Enlightened Rogues
Over at the notorious Allman Brothers Band website "Enlightened Rogues" gets very good press. The overzealous fanbase would have you believe that this over the top album was the perfect comeback for the band. Well, so much for their hyperbole. To my ears this is a slightly GOOFY album. If the later Arista Albums, "Reach for the Sky" and "Brothers of the Road" were quite bad, and they were then the slide started on "Enlightened Rogues". For certain the album is worth purchasing and their is a lot on the cd/record that reminds one of the old Allman Brothers Band. This album meant a lot to Gregg and Dickey, Butch and Jaimoe. They had broken up three years earlier. The band members were in dire straits financially and more so as a band. This was a make or break album. Well the truth is the band was just good enough to remind folks a lot of what the band had been. But again on this album the band had lineup changes. Lamar Williams was out and David "Rook" Goldflies was in. I don't know if Lamar was too sick to play or what. Lamar died some time in the 80's from cancer. He had been exposed to agent orange, a defoliant, in Vietnam and he had extensive cancer. Also very notably Chuck Leavell was out, so there was no keyboardist on this cd as on the last two albums. To replace Chuck it seems Danny Toler was brought in so the band would again have two guitarists in the band. This two guitar attack put the band back in the old lineup formation that the band lost with Duane Allman.
My favorite song on the record is Gregg's Can't Take It With You. There is a fine live performance of this song on a video from New Jersey from during this tour. "Crazy Love" is ok but it is certainly no Ramblin' Man and this is one song that is a bit bombastic or over the top. "Just Ain't Easy" is also easily one of the best Gregg penned songs on the record. Things get pretty goofy though on "Try It One More Time" where Dickey and Gregg go back and forth on vocals. The song is ok but lyrically it makes one wonder who the song is for? Was this song suppossed to be dedicated to women, to lost loves or to Gregg and Dickey and the band trying it again one more time. This song is just a bit dorky and silly, other than that the song is decent. "Pegasus" is an almost prissy instrumental put together by Dickey. It certainly was no In Memory of Elizabeth Reed or even High Falls. "Blind Love" shows Gregg trying real hard again vocally as on "Try it One More Time". "Need Your Love So Bad" is to my knowledge a cover of an old blues song but I'd have to look it up to see who wrote the song. The album closes with "Sail Away" a song Dickey wrote and sung. The song is ok but nothing too special.
All in all "Enlightened Rogues" is not a bad album at all. The problem is that the album also didn't pick up where the band left off. Truly "Win Lose or Draw" was not a full band effort but even that album has some of the real ABB magic going for it. The album was a half-assed project and Dickey and Gregg were off on little ego trips with all kinds of animosity flying around. In 1975 the ABB was not a happy bunch but they still were able to come out with an album that captured the essence of what the band was all about. "Enlightened Rogues" was a horse of a different color. This was not the lineup from 1975 or 1976. 1979 was the fourth incarnation of the Allman Brothers Band and it had been at the time the least of all of the lineups. That being said the five man band with Berry Oakley on bass never put an album of material together. All the five man band did was tour after Duane's death.
At best "Enlightened Rogues" stood as evidence of the greatness that had proceeded it. Yes, the Allman Brothers Band was back but this time they were trying to recapture the glory of old. The band put out a decent album, and perhaps in some ways the album was even better than say something like "Idlewild South" which has never been a favorite of mine. If "Idlewild South" was not a great album well at least it didn't showcase the band trying so hard to the point of being bombastic as on "Enlightened Rogues".
All in all though "Enlightened Rogues" is worth having and it shows that band at a critical point in time in their lives. And it is only too bad for the band and the fans that the ABB was not able to capture the magic of old. In about two more years after two really bad albums the band would call it quits for about 7 years.
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