Photo Credit: Kirk West Photography. Allman Brothers Band performing at the Beacon Theatre on October 28, 2014.
Forty-five years into their historic run, The Allman Brother Band took the stage for their final concert on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2014, at New York’s Beacon Theatre. They used their layered history as the night’s reflective backbone while working through various tracks that supported their historic place as jam innovators and improvisational guides. The forthcoming set will mark 10 years since the famed live show, and has been remastered to mark the momentous anniversary.
Dubbed Final Concert 10-28-14, the impending release via Peach Records captures original members: founders Gregg Allman (Hammond B-3 organ, piano, acoustic guitar, vocals), Jaimoe (drums) and Butch Trucks (drums, tympani), along with longtime rock aids Warren Haynes (lead and slide guitar, vocals), Derek Trucks (lead and slide guitar), Marc Quinones (congas, percussion, vocals) and Oteil Burbridge (bass, vocals).
Before the final show, the band had habitually returned to the revered Big Apple venue. After commencing the trend of annual location appearances in 1989, they set a Broadway record with 237 consecutive sold-out shows. “We’re spreading a religion here,” Duane Allman once said of the concert location and its inspired effect.
To set apart the 2014 conclusion, Haynes was tasked with mulling over the band’s massive catalog and culminating a three-set concert to celebrate ABB’s historic run, with particular care when pulling choice covers amid originals.
The night provided fans with 30 songs, pulled for six records ranging from the acoustic instrumentals of the Duane Allman-penned “Little Martha” before an intensified lean into “Mountain Jam.” The night coursed much more from “Midnight Rider” to “Blue Sky,” “Statesboro Blues,” “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” and other fortified favorites.
As the evening began to wind down, a tender “Melissa” preluded a return to “Mountain Jam” before a bounce over to “Will the Circle be Unbroken,” a song that this particular iteration of the group had never played. “Whipping Post” assisted in showcasing the group’s combined prowess before Butch Trucks spoke to the audience: “We’re going to bookend the Allman Brothers Band…end it with the song we started with,” settling into one final song: “Trouble No More.”
“Having joined the Allman Brothers Band in 1991, I had no idea what I was getting myself into as a percussionist joining two drummers on stage,” percussionist Marc Quinones reflects via press release. “Fast forward 23 years to the last show we played as the Allman Brothers Band. I feel honored to have been part of such a historical musical force that was and is the ABB. Love live the ABB!”
Notably, the concert closed in the early hours of Oct. 29, 43 years to the day of Duane Allman’s tragic passing. Now, 10 years after the history night in New York, fans of the band can cop a remastered set of The Allman Brothers Band’s final show. The box set features a special 3-CD package with an extensive 16-page booklet featuring exclusive photos and liner notes on November 22. It will be available digitally on October 25.
Scroll down to view the three-part tracking list.
Track listing for Final Concert 10-28-14:
Disc 1:
- Little Martha
- Mountain Jam
- Don’t Want You No More
- It’s Not My Cross To Bear
- One Way Out
- Good Morning Little School Girl
- Midnight Rider
- The High Cost of Low Living
- Hot ‘Lanta
- Blue Sky
- You Don’t Love Me/ Soul Serenade/ You Don’t Love Me
Disc 2:
- Statesboro Blues
- Ain’t Wasting Time
- Black Hearted Woman
- The Sky Is Crying
- Dreams
- Don’t Keep Me Wonderin’
- In Memory of Elizabeth Reed
- JaMaBuBu
- In Memory of Elizabeth Reed (reprise)
Disc 3:
- Melissa
- Revival
- Southbound
- Mountain Jam Reprise
- Will The Circle Be Unbroken
- Mountain Jam Reprise 2
- Whipping Post
- Farewell Message
- Trouble No More