Groundwire: Warren Haynes
by Lisa Sharken
Warren Haynes is undoubtedly one of the hardest working musicians around. As a member of the Allman Brothers Band, Gov’t Mule, and Phil Lesh & Friends, Haynes has been regularly touring and recording at a rigorous pace. Though some might call him a workaholic, Haynes simply loves playing music!
Groundwire caught up with the man Rolling Stone Magazine listed as 23rd in its “100 Greatest Guitarists” for the lowdown on his gear, his favorite sounds, and the eclectic mixture of ingredients that make up his musical entity. Haynes also offers up some useful tips on becoming a better sounding player.
In Gov’t Mule news, Haynes discusses the making of the group’s new live DVD and two-CD set, The Deepest End [ATO Records], which was recorded at the Saenger Theatre in New Orleans, Louisiana on May 3rd, 2003. He also shares some inside details on the difficult process of selecting a new bass player to replace the late great Allen Woody.
How do you feel about your ranking in Rolling Stone’s recent list of guitar greats?
Flattered. Honored.
Were you surprised by the people you were rated above?
Yeah, totally. I don’t think my list would have looked anything like their list. But I was honored, nonetheless.
What inspired you to play guitar?
I started singing when I was about seven years old and fell in love with Black gospel music. From there I went to soul music–James Brown, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, the Four Tops, and the Temptations. Then my oldest brother got a Sly & the Family Stone record, and hearing that pushed me towards rock music–hearing the guitar mixed in with the soul music. Then I heard Cream and Hendrix, and that’s what made me want to play guitar.
Which players were most influential to your style and tone?
In my late teens I started listening to a lot of horn players because you can be influenced by other instruments and you don’t have to listen only to your own instrument. I’m a singer and I love instrumentalists who phrase like singers. I listen to a lot of vocalists and saxophones players, too, and take influence from them. Whether it’s Maceo Parker and his amazing understated way, or Charlie Parker and his overstated way, there’s so much to learn from those people and I translate it to guitar.
As far as the non-guitar players, I think Sonny Rollins was most influential for tone, and Cannonball Adderley for phrasing–not to say that they both aren’t amazing for tone and phrasing. Both of those guys influenced me a lot. I always thought Sonny Rollins’ tone was the ultimate big fat tone with a nice spike on top of it. Cannonball’s tone was amazing, too, but Cannonball had that street level kind of soul that a lot of jazz people didn’t have and that churchliness has always been an inspiration to me. The way he phrases is totally amazing.
Of course, you can listen to a lot of great guitar players for tone, too. Starting chronologically, the first two that moved me were Hendrix and Clapton, and then Duane Allman, Billy Gibbons, Santana, Jeff Beck, and David Gilmour. There are so many different ways to get a great sound. For me and my own sound, it was always a humbucker thing. I would always hear people using single-coils and love it, but it never did work for me.
Which players affected your choices in gear?
Well, I guess Clapton in Cream. He was using Les Pauls, Firebirds, and 335s, and to this day I still play all of those. That was such a big sound–as was the sound that he got with John Mayall. Duane Allman, Billy Gibbons, and Carlos Santana all used humbuckers. They all had unique sounds, but they all had that one common ingredient.
What are the essential tonal qualities you strive for?
The richness has to be there. That allows you to relax while you’re playing and not have to fight the guitar. But at the same time, it should be a little bit of a struggle. You don’t want that totally saturated distortion where every note sings and feeds back equally. There should also be a natural acoustic quality to the over all tone. Like Sonny Rollins’ saxophone, it should be big and fat with this little spike on the top end to distinguish one note from another, and each note should be as big as it can be.
Describe your live rig.
Well, it varies from the Allman Brothers to Gov’t Mule to Phil Lesh & Friends. The common denominator is that all the guitars are Gibsons. In the Allman Brothers. I use predominantly Les Pauls, and occasionally a 335. I have a ’61 dot neck 335 that I played throughout the entire new album, with the exception of two songs. In Gov’t Mule, I use a lot more variety of tone, so I’m using Les Pauls, Firebirds, 335s, and an Explorer. They all have that Gibson character, but they all sound different and all have a slightly different top end. In Phil Lesh & Friends, I use SGs and 335s, leaning more toward the SGs because in that band I want a smaller sound and a spikier tone that fits the sound of that band a little more.
