Photo Credit:
Writer: Dickey Betts
Producer: Johnny Sandlin and the Allman Brothers Band
Recorded: December 1972 at Capricorn Studios in Macon, Georgia
Released: August 1973
Players: | Dickey Betts — guitar Gregg Allman — organ Les Dudek — acoustic guitar Chuck Leavell — piano Berry Oakley — bass Butch Trucks — drums, timpani Jaimoe — drums, congas |
Album: | Brothers And Sisters (Capricorn) |
The Brothers And Sisters album was the Allman Brothers Band's first following cofounder and guitarist Duane Allman's death in a motorcycle accident on October 29th, 1971.
Rather than try to force another guitarist to step into Duane's formidable shoes, the Allmans recruited a keyboard player, Chuck Leavell, whose playing is prominent on "Jessica."
"Jessica" was one of the first Allman Brothers tracks to feature Lamar Williams on bass, who stepped in after Berry Oakley died in a motorcycle accident on November 11th, 1972.
Drummer Butch Trucks said, "It's just a beautiful song. (Singer-guitarist) Dickey (Betts) wrote it for his little girl — she was about a year old, crawling around on the floor. That was the inspiration for that real kind of thing. It has a little lullaby on the ending, that kind of thing. It's energetic, melodic and very rhythmic. It's a lot of fun to play. That one can get pretty artistic sometimes."
"Jessica" was licensed to Buick for a Century car commercial, but Trucks said that had nothing to do with the band, which doesn't own creative rights to the song.
Possibly its most famous use was in the film Field Of Dreams, in a sequence in which actors Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones are riding on the open road. Trucks said, "That was great, sitting there. I didn't know it was coming. I went to see the movie and the thing popped up — that was cool, to sit in the middle of all these people and say, 'Hey, that's me.'"