“I’ve definitely lived a dangerous life,” Dickey Betts once admitted, and you only had to see him to know it. A stern gunslinger with a cowboy hat, handlebar moustache and ’57 Goldtop, Betts’ outlaw stage presence in The Allman Brothers Band often bled into his hairy personal life. Despite that, his passing on 18 April aged 80 meant he outlived all but one of his co-founders in a group synonymous with early death.
Born Forrest Richard Betts in 1943, his Florida family’s bluegrass background meant the young Southerner took up first the ukulele, then banjo and mandolin, before the epiphany of Chuck Berry’s Maybellene – and perhaps the realisation that “girls like guitars” – showed him the path. An early band, Second Coming, featured Berry Oakley on bass, and after the pair jammed with session ace Duane Allman in 1969 – convincing him to bury the hatchet and bring in kid brother Gregg on vocals – the great pioneers of Southern Rock had their nucleus.
Dickey Betts on stage with The Allman Brothers Band in September 1975
PHOTO BY FIN COSTELLO/REDFERNS/GETTY IMAGES