Lisa Denton and Barry Courter
BARRY COURTER: Lisa, we are entering one of the busiest and best stretches of the year if you like lots of music. It’s especially great for us ink-stained wretch types who enjoy writing about it. Between Riverbend in downtown Chattanooga and Bonnaroo up in Manchester, Tenn., there will be more than 200 acts playing music in our region over the next two weeks. What’s not to love about that?
LISA DENTON: The only thing not to love is trying to get to multiple acts at the same time – and different cities if you’re deciding between the two festivals. I’ve loaned out my Riverbend admission bracelets before if I wasn’t interested in the headliner, then discovered there was a show on a side stage I would have enjoyed.
Not to get all maudlin, but Friday would have been Gregg Allman’s show at the Tivoli. May he rest in peace.
BARRY: Yeah, it’s been a tough week or so at my house. He’d been sick, so it wasn’t a surprise to anybody, but the Allman Brothers Band has been on regular spin at my house for decades. It’s my wife’s favorite band, and the one I play when she tires of hearing My Morning Jacket or Bassnectar.
I had a great conversation with Don Felder last week about the Allman Brothers, Gregg and Duane – actually two conversations, since one was interrupted by a fire drill here at the paper, but he was super cool to call back. Felder, the former Eagles guitarist who will play Riverbend on Saturday, actually learned to play slide guitar from Duane. He told me the brothers and their bands used to soundly thump his groups in battle-of-the-bands competitions around Florida when they were coming up. When it comes to name-dropping, Felder might win in the “My Early Years” category. He taught Tom Petty guitar, and Stephen Stills was in one of his early bands.