Lowell George
Third-Greatest Ever Non-Seen Concert
The greatest concert I never saw was the original Pink Floyd, before Syd Barrett left the band to lick his psychic wounds. That was in Stockholm on September 10, 1967, and the subject of another fragment, (Pink Floyd Concert). The penultimate concert I never saw was Bob Dylan, also in Stockholm — April 29, 1966, and also covered in another fragment (Dylan Concert).
The third greatest concert I never saw was Lowell George. This was his penultimate concert, at the Bottom Line in New York on June 24, 1979. He played one more gig in Washington, D.C., on June 28 then died the following day.
At this point, I had been a Little Feat fan for years and considered Lowell George nothing short of a genius. I really meant to see him at the Bottom Line, but something came up — or it could have been a case of a little short of money at the time, New York was not cheap and we were not raking in the cash at this point. Besides, I figured, I’ll have a lot of other chances to see him.
Well, I figured wrong. I heard on the radio a few days later that he had died of a heart attack just four days after playing New York.
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These were the days of vinyl albums, and I owned both “Time Loves a Hero” and “Down on the Farm”, along with Lowell’s solo album “Thanks I’ll Eat it Here.”
“Time Loves Hero”, to this day, is one of my favorite albums, especially “Day at the Dog Races”, which, incidentally, Lowell George himself did not like at all — he used to leave the stage when, in concert, the rest of the band stormed into this free-style rock/jazz amazement.
I have since, first on CDs and now on MP3s, acquired all of Little Feat’s albums, and I return to them every so often for some of the best music ever recorded.
And, I have since seen the Lowell-George-less Little Feat three times, each a great experience, still, if only, if only.
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