God Rest His Soul. Remembering MLK - and Gregg Allman

Listening to Gregg Allman's "God Rest His Soul" on MLK Day, the 37th official celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. // Gregg on the Confederate Flag: "Burn them All."

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Gregg photo by Kirk West.

Today, January 16, 2023, is MLK day, the 37th official federal holiday comemerating and celebrating the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I hope everyone has a chance to pause and think about the man and his ideals today. I’m glad that the day has not become an excuse for sales.

It’s always good opportunity to share “God Rest His Soul,” Gregg Allman’s beautiful tribute to Dr. King, which he wrote and recorded in 1968, shortly after the assassination. The song was never on any of Gregg’s sanctioned releases. He said that he never intended to release it and just wrote it as a personal tribute, but he also sold the song for a few hundred bucks to producer Steve Alaimo when he needed money to get back from Florida to Los Angeles. No wonder Gregg called him “an unprincipled son of a bitch.”

Alaimo also bought “Melissa,” which ABB manager Phil Walden eventually bought back 50 percent of. My understanding is he basically went to Alaimo and said, “You can own 50 percent of a song that’s on a best-selling Allman Brothers Band album or 100 percent of a song that Gregg will never record.” Good deal all around at that point. I wish something similar had ever happened with “God Rest His Soul.”

There are multiple versions of “God Rest His Soul,” all of which were essentially demoes. I think it’s a great tribute to a great man. I am going to with this one, which was featured on One More Try, a brilliant two-CD anthology of outtakes and alternate versions that I worked on with Kirk West, who produced it. I wrote what was at the time my greatest essay for the liner notes, and was involved in every step. it almost immediately went out of print because of a legal dispute, which was gutting.

This also presents a wonderful opportunity to recall Gregg’s late-in-life thoughts on the Confederate Battle Flag:

“Well, I was taught how to play music by these very, very kind older black men. My best friend in the world is a black man. If people are gonna look at that flag and think of it as representing slavery, then I say burn every one of them.”

Art by Pandhandle Slim

I think it’s important to remember that when Dr. King was assassinated he was in Memphis marching in support of striking garbage haulers. I’m sure many of those striking men could have and would have done a lot of other things had they had the opportunity to do so. It bothers me that we have garbage pickup on MLK Day.

Please listen to Dr. King’s haunting final speech, “I Have Been to the Mountaintop.” it is unbelievable. Highlights:

Alan Paul’s fourth book, Brothers and Sisters: the Allman Brothers Band and The Album That Defined The 70s, will be published July 25, 2023, by St. Martin’s Press. His last two books – Texas Flood: The Inside Story of Stevie Ray Vaughan and  One Way Out: The Inside History of the Allman Brothers Band  – debuted in the New York Times Non-Fiction Hardcover Bestsellers List. His first book was Big in China: My Unlikely Adventures Raising a Family, Playing the Blues and Becoming a Star in Beijing, about his experiences raising a family in Beijing and touring China with a popular original blues band. It was optioned for a movie by Ivan Reitman’s Montecito Productions.  He is also a guitarist and singer who fronts two bands, Big in China and Friends of the Brothers, the premier celebration of the Allman Brothers Band.

The entire final speech is incredible. Listen here: