The Gregg Allman Band: I'm No Angel/Just Before The Bullets Fly

Double-disc reissue of Allman at his slick 80s apex.

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It had been almost 10 years between 1977’s Playin’ Up A Storm and 1986’s I’m No Angel, a decade beset by familiar Allman tropes (drugs, bad marriages, the inability to hold a band together).

Epic Records gave him the chance to resurrect his career with the solid if not especially crafted I’m No Angel album. It worked, too, even if the rough-hewn Allman charm was a thing of the past, his band sported mullets and the keyboard-heavy production mirrored the times. Two years later, he’d attempt the same trick with Just Before The Bullets Fly, but it lacked the easy charm of its predecessor. The title track wasn’t without merit, but it was a thin affair compared to the original I’m No Angel template that Allman had set himself.

Philip Wilding

Philip Wilding is a novelist, journalist, scriptwriter, biographer and radio producer. As a young journalist he criss-crossed most of the United States with bands like Motley Crue, Kiss and Poison (think the Almost Famous movie but with more hairspray). More latterly, he’s sat down to chat with bands like the slightly more erudite Manic Street Preachers, Afghan Whigs, Rush and Marillion.