Guitarists Warren Haynes and Derek Trucks lower themselves gently into the Allman Brothers’ final farewell at New York’s Beacon Theatre on 28 October 2014, conscious that they are beginning a four-and-a-half-hour show. After the sweet instrumental Little Martha and an abridged four-minute Mountain Jam (an eighth of the length the band could muster back in the day) they launch into track one, side one of the band’s self-titled 1969 debut, Don’t Want You No More, and the show is up and running.
Haynes and Trucks effortlessly recreate the searing guitar lines that Duane Allman and Dickey Betts made the cornerstone of the band’s sound. The other elements, like the dual drummer plus percussionist that kept up a rolling thunder behind the guitars and Gregg Allman’s plaintive keyboards and vocals, are still intact.
