The Long Players
In the early Aughts, the digital revolution was making changes both subtle and profound in the music marketplace. By 2004, Bill Lloyd, a hit country rocker and dean of Nashville’s power-pop community, noticed a new dynamic that concerned him.
“I was watching the album as a work of art diminish in popularity, with the internet becoming more song-oriented,” Lloyd explains. “And to me, there was something really beautiful about a band or a songwriter spending a lot of time crafting and creating something that holds together as a bigger piece.”
He responded by gathering a bunch of his talented musical friends to form The Long Players, whose primary goal is to celebrate classic albums by performing them in full onstage. The band had their first show — a re-creation of The Rolling Stones’ Let It Bleed — at 12th & Porter Playroom on March 26, 2004, and 20 years later, the world’s greatest tribute band is still paying homage to the album as an art form. As they are at every performance, the group was fronted that first night by an all-star collection of vocalists including Dan Baird, Jimmy Hall, Ashley Cleveland, Southside Johnny, Tommy Womack, Webb Wilder and Billy Burnette.
In the two decades since their debut, The Long Players have been joined by a fairly mind-boggling collection of singers, including Adrian Belew, Emmylou Harris, John Hiatt, Brendan Benson, Robin Taylor Zander (son of of Cheap Trick's Robin Zander), Marshall Crenshaw, Tracy Nelson, Dez Dickerson of Prince and the Revolution, Steve Forbert, Billy Swan, The McCrary Sisters, Mark Volman of The Turtles and Joey Molland of Badfinger. A bunch of top musicians have performed with the band as well, including harmonica wizard Charlie McCoy, organist Al Kooper, bassist Tom Petersson of Cheap Trick, and horn men Bobby Keys, Jim Horn and Wayne Jackson.
Sometimes instead of re-creating an album, a Long Players show will honor a label, a scene, a genre or a specific artist; special nights have been dedicated to Motown, Laurel Canyon folk-rock, The Beatles, Aretha Franklin and Traffic. Their official 20th anniversary show in April was a wide-ranging retrospective. Saturday at 3rd and Lindsley, the group will celebrate Memphis soul with a set list featuring the sounds of Stax and Hi Records.
The foundation for the group grew out of a series of annual John Lennon tribute concerts called Imagine No Handguns. The original members of The Long Players — guitarist Lloyd, guitarist Steve Allen, bassist Garry Tallent of the E Street Band, keyboardist John Deaderick and drummer Steve Ebe — all served in the house band for those shows. Ebe recalls the moment the seeds for The Long Players were sown. It was in the dressing room backstage at Exit/In immediately following the ninth Lennon tribute in December 2003.
“We were sitting around after the show, and somebody said, ‘Gosh, I wish we didn’t have to wait a whole year for us to play together — this is such a good band,’” the former Human Radio drummer says. “And we all agreed it would be cool if we could think of a reason to play together more often.”
As Ebe remembers it, he and the other musicians got a call from Lloyd not long thereafter. “Bill called us all up and said, ‘What about this? We call it The Long Players, and we do classic albums as live shows,’ and we all went, ‘Hell yes!’”
Since that first show in March 2004, The Long Players have re-created more than 80 classic albums, in addition to playing numerous theme nights. In February 2005, they moved their performances from 12th & Porter to Mercy Lounge, and then in 2014, they began performing at 3rd and Lindsley, which has been their home ever since. They also have appeared at a large number of private parties and special events over the years, including Beatles fests, the Germantown Street Festival and Kings of Leon’s Music City Food and Wine Festival, for which they were the house band.
While original members Lloyd, Allen and Ebe are still in the group, there have been a few lineup changes over the years. When Tallent became unavailable in 2007 because of his “day job” with Bruce Springsteen, Brad Jones took over on bass. Since keyboardist Deaderick departed at the end of 2010, that chair has been filled at various times by Jen Gunderman (The Jayhawks), Ross Rice (Human Radio) and Seth Timbs (Fluid Ounces). In addition, when the music requires more than two guitars, bass, drums and keys, multi-instrumentalist Jim Hoke and percussionist Paul Snyder are among the first to get a call.
Saturday night at 3rd & Lindsley, Snyder again will be sitting in with the band, as will trumpeter John Fumo and saxophonist Evan Cobb. Cissy Crutcher, Cleveland DuBois, Greg Barnhill, Jonell Mosser, Etta Britt, Jace Everett and Joel McAnulty are among the guest vocalists scheduled to perform with the group.
“Magic happens on every gig, and on the great ones, there’s just more of it,” Allen says. “We love this music, we love playing it, we love the audience being part of it. Through this music, there’s a lot of love and healing. Every time, it’s really, really beautiful.”
Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly identified Long Players guest Robin Taylor Zander as his father, Cheap Trick's Robin Zander.
