The road goes on forever
There was one Thanksgiving growing up that my momma either thought more people were coming to dinner, or there was a crazy sale on turkey at the grocery store, or she saw the opportunity to cook one meal that would feed the family for the next few weeks.
Whatever the original plan was, we ended up eating turkey in every form imaginable over the course of the next few weeks. It started with leftover Thanksgiving dinner, which was awesome the first few times. Then turkey sandwiches. Then turkey burritos. Then something she called “turkette,” which was was essentially shredded turkey in some type of broth. In short, I don’t recall eating turkey for at least a year after those harrowing weeks of turkey over-ingestion.
Honestly, I may not even have touched the turkey at next year’s Thanksgiving. It’s worth noting that a growing boy can, in fact, grow tired of a food that he loves.
Over the years, the Allman Brothers Band evoked a similar feeling for me. I’ve accepted the fact that I will hear “Midnight Rider” at least once a week — whether I like it or not. That’s not a diss. It’s just a fact. It was a great song the first million times I heard it. It still is a great song.
Macon, in all of her glory, has a tendency to over mythologize (and over play) a handful of artists who called this area home. There’s no discounting the ABB’s influence on music, race relations, even politics (they helped raise funds and awareness for a “simple” peanut farmer from Plains who was trying to run for president). Music-wise, “Live at Fillmore East” is one of the best live records ever made. Done. Discussion over.
Seeing the rippling effects of Gregg’s death all over the world has been a stinging reminder that this band meant a lot to many people. I don’t have any Gregg stories, but I know that plenty of people around here do. Some of them are even true.
On Saturday, fans, friends and family lined the streets from Snow’s Memorial Chapel to Gregg’s final resting place in Rose Hill Cemetery, where he joined his biological brother, Duane, and his brother in music, Berry Oakley. While this occasion was both a time to mourn and to celebrate Gregg’s legacy, it should also be a time to reflect on Macon and its long standing relationship with music as a whole.
Macon was important enough to Gregg to make Rose Hill the venue for his grand finale. Let’s continue to work as a community to celebrate musicians — past, present and future — to prove to him that his end of life celebration wasn’t the end of an era, but a continuation of one.
The road does indeed go on forever. Let’s work together to be sure it’s maintained.
Chris Nylund is a founding member of Field Note Stenographers, a collective of local musicians who write about shows in Middle Georgia. He likes books without pictures, good music and playing a variety of instruments with varying degrees of success. Contact him at fieldnotestenographers@gmail.com.
This story was originally published June 7, 2017 at 3:10 PM with the headline "The road goes on forever."