How does this release differ from The Fillmore Concerts, the expanded edition released in '92?

Hi Dave, excellent question. The only diffeence I can see is the addition of "Midnight Rider" and a slightly different order on Disc 1. It has also been remastered and there is a new booklet with a new essay. If you already have the '92 release, may not be worth the price.

Interesting. I only wish the post title were bit more literal.

Yes, perhaps I was a bit glib. It's remarkable that the band has been able to carry on with quite a bit of success for 30 years after they lost not one but two key members within a year. Who knows what that band may have accomplished.

I often think of Hendrix the same way, but on the other hand, I wonder how he could have topped EL and some his other stuff. But on the other other hand...

As for the Allmans, maybe they had several more in store...

The tragic difference between the Allman deaths and many of the others of the era (and since for that matter is that they were both accidents, not the seemingly inevitable result of a drug habit or regular binging, etc. You could argue that with Hendrix and Joplin, Morrison, Elvis, Cobain, etc that it was just a matter of time.

this record is quickly becoming the Kind Of Blue of rock music...let's see how many times have i bought it?.....

Mark, I know what you mean, but this seems to be the logical extension of it. All the songs recorded at the Fillmore shows are now in one place (well, there may be more, but they must have fatal flaws), in a very nice package, for a reasonable price.

oh yea, i didn't mean to implying that i wasn't gonna buy it...far from it. five years from now they'll put out another version with outtakes of greg allman bitching out a roadie about his setup...i'll probably buy that too.

you're a doomed music romantic

yep.

"He made everyone in the band better... and especially inspired fellow guitarist Dickey Betts to his greatest recorded work."

Not to mention inspiring Eric Clapton to his greatest recorded work. Patti Boyd may have been the primary inspiration, but without Duane pushing EC to his considerable limits, Layla might have been just another ol' album.

Couldn't agree more, the high point of Clapton's career, a high point in rock history, and the end of an era - Clapton has never been the same, Allman was gone shortly thereafter, the Beatles were gone, the '60s were gone.

I never saw what the big deal was about D & the D's except for "Layla".

I have enough other A-Bros stuff that I still have to get, so I think I'll give this set a pass.

Oh Dave, oh Dave, the album Layla is deep and wide as the ocean, the song "Layla" is just the centerpiece. It is a run through blues history as filtered through two of the greatest guitarists ever, at their most profound and mystical. And Clapton really sings.

Please listen to it again: the band is incredible, Bobby Whitlock's keys and background vocals are a moon unto themselves, and the album is a universe. You know what's what, just check it out again.

Clapton really, really goddam annoys the bejesus out of me- yet even I have to agree that the Derek and the Dominoes album is the shiznit.

The last cut of Layla, Thorn Tree in the Garden, serves as a marvelous musical counterpoint to the hard-driving blues-rock of the rest of the album. It defines the Dominoes as well as the title cut does.

Seems to me that the music of Clapton is like black licorice - people either love it or hate it - there's no middle ground.

There are also two very distinct phases to Clapton's career: before and after Layla.

Indeed, there are those who love pre-Layla Clapton and can't abide post-Layla Clapton. No doubt there are those who prefer post-Layla Clapton to pre-Layla Clapton. I trust that number is a small one.

I assume most of us can agree on "Layla"'s deserved status as a masterpiece. And this music fan (who prefers early Clapton) believes Layla and Ohter Love Songs is damned fine, even magical, from beginning to end.

right on Nat, your taste is phat

I think lumping Clapton's career into two phases is a bit overly simplistic. Bluesbreakers with Clapton were not Yardbirds were not Cream were not Dominoes were not Blind Faith, and comparing two albums post-Layla, say 461 Ocean Blvd. to Money and Cigarettes, or Slowhand to From the Cradle, is like comparing apples and tire irons.

Perhaps, but there was a fundamental change that happened in and around Layla - he went into a heroin fog for like two years after the Layla tour and didn't come out until 461, which is a very nice album, but as if from a completely different artist. Looks like I'll have to post something on this.

>>Bluesbreakers with Clapton were not Yardbirds were not Cream were not Dominoes were not Blind Faith

Indeed. But all were excellent and adventuous (well, save BF), but all, even BF had their moments of transcendence.

>>comparing two albums post-Layla, say 461 Ocean Blvd. to Money and Cigarettes, or Slowhand to From the Cradle, is like comparing apples and tire irons.

Perhaps. But I have to side with Eric: The artist who created them all was a changed man from his previous incarnation.

Point conceded - there is a paradigm shift induced by his heroin fog.

In my litany about his pre-Dominoes bands, I neglected to mention the band that was largely responsible for the lineup on Layla - Delaney and Bonnie and Friends, in which he retreated from the God image that had been painted for him and hung out behind the stacks. Delaney and Bonnie was where the fundamental shift from frontman to anonymity began, prior to his disappearance following the Dominoes.

I'm afraid I have to admit it - I am a Clapton fan, both pre- and post-Layla. With the exception of Money and Cigarettes, I really enjoy almost all of his stuff.

I'm not real big on August or Pilgrim either, now that I think about it. These things come to me just after I hit the Post button.

T, good point, but still all pre-Layla work was done in a very "loud" sort of anonymity. If you think about it, the process is actually the reverse: he played in various bands and shared the spotlight with Mayall, Yardbirds, Cream, D&B (he was a "friend"), Blind Faith, even D&D was under an assumed name and was definitely a group. It wasn't until after all this that he became the solo artist, and, ironically, "retreated" as you put it.

And Natalie, yes, I certainly agree with your assessment of Layla as a masterpiece. It remains my second-favorite album of all time, though it is not one I listen to all that frequently.

Both the album that's the topic of this post and "Layla..." are favs of mine. I even enjoy the Dominoes+Allmans jams on disc two of the Layla boxed set.

How would you rate the mix on the new deluxe edition of Fillmore?

I don't know if anyone uses this anymore to post comments, but I have a question since you all seem to be knowledgeable fans. I am a huge Clapton and Allman Bros fan, and I have been searching for videos of the Allman Bros as well as video of Derek & the Dominos. Does anybody know of a video with Clapton and Duane?

i've been listening to the allman brothers since
1974, when duane didnot play slide i cant tell him and dickey apart. who took the first solo on
whipping post?how can you tell them apart?