Ampwise, the common ingredient for all of those situations is my César Diaz CD-100 which finds its way onto all three stages. In the Allman Brothers, I’m using my new 100 watt Marshall Super Lead Plexi reissue these days. In Phil & Friends, sometimes I use my Custom Audio Electronics head that was made by Bob Bradshaw, and sometimes a Fender Super Reverb. In Gov’t Mule, the additional head is my Soldano SLO-100 which I’ve used forever and ever. Sometimes I use a Gibson Goldtone GA-30RVS 2×12 amp that really sounds cool.
With Gov’t Mule and Phil Lesh, I use effects, but with the Allman Brothers, I don’t, and I just plug straight in. I have a Boss OC-2 Octaver, two-speed stereo tremolo made by Bob Bradshaw, César Diaz Texas Tone Ranger pedal, Centaur distortion, Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere Leslie simulator, Dunlop Crybaby wah, and Guyatone Funky Box envelope filter.
What type of picks do you prefer?
All my life I had been using what used to be called the Gibson Star picks, which are teardrop shape, but not the real small ones like the mandolin picks. They’re smaller than a regular pick and more curved like a teardrop. When Gibson originally made them, they were just called the Star and they used to have a picture of a star on them. It was kind of medium, but kind of not. They’re probably a little heavier than a medium. I grew up playing with those until Gibson discontinued them. Then I had to search elsewhere for picks. Gibson later started remaking them, but they just didn’t feel right. So now I’m using D’Andrea picks that are the same shape and gauge.
How are your guitars set up?
My standard set up is what I consider too low for slide, too high for lead. It’s a compromise where I can play both lead and slide on the same guitar. It’s pretty high, but not as high if I were just playing slide, but high enough to where I could just pull a bottle out and play slide on it at any moment. It’s set up .010-.046, unless I’m tuned down. Then I use .011-.050. I have a few different tunings. I have a couple of Firebirds that are tuned down a half step in standard tuning, and a Les Paul that stays in dropped-D. My Explorer is tuned in open A, which is like open G, but a whole step down. One of my Les Pauls is in this C tuning that I got from Jimmy Page which goes (low to high) C, G, C, G, C, E. I think Page got it from Leadbelly or Big Bill Broonzy, and he used it on some Zeppelin records. I wrote a couple of songs in that tuning and it’s pretty cool. That low C sounds huge. I use .010-.058 on that guitar and I use GHS Strings on all my guitars.
Which guitars are outfitted with Duncan pickups?
Some of the Les Pauls and Firebirds, which are all Gibson Custom Shop guitars built over the past 15 years. My main Les Paul is a 1989 ’59 Reissue that I’ve played for years and it has Pearly Gates in it. I recently got another Les Paul that I like more than that one, but I’m not sure what’s in that one at the moment. My mid-’90s ’58 Reissue Les Paul has an Antiquity humbucker in the bridge position. My 1998 ’59 Reissue Les Paul has a JB in the bridge. My 1964 Firebird III has an Alnico II Pro Mini-Humbucker in the neck, and my 1997 tobacco sunburst Firebird has an Alnico II Pro Mini-Humbucker in the bridge. My non-reverse Firebird has a P-90 in the bridge. The 2000 SG-61 I use with Phil Lesh has two custom-wound humbuckers that Seymour made for me. The neck pickup is a copy of Peter Green’s neck pickup with the reversed coils, and the bridge pickup is a copy of the bridge pickup from Eric Clapton’s SG–the one he played with Cream that was painted by The Fool.
What do you like most about Duncan pickups and the way they complement your instruments?
I think the cool thing about Duncans is that if you want to replicate the sound of the original pickup that came in those old guitars, you can do that. If you want to enhance that sound and make it a little brighter or fatter or midrangier or hotter, you can do that. They’re not like a lot of pickups where they’re trying to reinvent the wheel. They’re taking classic sounds and either recapturing them or enhancing them, but not going totally away from the original concept, which I really like because most of the sounds I prefer are made with pickups that are 30 or more years old. Even when you can find the old pickups, they don’t always sound the way they used to. So it’s great to know that you can get back to that sound if you need to or enhance it.
Do you have a collection of vintage instruments that aren’t taken out on the road?
I have a few of them. I have my ’61 dot neck 335 that I don’t bring out. I’ve also got a ’56 or ’57 Les Paul TV Special. I have at least one more that I’m scared to bring out, but not a lot. I have a bunch of old amps that I collect, too. I have a few Fenders, Epiphones, and Danelectros, and stuff like that, but probably more Gibsons than anything else. When I’m recording, I take the ones that really record well into the studio and mix them in with my big amps.
