The Allman Brothers Band

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Pam wrote on February 26, 2006 at 4:34 pm
Thanks Goliath. Here is another article from today. Maybe it can be put on the homepage for a bit with a place for comments since there is no online guest book to sign? News Obituary Article MARIETTA: Scott Hayes, worked for Allmans By HOLLY CRENSHAW When he was a teenager in Macon in the 1950s, Scott Hayes didn't lay his head on his pillow at night just to sleep. He huddled close to his muffled transistor radio, listening to Little Richard and Muddy Waters and dreaming of a life that would never lose rock 'n' roll music's crackling electric charge. Through the sheer force of self-invention, he created that life. He crisscrossed the country with superstars, embraced everything that gritty rock 'n' roll stands for and never missed a party with the band. "We always said that neither Keith Richards nor Pop could be killed by conventional means, which was one of the reasons we were surprised when he died," said his son Scott Hayes Jr. of Sandy Springs. "If you looked in the dictionary, you'd see both their pictures right there under 'rock 'n' roll lifestyle.' " Thomas Scott Snead Hayes Sr., 64, of Marietta died of a heart attack Feb. 18 at Kennestone Hospital. The body was cremated. The memorial service is 2 p.m. today at Roswell Funeral Home. Mr. Hayes moved to Atlanta in 1963 and lived for those nights when he and his friends could slip on their sharkskin suits and catch the parade of rhythm-and-blues artists at the Royal Peacock. Mr. Hayes designed and built swimming pools around town, but he jumped at a chance to work for the Allman Brothers Band in the 1970s. He was an advance man for their tours, in charge of checking out hotels and lining up limousines before the band hit town. During Gregg Allman's high-wattage marriage to Cher, Mr. Hayes worked security and fought to keep overzealous tabloid reporters at bay. "My dad used to say, 'I'm not bad, but the bad don't mess with me,' " said his other son, Rob Hayes of Alpharetta. "He was a piece of work, no question. He could be rough, but he also was a voracious reader with an extremely high IQ who could have conversations about anything." "My very first concert was when I was 15 and the Allman Brothers played in Lakeland, Fla., on New Year's Eve," the son said. "I stood behind Gregg Allman on stage through the whole show and got kissed by Cher at midnight. It was the first time I got to see music from Pop's perspective, and it kind of spoils you. After that, sitting in the upper decks is not very appealing." Mr. Hayes was on the front lines of early rock merchandising when he sold T-shirts at the Watkins Glen Festival in upstate New York in 1973, still ranked as rock music's largest gathering, with 600,000 people. He continued as part of Great Southern, a rock merchandising company, and helped rally Southern rock bands behind Jimmy Carter's presidential campaign in 1976. Mr. Hayes took a break from music in the 1980s, falling back on his natural fix-it skills to work as a master plumber. He spent most of the 1990s managing Center Stage Theatre, a live music venue in Midtown. For the past five years, he renovated and sold condominiums, restored classic cars and put thousands of miles on his Ford truck visiting far-flung friends. Willie Perkins, the Allman Brothers' tour manager in the '70s, said his book, "No Saints, No Saviors," is filled with stories about Mr. Hayes. "He never let me down in a time of need," said Mr. Perkins, of Macon. "He was a good person to have around in times of trouble, and a good person to have around when you wanted to have a good time. "I kept telling him to sit down with a tape recorder to get some of his stories down, because he was a raconteur who could go on for hours and hours. When he held court, you just couldn't ignore him. He could be the most charming man at the dinner table or he could make you want to crawl under the dinner table." There are no other immediate survivors.
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