Dickey Betts - Night (1981)

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"Night" is the unreleased solo album of Dickey Betts. For those of you familiar with The Allman Brothers Band's "Dreams" box set, you may already know Dickey was working on a record with Nashville producer Chips Moman. This album also features the track "Nancy", though this is a completely different version. I doubt this has anything to do with Chips Moman yet, but I could be wrong.
I have to warn you, this is not a great sounding copy. I don't know the source, but it's probably ripped from a poor quality cassette tape. The whole album is drenched in a heavy hiss. I couldn't remove it without wrecking the sound, so I left it as it was. I would love to have a better version, but I don't know if it's circulating. Any official release would be a definite improvement. Because of the quality, I'd say this is only interesting for raving mad Betts fans and Southern Rock scholars.
Musically this is very close to straight-up Country (Betts-style). I quite like the songs. This also has the song "Whole Lotta Memories", which can be found, in a live version, on the BHLT Geneva recording. Thanks to Mawos for providing the music. Great Southern.

Betts, Hall, Leavell & Trucks - 1983 - Geneva , NY

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Betts, Hall, Leavell & Trucks features Dickey Betts and Butch Trucks (Allman Bros), Jimmy Hall (Wet Willie) and Chuck Leavell (Allman Bros & Sea Level). Unlike most Southern Rock bands in the early 80's, this band did not venture into AOR territory. Instead, this is fairly classic Southern Rock, with songs of The Allman Brothers, and Jimmy Hall and Dickey Betts solo cuts. It's a soundboard recording of a gig they played in Geneva, NY, on Jimmy's birthday. The sound is a little thin at the start, but it gets better with the second song. Vocal duties are being shared by both Dickey and Jimmy. I don't know if they ever recorded any studio demos, but this is very nice anyway. The kind of band you'd love to hear on a Charlie Daniels Volunteer Jam. I'm guessing you'll enjoy hearing this lot keep playing Southern Rock like the 80's never happened. Yay!

Various Artists - Hotels, Motels & Road Shows (1978)

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Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy! It's the holiday season coming up alright. Yet another bag of goodies here. This album is the perfect example of what I dig about Southern Rock. Ladies and gentlemen: it's the jackpot!
I knew about this album for a long time, and I wanted it really bad. But I never found a copy. But how cool is that? To find it's everything I'd expected, and then some..
"Hotels, Motels & Road Shows" is a compilation album, chockful of Capricorn recording artists. But this is no cheezy-cheapo-cash-in greatest hits of the label. No, no, no, no. It's a 1978 Rebel Jam! All exciting live performances, classic Southern Rock, and a guaranteed good time. And these tracks haven't been released on albums by the artists themselves. And some artists never released a live album to begin with. The artists: Stillwater, Elvin Bishop, The Allman Brothers Band, Bonnie Bramlett, Dickey Betts, Grinderswitch, Sea level, , The Marshall Tucker Band, Wet Willie and Dixie Dregs. You get the whole spectrum of Southern Rock on one album. Well, it gets very close to that. This is really, really good. Up among the bestest. For real!