Five years after country music’s super-group Alabama retired from the road, Jeff Cook, the band’s multi- talented lead guitarist, fiddle player and founding member, has gathered eight other musicians to form The Allstar Goodtime Band (AGB.)

Jeff doesn’t remember when music solidified itself in his soul; just that it was always there, “I started out with a ukulele. When I was in the third grade, I played on stage and sang ‘You Ain’t Nothin’ But A Hound Dog.’ It was just three chords that my dad taught me on the spur of the moment. I guess that was the beginning, that’s as far back as I can remember, anyway.”

“I was playing lead in a group at thirteen.. I got into radio a few days after I turned fourteen as a disc jockey.” Influenced by the British invasion, the Ventures, Motown and country, “I feel I have a pretty well rounded appreciation of different kinds of music. There’s some stuff out there today that passes for music, but it’s not,” Jeff says sagely.

“I’d always been encouraged by my parents to play music, but not to do it for a living because the music business was so fickle. So, after high school, I went to electronic school for three years. Graduated there and went to work at Western Electric and the Anniston Army Depot. When Alabama, which was Wild Country at the time, got the opportunity in 1973 to go to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, I took a three-month leave and just never went back.”

“When I left Fort Payne to make a living playing music, my dad, who was my biggest fan and my biggest critic, thought that I had seriously messed up, made the biggest mistake of my life by giving up a government job to go try to play music and make a living at it. He wouldn’t talk to me for three months. Looking back on it, he’s not with us anymore, and I feel like it’s three months that I lost with him. When the royalties started coming in, he was very proud, but made sure the success didn't go to my head.”

Jeff believes his destiny was firmly confirmed by a near tragic accident that ended in triumph, “In 1976, I had an accident. I cut a nerve and a tendon of my ring finger on my left hand, and it’s left me with a permanent bend at the last joint. I had to have two surgeries on it and then went on to be what Alabama came to be and I’m still playing today music today. I have to believe music’s what God put me here to do.”

Alabama went on to have a thirty year run, accumulating forty-two #1 Hits, two Grammy Awards, twenty-three American Music Awards, five CMA & ACM "Entertainer of the Year" Awards, ACM's "Group of the Decade," and the RIAA's "Group of the Century”. In 2008, the City of Fort Payne (AL) erected statues on the corner of the city park to the hometown “boys in the band”. In 2001 the Gibson Guitar Company named Jeff ‘Guitarist of the Year’.

“It’s still hard to realize, sometimes, that we accomplished what we did. We had such an incredible career through our journey. First of all you think about, maybe… maybe having a hit record, then to have forty-two number ones is quite an accomplishment for anyone.”

“One of the perks of our success was the people that I got to meet in the music business that I would not have gotten to meet otherwise, Not only people in the music industry, but also the film industry, presidents, and the list goes on, things that wouldn’t have happened, otherwise. I had an opportunity to be in a couple of movies that I couldn’t do because of our touring schedule.”

His love of fishing has played a big role in Jeff’s life, his largest catch being a one hundred and seventy pound blue marlin near Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. “I have a lifetime appointment as Alabama State Fishing Ambassador, which was bestowed upon me in conjunction with the bass tournament I did for sixteen years where the money went for kids with cancer,” he says proudly.

Jeff’s interests veered for a while into the culinary world, opening a restaurant called Jeff Cook’s Warehouse in Gasden, Alabama. The food industry couldn’t mask his true love for long, “I had it for three or four years,” he explains. “We had live entertainment there six nights a week. I liked to have a place to go sit in with the band. It was like a plumber working all day and then going home and working on his own pipes.”

“When Alabama retired from the road in 2004, I’d already been playing some gigs with some of the members of my current band, The All Star Goodtime Band (AGB). We did a little re-organization after I came off the road and added the horns. We started widening our range of music to, what I call, ‘Country, Soul & Rock ‘n’ Roll.’ I put this group together with variety and with the intent to target the demographics of casinos, fairs, and festivals, that sort of thing. They are all very talented and I’m very lucky to have gotten them all in one group. I don’t ‘hog the spotlight’, I pass it around, let everybody get a shot at doing what they do and the songs that they like.”

Jeff says being the front man is, “A lot more fun. I don’t have to ask anybody’s permission to record anything. If I feel like I want to record, I’m a lot more relaxed and not as uptight as I used to be. I didn’t even know I was uptight. I’m not stressed as much. Got a lot of time to fish, spend some time on the computer. Of course, the music is still the number one thing. Whatever our process might be, we sound different than everything that is out there today. I don’t go out and try to do a nostalgic, watered-down version of Alabama. I do some Alabama songs, but it’s definitely not the bread and butter of the song list.”

The Allstar Goodtime Band (AGB) released its latest CD, ‘Ashes Won’t Burn’ in March of 2009. The nine-member band includes a three-piece horn section and percussion. “Music is the opportunity to entertain people, take their mind off their problems, even if it’s only for an hour and a half,” he says. “I’d like to invite everybody to check out my website, check out my videos and if you hear of us playing close, come to see us.” He adds laughing, “If you like the music, we have CD’s for sale, if you don’t, we sell t-shirts.”

With his amazingly versatile talent and energetic spirit, Jeff says he is, “Looking forward to playing some more music, catching some more fish, and enjoying every day like it was my last.”