Which guitar do you consider your favorite?
Well, I think my ’61 335 would be my favorite over all, even though I don’t perform with it, except when I’m in New York. For performance, I’ve been playing my new ’58 Reissue Les Paul which I really like. I think that in the past couple of years Gibson has been making guitars better than they did for a long time. The ’58 Reissue is my favorite performing guitar, but it’s not a ’61 335.
Do you maintain any sort of practice regiment when you aren’t touring?
Since I tour so much and I’m working all the time, I don’t really worry about it that much. I usually have an acoustic sitting around the house, and occasionally an electric and a small amp. I tend to just putz around on the acoustic more than anything when I’m not working.
Do you tend to do more writing on the acoustic?
Yeah, I do, and I really have to make myself write on electric because some songs can only be written on an electric guitar. I just tend to gravitate to the other direction. I think this is backwards from the way a lot of people work, but I’m one of these writers who writes lyrics first. So I usually wait–probably out of laziness–until I’m lyrically inspired. Then as I’m writing the lyrics down, eventually melodies start coming into my head, and then eventually, I put music to the lyrics. For some reason, I like that method better. It’s easier for me to decide what mood a lyric evokes than it is to do the opposite. But having said that, I’ve been doing the opposite just to shake it up and do things a little differently, and not get into a rut. So on a lot of the songs I’ve written recently, I’d written the music first, and then added the lyrics. That works well, too. A lot of my songs do start out on acoustic guitar because that’s what’s laying around at the time of the morning when I usually write, which is typically between 3 and 5 AM.
How do you warm up for a gig? Do you have any kind of routine?
I warm up a little bit vocally. I pick up my guitar at soundcheck and play it a little bit, but I don’t have any regimented type routine that I do. Maybe I should, but I’m not someone that puts a lot of regiment into my daily routine. We usually do a soundcheck and that gets me loosened up.
Tell us about Gov’t Mule’s live performance on The Deepest End DVD and CDs. What are some of the highlights from the show?
It’s almost all highlights in the way that we just had all these amazing people. There were 25 guest and 13 were bass players. Between the DVD and the two CDs, it captures the whole six-hour show. There are a few overlaps with a few songs that appear on both the CDs and the DVD. But for the most part, it’s different material. The concept behind the DVD was to have each bass player represented for at least one song. There were a few bass players like Paul Jackson and Rob Wasserman who only played one song, so we made sure to include their performances on the DVD. The Dirty Dozen Brass Band was there for a couple of tunes, too. Playing with Victor Wooten for the first time was really cool and playing with Bela Fleck was great. It ran the gamut of Gov’t Mule’s influences from bluegrass to blues to jazz to psychedelic rock to R&B to hard rock. By the time you get through with it, you get kind of a glimpse of everything that we’re moved by.
The biggest challenge not only for The Deepest End live concert, but also for the two studio records, The Deep End Volume 1 and Volume 2, was to pick the right songs for the bass players, and also for the special guests. We were predominantly focusing on the bass players. Since each of these bass players has their own voice and plays with their own strong musical personality, it was really important to give them a song which could be a vehicle for that personality. We didn’t want anyone to anybody to feel like they were just playing a song and going through the motions. We wanted everybody to feel like they were being themselves and featuring or showcasing their own musical voice. So a lot of time went into marrying the right song with the right musicians, more than anything else.
How does playing with different musicians affect you as a player?
When players are improvising, you’re responding to what you’re hearing. Each time a different bass player or different musician steps onstage, you have to alter your role a little bit. It’s not so much something you think about, you just do it in response to what you’re hearing. All these people were such wonderful players that there were no “train wrecks.” Everybody there had command over their instrument and the music that can be made in a spontaneous situation like that is limitless. It’s like when you’re on a first date and everybody’s on their best behavior–trying to impress each other, and not do anything stupid. It’s the same reason that first takes in the studio sometimes turn out to be the best take. There’s something that happens the first time you play a song or the first time you play with a certain group of musicians. When it happens, it’s undeniable, and a lot that kind of stuff went on that night.
How did you go about choosing a new bassist to replace Allen Woody in Gov’t Mule?
