The last time Warren Haynes set foot in Key West he was barely 20 years old.
The Asheville, North Carolina native began playing guitar at age 12, and not long after, the music industry began to take notice, with some realizing a rare prodigy was walking among the mortals. By 1980 Haynes began touring with David Allen Coe, who spent various seasons on Big Pine Key, writing music and burnishing his outlaw persona in local bars around the Keys.
During that time Haynes vaguely recalls playing a bar in Key West following a recording session at a local studio with Coe and Gregg Allman. Allman, of course, was at the height of his fame, freshly divorced from Cher and riding the success of the Allman Brothers’ third studio album, “Eat a Peach.”
“I started playing with David as a kid and didn’t really know much about him or his lifestyle,” Haynes said. “But he was living in Big Pine Key and he had a warehouse in Key West. So I came down several times and rehearsed and actually played a free show on the loading docks at his warehouse facing Duval Street. Surprisingly, Gregg Allman sat in with us that day and played a few songs. And that was the first time I ever played with Gregg Allman. I met him prior to that in the recording studio with Dickey Betts, which blew my mind at that time.”
Forty-two years later, Warren Haynes, along with his band Gov’t Mule, will return to Key West for a show on Tuesday, Oct. 18 at the Coffee Butler Amphitheater. But this time he arrives as a Grammy winner and eight-time nominee, spanning stints with Gov’t Mule, The Allman Brothers Band, the Grateful Dead and various solo projects and collaborations with just about every celebrated musician worthy of his artistry — names like Dave Matthews, Carlos Santana, Phil Lesh and countless others.
Today, many acclaimed music critics consider Haynes one of the greatest live music performers to ever hold a guitar, while most consider an opportunity to join Haynes on stage to be a rite of passage. He is a practitioner of the Gibson Les Paul ’58 guitar. Fittingly, many attribute Haynes’ affinity for Gibson guitars to the influence of the late Duane Allman, who alongside names like B.B. King and Elmore James, had a profound impact on him as a teen.
Yet as far as music legends go, Haynes is an enigma. For decades, fans have tried to pigeonhole his style into a single genre, whether it be rock, blues, bluegrass, jam band or even country. Not long after leaving Coe and joining the Nighthawks, Haynes co-wrote “Two of a Kind, Workin’ on a Full House,” which Garth Brooks released on the album “No Fences” and carried the song to No. 1 on Billboard for nearly five months. However, Haynes is more commonly accepted as an artist blending blues, Southern rock and jam band.
As Key West awaits the arrival of Haynes and Gov’t Mule, the Keys Weekly caught up with Haynes on tour, covering everything from his time with the Allman Brothers to who among the younger generation will be able to carry the torch as the next guitar heroes. Below are some excerpts from our interview.
For the full interview, search “The Florida Keys Weekly Podcast” on any major podcast provider or visit keysweekly.com for the entire recording of our interview.
KW: You play across so many genres from rock, bluegrass and blues, but for those in Key West who might not know about Gov’t Mule, how do you describe the band and your sound as it has progressed over the past three decades?
WH: Let’s start by saying in 1994 Gov’t Mule was started as a side project to the Allman Brothers. Myself and Allen Woody had been a member since 1989 and we decided to do something for fun. We had no idea it would take off and become a major band, but things kind of caught fire and here we are all of these years later. In the beginning our influences were Jimmy Hendrix and Cream and bands that were a power trio. We were a trio and we felt that no one was doing the improvisational rock trio thing and we wanted to bring that back. With each record we brought more of our influences in, like rock, blues, jazz, soul, reggae and even some country. But we take a jazz philosophy to our music, meaning moment by moment creating songs differently on a nightly basis. If you hear a song tonight and then a week from now, it won’t be the same version.
KW: When the best guitarists talk about their influences, names like B.B. King and others are constantly brought up, but your name is commonly referenced in those conversations. To be considered one of the greatest guitarists ever, has that ever really settled in with you or do you have time to stop and appreciate what that means at this stage of your career?
WH: It’s hard for someone to gauge the way other people feel about their music. I think about the people I grew up listening to and the impact they had on me. And if I can have one 1/1000th of that impact on a young guitar player, that’s incredible. So when I think about my heroes, I spent hundreds of hours studying what they did, and that influence has stayed with me all of my life. It’s an amazing thing to look at young musicians right now and a lot of the music they are listening to and learning from, because many of them are the same we studied as a kid. Which brings us to Gov’t Mule, because there are a lot of 14-year-old kids showing up to our shows and discovering us, but they are also discovering Led Zeppelin or Pink Floyd or Hendrix or the Allman Brothers and that music is having the same impact on them as it did for us because it’s timeless music. So the moral of the story is, we all strive to make timeless music because I think that’s what’s most important. You don’t follow the trends of the day, you try to make music people will like 50 years from now, so you do what’s in your heart.
KW: It’s pretty well documented that you picked up a guitar at age 12 and the rest is history, as they say. But do you remember that actual moment you picked up the guitar and thought ‘I love this. This is what I’m going to do?’
WH: The first time I picked up a guitar at all I was 11 and even then I had thoughts like kids have, but usually six months later you move on as a kid. But for whatever reason it remained enticing to me and I never wanted to stop. I do remember somewhere around 14 acknowledging if I stick with it, I could be good at this and then playing in front of a live crowd, it was immediately addicting and stimulating with no negative side effects. I was immediately hooked. So once I experienced that, I was like, yeah, this is what I want to do, so I started playing bars and clubs at age 14.
For the full interview listen on any podcast app by searching “Florida Keys Weekly Podcast” or visit keysweekly.com.
Warren Haynes and Gov’t Mule will be joined by Old Crow Medicine Show on Tuesday, Oct. 18 at the Coffee Butler Amphitheater in Key West. Tickets remain available at thekeywestamp.com.
