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Dickey Betts

Highway Call

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by WillGilbert on 01/29/2006

Richard "Dickey" Betts was the country influence in the Allman Brothers Band; the one who wrote "Ramblin' Man" and "Blue Sky." This is his first solo album. Recorded in the Capricorn Records studios in Macon, it features a slew of great players. Steel, Dobro, boogie-down piano, Betts' signature harmonizing guitars, a super-tight rhythm section, and an amazing local group singing the backing vocals. Ol' Dickey takes a few lengthy solos, but they're so catchy that it never veers into jam-band territory. And the band seems to be having so much fun that, for me, the joy comes right through the speakers. The album starts off in fine form with "Long Time Gone," a song that encapsulates a perennial theme in southern rock and country--what it's like to be away from home for a long time and then to return. Joyous jammage. Amazing steel work. "Rain, Rain, Rain" keeps it going. The lyric, "Rain Rain Rain / You're lonesome company / but it's just you and me tonight," pretty much sums up the gist of this one. More great and soulful playing here. "Highway Call," the title track, follows. Of missing a woman he knows back home, Betts sings (incidentally, right after a transcendent piano solo from the great Chuck Leavell, who went on to play with the Stones and many others) "Sometimes I feel so all alone / But that ain't no place to be / I wish I had my feet under her table / A little child on my knee." A slow insrumental ending, replete with cymbals accents and some very pretty lick-trading between the piano and steel guitar takes us out. And thus ends one of the most perfect and original 13 minutes in the history of the Country Rock genre. As far as I know, no other music like this exists. The album goes on with "Let Nature Sing," which is great, but incomplete. A plus is that a banjo and fiddle have now joined the band. But, for all of it's inspired pickin', and it's great melody and backing vocals, it falls a bit short because it's sort of a Story Song that, for one reason or another, has had a verse chopped out. Or, it seems so to me. It's like you can tell that there was supposed to be singing at one point, and it's obvious that there's more to the story, but for some reason that verse was taken out and made instrumental. That's my theory, anyway. Side 2 is made up of two long jams, unfortunately reminscent of Side 4 of All Things Must Pass--remember Thanks for the Pepperoni? I don't. As with the aforementioned Pepperoni, I am not fit to comment on these long instrumental jams, as I don't think I've ever even heard them all the way through. Though not really a complete-feeling record, this is still some of my favorite music.

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Album Details

Year: 1974
Label: PolyGram
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Tracklist

1	Long Time Gone
2	Rain
3	Highway Call
4	Let Nature Sing
5	Hank Picked
6	Kissimee Kid

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