We played with over 30 bass players over the last three years, many of which are just legendary. Of course, some of these people are not available for full-time gigs. But when we played with Andy Hess, it had that kind of indescribable chemistry that bands are built on in the first place. Where he fills the pulse with Matt is really special, and we like the fact that he doesn’t sound like Woody, but he has that big tone like Woody. He also feels the groove in the same kind of place, which is really important. We didn’t want an Allen Woody clone. We wanted somebody to come in and be authoritative, play with their own personality, and respect what Woody had done, in the same way that the Allman Brothers didn’t want a Berry Oakley clone when they hired Woody in the first place. I think it’s really important that like Allen Woody, Andy listened to all types of music. He’s very schooled in all these different genres. We played with a lot of bass players that would be perfect in certain situations, but not in others. Andy is just one of those guys that fits into all of them.
What advice would you give to other players on developing their own style and improving their tone?
I would say that as far as developing your own style, the method that most of us seemed to grow up with was playing along with records, but eventually playing your own solos. I think you have to start out learning other people’s solos just to have some sort of repertoire and some sort of ammunition to fall back on. But at some point you’re going to want to start playing what you feel. It’s hard to make that step, but you have to in order to create your own style. And I think listening to all types of music is really important. If you limit yourself and don’t listen to any certain genres, then you’re selling yourself short. I think most of the great solos that we hear have at least one, if not many, influences that you would never guess–something that is so strange that it may not make sense to you. When I say that, I think about B.B. King because he made a statement very similar to that at one time when someone asked who his influences were. He said Django Reinhardt. Most people probably don’t realize that he listened to Django Reinhardt. So it’s that little bit of Django that made him different from everybody else. The more people you listen to, the better chance you stand of creating your own voice. You don’t want to be a jukebox, where you just kind of flash upon one style after another after another. You just have to find out what it all means, and take each of these genres, then figure out what works for you and what doesn’t.
As far as finding that tone, that’s a hard thing because it’s easy to plug a Les Paul into a Marshall and get a great sound that tons of other people have gotten before. But it’s not easy to get your own tone. That’s the hardest thing. A lot of it comes from your fingers–your approach and your touch. You have to search for that something different. It’s great to say you want to sound like Duane Allman or Hendrix or David Gilmour, but it’s people that have their own tone that really are the ones in the long run that are respected and revered. You have to find your own voice and that’s a hard thing to do. You just have to figure out whether it’s guitars, pickups, amps, or turning the knobs. Find out what makes the difference and what works for your ear, but it really comes down to playing with a band. You can’t find your own tone by sitting in your room. You have to find it with a band because each instrument covers up frequencies in a different way. When you find a group of musicians that you like playing with, your tone will kind of find itself based on the sound of the other instruments that are surrounding it.
What advice can you offer on becoming a better songwriter?
Don’t just listen to the songwriters in the genres of music that you love. Search out all the greatest songwriters in every genre and try and find something cool in each of them. People probably have no idea that I listen to folk music, and to Joni Mitchell, Rickie Lee Jones, Elvis Costello, and people like that. Most people don’t know that they’ve influenced my songwriting just as much as Otis Redding has influenced my singing, or Jimi Hendrix has influenced my guitar playing. Take influences from everywhere. Seek out the best people and learn from them.
What have you been listening to for enjoyment and inspiration?
Well I try and discover new music, if I can, and there’s a lot of cool new music out there these days. If I get to that saturated point where nothing satisfies me, I always go back to the things that I consider absolute classics–Dylan, Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, Van Morrison, and Sam Cooke. It’s mostly singers for me, but then I’ll also do the same thing with guitar players. I’ll listen to B.B. King, Albert King, and Freddie King. You can always go back to where it all came from.
The only guitar teacher I ever had taught me for about a month. Then he told me that I should teach myself because he was self-taught. He thought he was just taking my money and that I would do better learning on my own. Well, the most valuable piece of advice he gave me was that if you just listen to the three Kings–Freddie, B.B. and Albert–there’s a world of information there and you can never go wrong.
It’s good to go back and see where it all came from. With B.B. and Freddie, you can see more of the lineage of who came before them and where they got it from. But even though they absolutely established their own voices, and nobody played like them, you can kind of trace it. With Albert King, only God knows where it came from! I’ve never heard anybody play like that before Albert. He’s influenced everyone. I’m not going to sound off about the whole Rolling Stone 100 Greatest Guitarists list, but I am disappointed that Albert wasn’t in the top 100. I’ve always maintained that he is the blues guitar player that influenced rock musicians more than anybody else. He was obviously a huge influence on Hendrix, Clapton, Duane Allman, and eventually on Stevie Ray. There’s no question. So anybody who doesn’t know how important Albert King was needs to go back and discover that.
Lisa Sharken is Seymour Duncan’s New York-based artist relations consultant.