The name Les Dudek may not ring a bell, but he's the textbook definition of one of those 'been there, done that' guitar players.
He recorded and toured with (not to mention dated) Cher, jammed with Journey just as they were coming together, and guested onstage with Mike Bloomfield (without him knowing).
Oh, and have you ever heard the song Ramblin' Man? That's Dudek harmonizing his electric guitar lines with Dickey Betts at the end.
During a time when the Allman Brothers Band were in limbo following the tragic death of lead guitarist Duane Allman, Betts was exploring his options, as it was unclear if the band would go on following Duane's death.
“We were invited to go hang out on the farm with Dickey for a weekend,” Dudek related to Guitar World in a recent interview. “Me and and Peter [Sches, then a bandmate of Dudek's] went up to Macon and hung out and jammed on the back porch with Dickey. That went pretty well, but you know, things were kind of solemn... Duane had died not too long before then, so it knocked the wind out of everybody’s balloon.”
It was in that context that Betts called Dudek back for further jams, even after the Allman Brothers Band had slowly re-assembled. One of these calls came on an evening when they were cutting a song called Ramblin' Man.
“I was hanging out in the control room, and Dickey got the idea of putting some guitar parts at the end; he was thinking about harmony guitars, like what he did with Duane,” Dudek recounted to GW.
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“I had my goldtop Les Paul Standard. Berry Oakley played bass on it. I think it was the last song he cut before he died. I helped Dickey with all the guitar harmonies and the arrangements on the end of it. I pretty much played half of the lead guitars, but people don’t realize it.
“We stacked the guitars at the end – the low and high octaves,” the guitarist continued. “We had a blast doing that. It was a lot of fun.”
Dudek also worked with Betts on, and made significant contributions to, another Allman Brothers classic, Jessica.
“[Dickey] already had the verse of Jessica, but he needed a bridge. He was very frustrated,” Dudek said. “Anyway, he went to the kitchen – and that’s when I came up with the bridge. The song needed a release, and it needed a part when it comes back to the original section. Dickey was pretty pleased about it.”
To read Guitar World's full interview with Les Dudek – which covers all of the aforementioned adventures, his time with Steve Miller, and more – pick up the new issue of the mag at Magazines Direct.
