Mule train rolls into town
Gov’t Mule brought their special brand of boogie blues and roots rock through Houston last weekend, the last stop on a winter tour in support of their latest CD – By A Thread. Warren Haynes and company played two sets and a pair of encores for a packed House of Blues. The band opened the evening with ‘Streamline Woman’ off of 2006′s High & Mighty. Songs played from the new album included ‘Broke Down on the Brazos’, ‘Steppin’ Lightly’, and ‘Railroad Boy’ – the last played with a capo’d Les Paul 12-string. Mule also reached back in their catalog to play tunes like ‘Lay Your Burden Down’ off 2000′s Life Before Insanity and ‘Rockin’ Horse’ from their 1996 debut.
We’ve been fans of the Mule for a while now, but oddly this was the first time we’d seen them live. Warren played a variety of Gibson beauties, including the aforementioned Les Paul, dark wood-grained Firebird, a black SG, a ’59 reissue 335 and more. The amp spread on stage ranged from Warren’s Diaz and Soldano heads to a Marshall/Category 5 head tandem being used by Jorgen for bass. There were a couple of additional Category 5s on stage – including one that appeared to be set up as Matt’s guitar monitor. Like the night before at TSOOL, there was a bit of keyboard mischief, but it appeared to be limited to a bum Line 6 DL-4.
Warren came out early, with opening band Carney, and jammed their closing tune. That band’s guitar playing brothers returned the favor during the Mule’s final song of the night, ‘Lucky’. Check out a few photos from the evening below.
