuff from King’s 1973 album Fantasy.

15. Steve Miller Band, Journey From Eden . . . From the tail end of Miller’s earlier, psychedelic, bluesy period, a seven-album stretch starting in 1968, before he became a commercial hits machine via albums The Joker, Fly Like An Eagle and Book of Dreams. This is from his 1972 album Recall The Beginning . . . A Journey From Eden. A year later came The Joker and widespread commercial success. And I send this one out to a friend who has been mentioning Miller to me recently.

16. The Tragically Hip, Eldorado . . .

“And tired of thinking ’bout drinking
For thinking of drinking
While thinking ’bout drinking
And thinking ’bout drinking
It’s man-sized inside”

From the Hip album Fully Completely.

17. Neil Young, Eldorado . . . Same title as the Hip song, different song. Spanish guitar showcase, and other things, from Young’s 1989 album Freedom.

18. Van Halen, Cabo Wabo . . . If you like drinking, you like this line: “We drink Mescal right from the bottle. Salt shaker, little lick a lime, oh” . . . Sammy Hagar of Van Hagar fame still going strong, a rich man not just from music but via his Cabo Wabo bar, whiskeys, etc.

19. Billy Joel, Stiletto . . . Why this funky groove, my favorite on the album, wasn’t a single from 1978’s 52nd Street is beyond me but in the end I’m glad because it therefore qualifies as a deep cut which is my show’s raison d’etre.

20. KC and The Sunshine Band, Boogie Shoes . . . Guilty pleasure track, occurred to me out of the blue as a tie-in with Billy Joel’s. Stiletto shoes, you know, etc. An interesting maybe instance of a song being an album track, on KC’s self-titled 1975 album which featured the big hits That’s The Way ( I Like It) and Get Down Tonight then later, via the Saturday Night Fever movie soundtrack, becoming a hit.

21. Joe Walsh/Barnstorm, Mother Says . . . From the first album, 1972’s Barnstorm, Walsh did after leaving the James Gang. It was the first album recorded at Caribou Ranch, built by James William Guercio, best known as the producer on Chicago’s first eleven studio albums. Chicago recorded five albums there while Elton John named his 1974 album Caribou after the studio, where he also recorded Captain Fantastic and The Brown Dirt Cowboy and Rock Of The Westies.

22. Jack Bruce, Never Tell Your Mother She’s Out Of Tune . . . Up tempo jazz all over the place excellence from the former Cream member’s 1969 debut solo album Songs For A Tailor.

23. Warren Zevon, My Ride’s Here . . . Jesus, John Wayne, Shelley, Keats, all in one song . . . Zevon’s way with lyrics was arguably unparalleled. The music’s good, too. Title cut from his 2002 album, as I ride on out of another show.