Warren Haynes on the making of ‘Million Voices Whisper’, his first solo album in over 10 years

Warren Haynes’ new solo album, Million Voices Whisper, is out now, and it’s his first solo record in more than 10 years.

The Gov’t Mule frontman tells ABC Audio that one of the reasons he decided to make another solo record after all this time was because he’d been writing so much since the pandemic, noting that most of the songs on the album “were written in the past two or three years.”

“Usually if I write a handful of songs that seem to work together but don’t seem like Gov’t Mule songs, I start getting an indication that it’s time to make a solo record,” he shares. 

Haynes says that making a solo record isn’t all that different from making one with Gov’t Mule, in that he uses the same approach, “which is us side by side in the studio, looking at each other while we’re recording live, as live as possible.”

He adds, “The biggest difference would be the musicians themselves and the way everybody is interpreting the songs.”

Million Voices Whisper features already released singles “Life As We Know It” and “Day of Reckoning,” featuring Lukas Nelson and Jamey Johnson. And there’s also a very special track, “Real Real Love,” featuring Derek Trucks, which is a song that was originally started by the late Allman Brothers Band leader Gregg Allman, but never finished. 

“I wanted it to be as if he were there and I wanted to write the music the way he would approach it, even down to the vocal melody and the way I chose to sing it,” he says of his approach to finishing the tune. “It came about really quickly and easily, and Gregg’s presence was there for sure.”