Tedeschi Trucks Band Jam It Up at Baycare Sound in Clearwater
Once the sun went down in Clearwater, it was a beautiful, balmy Sunday night for a chill evening of music for the over 7,000 jam crowd piling in for the great Tedeschi Trucks Band on their “Live In 25” tour”. Taking over the Sound’s stage with a dozen musicians, including a horn section, two drummers, keyboards, percussion, guitars and vocalists, they are a formidable cast. Leading the charge is the Grammy-winning husband & wife team of guitar virtuoso Derek Trucks and lead singer & guitarist herself, Susan Tedeschi Trucks.
They played over a two-hour set opening with a cover of “Got My Mojo Workin”, originally recorded by R&B singer Ann Cole and the Suburbans in 1957, talk about digging way back. Their fifteen song set included their originals “Midnight in Harlem” and “Issac/Kebbi Jam” and the original 1998 tune “Just Won’t Burn” from Susan’s solo album of the same name. A Derek & the Dominoes cover of “Keep On Growing” was awesome! The original 1970 song written by Clapton had Duane Allman on guitar who is one of Derek’s guitar heroes and allows Trucks to pay homage to the late Allman Brother.
Like if all this wasn’t enough, Gov’t Mule’s Warren Haynes joins them on stage for a 22-minute encore of the TTB written “Pasaquan.” and the cover of Joe Cocker’s hit “Space Captain.” Of course, Haynes’ connection to the Allman Brothers Band and playing with Trucks in the late 80’s & with the Dickey Betts Band is well known to this Florida audience as they were up out of their seats. As usual, Tedeschi Trucks brings it all to the blues/rock fans. You can find all the info and tour dates for the band at https://www.tedeschitrucksband.com/
This is a true Allman family of musicians with Duane Betts and Palmetto Motel opening the show for TTB. The son of the Allman Brothers guitarist Dickey Betts, Duane is a Sarasota native. He played with his dad’s band “Great Southern” and more recently in the “Allman Betts Band” with Devon Allman, son of founding ABB member Gregg Allman. Since then Duane recorded his newest solo album “Wild & Precious Life.” Joining Duane onstage was a Sarasota favorite musician Pedro Arevalo on bass who also played with the Great Southern Band. They played a 30-minute set that included a beautiful cover of the Allman Brothers Band song “Blue Sky” written by his dad and is on the 1972 album “Eat A Peach”. Duane announced he would sign t-shirts and CD’s at the merch stand after the show. He arrived to find a long line of excited fans to greet him. He signed autographs and took selfies much to everyone’s delight. Check out his website at https://www.duanebetts.com/
By the way, if you need another jam band fix, Warren Haynes and Gov’t Mule will be playing on Tuesday night at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater and there are still some tickets available at www.rutheckerdhall.com
Vicky Sullivan Photos for The Suncoast Post