I think that Bruce will go down as one of our most unheralded yet influential musicians, if you look at the whole school of Hampton.

That’s exactly what he wanted. He wanted a low profile, he wanted to be like a minor league coach. That’s the way he viewed himself. He doesn’t tell people what to play. The lessons you learn from him are not about how to play your instrument, in fact, that the last thing it’s about. When you’re playing with Bruce it’s not about any of the things that you think about that can make a better musician, that’s what’s so fresh about it. He teaches you about being a person first, about your craft and your dedication to your craft and your family. It’s really deep, it’s really deep. It’s definitely not about playing bitching solos or any of that bullshit, it’s so much deeper than that.

It’s easy to overlook people who aren’t out there in the public all the time. He didn’t think his thing was for everybody but he wanted it to be for anybody who wanted it. It’s not for the masses unless the masses love it. The point being, he liked to keep a low profile. He had many chances to become more popular. He had many chances to have a high profile and he always leaned the other way. He was the most comfortable in a 200-500 seat club, that’s where he worked his magic. That’s what he wanted to do. I have no idea where any of us would be without him. I mean, as far as the people I grew up with musically: Oteil, Jeff, Derek Trucks.

Later, there was always the next wave of people who came. We all share something special with each other. The Codetalkers were a great band, a great band. These guys could go into a studio and they could do three records in one day. I heard a CD of 25 songs that were all completed and they were ready for vocals, they didn’t have vocals on them. These were songs they were playing and when I was going to play with them they gave me that to learn the songs. The vocals weren’t on there but it was real obvious where the vocals would have gone and I was so impressed. I went to Bobby Lee [Rodgers] and I was like, “Dude, this CD is unbelievable. Where did you guys do this?” He goes, “Oh, we just did that one day over at Jeff Bakos’ studio.” They did those 25 tunes in one day. One day! Who can do that? It was all live and it sounded like a record. The only thing it needed was vocals. I was like, “Man this is absolutely album worthy stuff right here. They did it in one day and it’s mind blowing.”

What was interesting about The Codetalkers is that right when they were at the cusp of gaining some real national recognition, Bruce decided he wanted to move on to something else. Do it think it was that he wanted to go back and coach a new team of players?

That’s a very good guess. I guess your guess is as good as mine. When we got signed with ARU, a week later he was kind of taking steps to leave the band. And we were all like “What? What are you doing?” We luckily talked him out of it. And we stayed together, made two records and then he left. But it was just time.

Every five or six years he needs to do something new, and sometimes his bands don’t last that long. I feel lucky—we were the longest band he had ever had until the Codetalkers came along. And then they eclipsed us, they were together 7 years. I think we were only together 5 or 6 years, so they had a good run with Bruce.

While you’re about to embark on an extended summer tour and I’m sure that’s foremost on your mind, I’m particularly excited about your fall dates with John McLaughlin. What can you tell folks about him who might not familiar with his music?

John’s one of the children of Miles Davis—people like John, Chick Corea and of course there’s lots more. But John went and formed Mahavishnu, Tony Williams formed Tony Williams Lifetime, Joe Zawinul formed Weather Report [with fellow Davis alum Wayne Shorter] and Chick Corea formed Return to Forever. These are all pivotal and they were straight out of Miles’ band. You know, it was out of his urging and in fact we think of Bruce like our Southern version of Miles Davis.

I think with John what you’ve got is somebody who really learned from Miles and never stopped evolving. He’s constantly recreating himself and he’s been very successful. He’s someone who never sits still. He’s constantly changing and putting a new group around himself to do his thing in a different light, which is what Miles did. It’s very inspiring. Actually, it’s beyond inspiring, it’s both terrifying and inspiring.

To me, he’s always been the pinnacle since I became aware of musicians who took their craft to a very high level. As a kid you grow up and you’re listening to music. And then the older you get, you get exposed to different things. When I first heard Mahavishnu, it’s like my whole world changed instantly. It was like my focus changed. It went from first just wanting to play rock and roll—which there’s nothing wrong with and which I still love very much—to all of the sudden practicing eight hours a day to try and learn my craft a little better.

When you’re young you might focus purely on the technical side of things because you hear how fast John and Mahavishnu can play. So of course that’s gonna be one of the things you’re gonna have to work on the most to be able to play any of his music. But after you get past that part of it, you see the depth in the compositions. And the technique is only one element of what he does. His music is spiritual. It’s on another level.

John is citizen of the world, he’s not from one place and he loves music from different cultures. You know he came to New York and embraced the New York sound. Then of course he was into Indian classical music.

So to be asked to play with him, I’m still scratching my head. But he is so wonderful and generous and kind to us. I guess he must be sort of intrigued by the southern faction of whatever it is we’re trying to do. It’s got elements of jazz, it’s got elements of rock, it’s got elements of funk and blues and roots music in it. I guess he finds that intriguing in sort of a curious kind of way. Which is hilarious to us, we’re like, why does he want to play with us? You know, he’s John McLaughlin.

To me, he’s a titan and there aren’t a lot of titans still with us. I have no other word for him.

I completely agree with you. He is a titan, he’s one of the creators, he’s a musical innovator. And he was an innovator at a time innovation was embraced. Nowadays it’s harder to innovate and still be able to work. You know, because if it’s not automatically popular, it’s hard to get gigs and stuff. But yeah, he is a titan. You called it perfectly. It’s amazing, inspiring, you know?

Several years ago we did this gig at Paul Reed Smith’s 30th anniversary event. He asked ARU to play at his event and we were like “Really, you want ARU to play at your respected guitar company’s event, are you serious?” and he was like “Yes, I want you guys to do it.” Then he called John McLaughlin and had him come and play with us. And when we played with him it was pretty happening. He just jumped right in like he had always been there. And he enjoyed it, which really meant a lot to us, of course. It’s pretty intriguing to me that he finds anything worthy about what it is we’re doing (laughs).

Final one: folks would love a quick Widespread Panic update. I’m curious if you have any plans to enter the studio at the end of this year or early next year?

Nothing’s been discussed as far as that, but we’re definitely writing music, everybody’s writing music. People are sending home demos to each other. There are emails coming all the time with “Hey man, what do you guys think of this here?” JB will write a little tune in his studio, he’ll do a demo and send it around and everybody will be jazzed about it. So we would love to go back in the studio. Nobody’s said “Let’s go into the studio at this time or this date” but I’m sure we will. It’s one of the beautiful things about this band, it’s gonna keep going. So we’re gonna do it, I just don’t know when.

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