Gov't Mule playing 'Dark Side of the Mule' set at St. Augustine show on Saturday

Rock band Gov't Mule has recorded more than 100 original songs and put out more than a dozen albums in a career dating back nearly 30 years.

So why is the band planning to dedicate the entire second set of Saturday's concert at the St. Augustine Amphitheatre to playing Pink Floyd classics?

"The audience loved it and kind of demanded it," bandleader Warren Haynes said in a phone interview last month. "It's coming from the audience more than anything else."

The band routinely works cover versions of other artists' songs into its setlist, but for this show they'll do one set of originals, take a break and come back for a "Dark Side of the Mule" set.

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Haynes said it goes back to 2008, when Gov't Mule chose to do a night of Pink Floyd songs for a Halloween show. They had previously done similar Halloween shows featuring the music of Neil Young, Black Sabbath and the Who, but something about that Pink Floyd set struck a chord with fans, who called for a repeat. The band has played Dark Side of the Mule shows several times in the subsequent years, including several this summer to mark the 50th anniversary of Pink Floyd's landmark "Dark Side of the Moon" album.

For the Pink Floyd set, Gov't Mule will expand from four pieces to eight, adding sax player Ron Holloway, multi-instrumentalist Jackie Greene and singers Machan Taylor and Sophia Ramos. "It's a really cool unit," Haynes said.

The setlist changes with each "Dark Side" concert, but each includes a laser show, in keeping with Pink Floyd tradition. "I don’t think we have the flying pigs this time, but the laser show is pretty awesome."

Gov't Mule has played more than a dozen "Dark Side of the Mule" shows over the years, but Haynes said St. Augustine's will be the last one.

"St. Augustine is the very last 'Dark Side of the Mule' show," he said. "As of now, we’re saying never again. We never thought we’d do a second one, so for now, we’re saying never."

Haynes wouldn't say if he's invited any special guests to sit in with the band for the St. Augustine show. "It’s the last show, so I’m not ruling anything out."

Haynes has a knack for singing other people's songs. He'll take a song originally sung by Gregg Allman, Ronnie Van Zant, James Brown, Tom Waits, John Lennon or Pink Floyd's David Gilmour and Roger Waters and make it sound like it was his all along.

"It’s a nice challenge to sing someone else's music in their key and pay respect to the song," he said. "My criteria for doing a cover has always been that it was a song that I wish I had written or that I had always wanted to sing or a song that we could put out own spin on and make our own unique thing."

For the Pink Floyd songs, Haynes said he sings them the way they were recorded. "We stick a little closer to the original versions, out of reverence for that music."

Gov't Mule is working in a new bass player, Kevin Scott, who joined earlier this year, and promoting two albums, "Peace ... Like a River" and 2021's "Heavy Load Blues," which were recorded simultaneously but don't sound like it. Haynes said the band is working in two or three new songs at every show, but they never play the same setlist twice.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Gov't Mule bringing 'Dark Side' to St. Augustine Amphitheatre show