Gregg Allman was the ultimate titan of Southern rock. As the frontman for the Allman Brothers Band, he attained true greatness. Sadly, however, with the glory came gut-wrenching sadness and pain. Allman's troubled life is explored in depth in a new documentary, Gregg Allman: The Music of My Soul. Its director, James Keach, shared with Fox News Digital "how Allman's father's murder, the death of his brother Duane and years of addiction" impacted him irrevocably. Nevertheless, in the words of the outlet, Allman finally achieved "a hard-won redemption."
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Allman's Demons Were Always at His Heels
Keach explained, "He revealed why he struggled with addiction and his triumphs over that addiction. It's Gregg telling the story of a kid's early childhood trauma, his dad being murdered, his losing his brother — and then you could just see the loss that this guy had in his life and the effect that the trauma had."
He also discussed how all the trauma Allman endured ultimately shaped him into the man and the musician he became. Keach observed, "And then you go back into his life, and you see how it affected his music. It affected his playing...[and] his dysfunction with marriage. It affected his dysfunction with drugs and ultimately his ability to redeem himself — to go through the gauntlet."
The doc about Gregg Allman will hit theaters on Wednesday, June 17, only.
He died on May 27, 2017, at the age of 69.
His Father Was Brutally Murderd When Allman Was Very Young
Per the outlet, Gregg Allman's dad, U.S. Army Captain Willis Turner Allman, was slain on December 26, 1949. He was 31, a courageous World War II vet. His sons were so young. Gregg was 2. His brother, Duane, was a year older. His dad's murder left an emptiness in the youngster's life that was very hard for him to bear.
As James Keach put it, "He didn't remember his father. But the thing he did remember is the lack of having one. Because all his friends, they had dads in their life, and he didn't have anybody to go out and play catch with him. He didn't have any of that. He had just his mom."
The director also mentioned, "And then when his mom went off to accounting school and sent him into military school, his brother became his de facto dad. And when his brother passed, it was like he lost his father again."
He Greatly Admired His Brother, Duane
Gregg Allman's brother, Duane, was someone he put on a pedestal. The two siblings formed the Allman Brothers Band in 1969. It became "one of the most influential groups in Southern rock history," per the outlet. Among its standout members was the iconic Dickey Betts.
Tragically, Duane Allman lost his life in a motorcycle accident on October 29, 1971. He was 24. James Keach put that devastating death into perspective. "That trauma I think informed [Gregg's] music and a lot of the problems that he had in his life because he was trying to numb the feelings that he had, that loss, that abandoned feeling and that feeling of being adrift and not knowing where to turn."
Furthermore, he said, "You can hear it in his voice, the ache in his voice. So that was his way of getting it out. And I think his ultimate drug addiction was the music. And that's not a bad addiction. That's a good one."
