Gregg Allman
Gregory Lenoir Allman (born December 8, 1947 in Nashville, Tennessee), known as Gregg Allman (sometimes spelled Greg Allman), is a rock and blues singer, keyboardist, and songwriter, best known as a founding member of The Allman Brothers Band.
Early years
Raised in Daytona, Florida along with his older brother Duane Allman, Gregg took an interest in the guitar before Duane did. But while Duane would soon become the superior guitarist, Gregg focussed more on vocals. Little Milton was one of his favorite singers to listen to.
Allman Joys and Hour Glass
In the mid- to late-1960s, the Allmans played in a series of bands including The Escorts and Allman Joys, mostly gigging around their native American Southeast. Toward the end of the decade, The Allman Joys relocated to Los Angeles, California, and were signed to Liberty Records, which renamed them the Hour Glass. Strongly controlled by the label, the group produced a pair of psychedelic blues albums. All the players were deeply dissatisfied with the results; Duane Allman in particular spoke bitterly of the Hour Glass's output.
Formation of The Allman Brothers Band
After its second album, Hour Glass broke up and Duane Allman returned to the South, playing sessions at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. In time, he would put together the group that would become The Allman Brothers Band - Duane and Dickey Betts on guitars, Berry Oakley on bass, and Butch Trucks and Jai Johanny "Jaimoe" Johanson on drums. Liberty Records believed that Gregg Allman had potential as a solo act, and allowed the rest of the Hour Glass to go on condition that he stay in California to record for them. Gregg quickly grew miserable with this arrangement, and when Duane called from Jacksonville, Florida in March 1969 to say that he had assembled a band that needed a singer, Gregg jumped at the opportunity. He had long wanted to play the Hammond Organ, and was given one immediately upon joining the band, which he had to learn to play in a hurry; the style he developed has been compared to that of Jimmy Smith. He has played the Hammond B-3 and handled much of the lead vocal and songwriting duties for the band (when it has been together), along with occasional piano and guitar contributions, ever since.
Solo efforts
His fame will always be primarily linked to The Allman Brothers Band, but beginning in the mid-1970s, Gregg Allman carved out a solo career. His first album, Laid Back, was released in 1973 to a positive critical reception. It included a couple of reworked Allman Brothers songs, such as a horn-laden, swampy version of "Midnight Rider" (one of the band's most famous songs) that made it to #19 on the Billboard singles chart, and originals like "Queen of Hearts", which Allman and the band felt did not quite fit the Allman Brothers sound. There are also a few cover songs on the record, such as the traditional "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?" and an acclaimed take on former California roommate Jackson Browne's morose classic "These Days".
Allman's solo career has continued intermittently throughout the subsequent decades, sometimes touring when the Allman Brothers Band is off the road. Generally, these solo efforts - first with the Gregg Allman Band, and later with Gregg Allman & Friends - eschew lengthy guitar solos and cast Allman more in the mode of his favorite soul singers. The bands often include a horn section and are more groove-oriented. The template of mixing originals with reworked Allman Brothers songs and covers of blues, R&B, and soul classics remains in place.
Allman's biggest hit single came in 1986 with "I'm No Angel", from the album of the same name. The song's production is overly slick, as befits the time it was recorded, but it is in a sense a more radio-friendly take on a prideful blues boast, which he has always done well. It fits with Allman's persona as a singer, although he did not write the song (other stand-outs on the album include "Can't Keep Running" and "Lead Me On").
As an actor Gregg had roles in the films Rush Week (1989) and Rush (1991). Allman makes a brief, speaking cameo in the Family Guy episode "Let's Go the the Hop".
The blond, blue-eyed Allman struggled with drugs both legal and illegal, primarily cocaine, heroin, and alcohol, from the 1970s onward. But the six-one singer is sober as of the mid-1990s and has often spoken in interviews of being revitalized and enjoying life again. Not surprisingly, his output and the quality of his vocals have improved with sobriety. He continues to tour every year with both The Allman Brothers Band, which in 2003 released its first studio album in nearly a decade, and Gregg Allman & Friends.
Personal life
Allman has been married at least six times, most infamously to singer/actress Cher from 1975 to 1979, a relationship that gave Gregg more general celebrity than he ever had as a musician. Together, they had a son, Elijah Blue Allman, who grew up to become a musician as well. Gregg and Cher even tried an unlikely musical collaboration, releasing the album Two the Hard Way (billed as Allman and Woman) in 1977. It was universally panned and has long since been out of print.
Gregg was linked to Shannon Wilsey (who was later to be known as porn actress Savannah) between 1986 to 1988, when he was 40 and she was 16, a relationship which apparently ended when she became pregnant at 18. (The pregnancy ended in a miscarriage.)
Gregg was married to wife Julie from 1979 to 1981; they had a daughter Delilah Island Allman. Gregg's son Devon Allman, from his first marriage to wife Shelley, is also a musician. Devon leads the band Honeytribe, and has appeared wih the Allman Brothers Band on a few occasions.
He married Stacey Fountain in 2001. They currently reside in Richmond Hill, Georgia.
Discography
Albums
- 1973 Laid Back
- 1974 Gregg Allman Tour (live)
- 1977 Two the Hard Way - Allman and Woman (Cher)
- 1977 Playin' Up a Storm
- 1987 I'm No Angel
- 1988 Just Before the Bullets Fly - The Gregg Allman Band
- 1997 Searching for Simplicity
- 2002 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection (compilation)
- 2002 No Stranger to the Dark: The Best of Gregg Allman (different compilation, with 3 new tracks)