Guitarist Marcus King dropped by The Howard Stern Show in New York City recently to pay tribute to his Southern rock forefathers in the Allman Brothers Band. The singer-songwriter and titular bandleader performed “Ramblin’ Man” between stops on his Mood Swings World Tour.
Introducing the Brothers and Sisters classic that took the Allmans to the zenith of their commercial success, King remembered the band’s late guitarist Dickey Betts who passed away earlier this year at the age of 80. Dickey’s spirit was alive and well in Howard Stern’s studio, as King’s ever-expanding backing band rollicked along the tumbling rhythm. Having started performing live at the age of 8, the now 28-year-old King embodies the road-weary wisdom Betts immortalized in “Ramblin’ Man”.
Say what you will about the former child prodigy’s decision to bring a second guitarist into his band, but there’s no better way to capture the dual lead-guitar approach that defined the Allman Brothers’ sound. The delegation of duties has also freed up King to focus on his vocals, an energetic shift felt throughout his latest solo album, Mood Swings. After he paid tribute to classic rock greats (and lamented his own rock n’ roll excesses) on his previous disc Young Blood, the bandleader tried a little tenderness on his most recent album. Invoking soul greats like Al Green, Bobby Womack, and Marvin Gaye, King laid his spirit bare with some of the most brutally honest songwriting of his career as his lyrics opened up about his struggles with mental illness and substance abuse.
“The track and album title ‘Mood Swings’ is a play on the swinging nature of the material while also referencing my up and down shifts in mood while I was either abusing the wrong substances, in between mood stabilizing meds and anti-psychotics, self-medication on top of that, along with a foot locker FULL of repressed childhood trauma all being taken out on my relationship at the time,” King said at the time. “Without this assembly of songs, I don’t think I’d be around.”
Watch Marcus King perform the Allman Brothers Band’s “Ramblin’ Man” for Howard Stern, along with Mood Swings track “F*ck My Life Up Again” and a guitar warmup exercise. King’s Mood Swings will continue with shows along the East Coast through mid-October before heading overseas. Find tickets and a list of tour dates here.
Marcus King — “Ramblin’ Man” (Allman Brothers Band) — The Howard Stern Show
Marcus King — “F*ck My Life Up Again” — The Howard Stern Show
How Marcus King Warms Up To Play — The Howard Stern Show
The post Marcus King Covers The Allman Brothers Band For Howard Stern [Watch] appeared first on L4LM.
