The Allman Brothers Band by The Allman Brothers Band

The Allman Brothers Band is the debut studio album by American rock band the Allman Brothers Band. It was released in the United States by Atco Records and Capricorn Records on November 4, 1969 and produced by Adrian Barber. Formed in 1969, the Allman Brothers Band came together following various musical pursuits by each individual member. Following session work, Duane Allman moved to Jacksonville, Florida where he led large jam sessions with his new band, one he had envisioned as having two guitarists and two drummers. After rounding out the lineup with the addition of his brother, Gregg Allman, the band moved to Macon, Georgia, where they were to be one of the premiere acts on Capricorn. The album was recorded and mixed in two weeks at Atlantic Studios in New York City. Much of its material was premiered live over the preceding months and combines blues, jazz and country music to varying degrees. It includes re-workings of "Trouble No More" and "Don't Want You No More," as well as notable originals such as "Dreams", which highlighted the band's jazz influence, and "Whipping Post", which became a crowd favorite. Although the group was arranged to work with producer Tom Dowd (whose credits included Cream and John Coltrane), he was unavailable, and they instead recorded with house engineer Adrian Barber. The album's artwork was photographed in Macon and surrounding areas. The record initially received a poor commercial response, charting in the lower levels of Billboard's Top 200 Pop Albums chart. Despite this, the album received critical acclaim from publications such as Rolling Stone, who called it "subtle, and honest, and moving." Following the band's increased fame in the early 1970s, this album and its follow-up, Idlewild South (1970), were repackaged into the compilation album Beginnings. Owing to the band's dislike of Barber's original mix, their debut album was remixed by Tom Dowd. In 1973, Beginnings was certified gold for sales of 500,000 copies, according to the Recording Industry Association of America.In 2016 a Deluxe version of the album was released by Mercury Records that contained the "Original Stereo Mix by Adrian Barber" from 1969 and the “Beginnings” Stereo Mix by Tom Dowd from 1973.