Less than two weeks ago Derek Trucks found himself in New York City with a group of old friends celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Allman Brothers Band. Founding drummer Jaimoe had reunited a cast of usual suspects for a show dubbed “The Brothers”, which saw Trucks, Jaimoe, Warren Haynes, Oteil Burbridge, Duane Trucks, Marc Quinones, Reese Wynans, and more run perform a mix of tunes from the ABB catalog at Madison Square Garden back on March 10th.
News reports of COVID-19 at the time were minimal, though it was on the radars of Americans at the time but had not yet reached the level of concern it has today. Just two days later, Trucks, his wife and Tedeschi Trucks Band bandmate Susan Tedeschi participated in the Love Rocks NYC benefit at New York City’s The Beacon Theatre with stars like Dave Matthews, Warren Haynes, Marcus King, Leon Bridges, and more. By that time on Thursday, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo had instituted a ban on gatherings of over 500 people, and the all-star group of musicians found themselves playing to a severely limited industry-only crowd for the God’s Love We Deliver benefit. Derek Trucks spoke about his experience of playing shows in what has become an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic in a recent interview with Rolling Stone.
“When we first got to New York about a week before, there were no restrictions and no one was really thinking about [the virus] too much,” Trucks said in a new interview published to Rolling Stone on Thursday. “I was being OCD with Purell, but you eat out; you’re on the road and that’s what you do. But now a thousand things go through your head—one being, ‘Sh*t, should we have done that?’ The demographic of the Allman Brothers is kind of a prime candidate [for the virus]. So that felt a little weird. But information was rolling out at such a trickle that it was hard to make sense of anything.”
Trucks continued, “It was a one-off celebration of 50 years of the band and it was sold out. But I know a bunch of people who had tickets who didn’t come. My parents were unable to make it. They were worried about traveling and their doctor told them not to hop on a plane to New York. So that was bittersweet in a lot of ways. You wish it had been slammed to the rafters and everyone wouldn’t have had that in the back of their mind.”
Related: 25 Concert Films & Music Documentaries To Stream While You’re Self-Quarantining
Though the thought of canceling or postponing the show had run through Trucks’ head, it wasn’t his call, and, “It also felt like one of the last moments for a long time when people would be able to suspend reality and let go.”
Derek went on to talk about the special nature of the performance, adding that he would have reservations about playing another show like that in the future.
“It’s special because it was a one-off,” he said. “I don’t know how long you could run down the road playing that music before it became something else. That legacy means so much to me and our family and I don’t want to do anything to diminish it.”
As Trucks told Rolling Stone, the Tedeschi Trucks Band does not have any tour dates scheduled until late June, so the band’s shows may escape the rampant postponements and cancellations many others have faced. For the most up-to-date information on the TTB tour, head to the band’s website.
[H/TÂ Rolling Stone]