PHOTOS: Musical stars come out in support of Brian Haynes for Asheville City Council

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A host of musical stars come out Tuesday night in support of Asheville City Council candidate Brian Haynes, including the candidate’s brother, Southern rocker Warren Haynes.  A slew of musicians hit the stages at New Mountain AVL for the benefit jam concert, a marathon music extravaganza that featured an array of incredible talent.

The show was lightly peppered with a couple of political speeches, including one by first-time candidate Brian Haynes, who told the crowd of several hundred people gathered at New Mountain’s outdoor stage that he would work on behalf of residents. Haynes decried the big development he said was overtaking Asheville (especially in the form of hotel chains) and said he would listen to the concerns of working-class voters.

But Brian Haynes mostly remained in the background, as campaign volunteers peddled T-shirts, collected voter information and urged attendees to get out and vote in the Oct. 6 primary. Haynes is one of 16 candidates vying to be one of six people who will move on to the November election in hopes of winning one of three Asheville City Council seats.

The spotlight was firmly on Warren Haynes, who earned his musical chops in Asheville and went on to musical fame playing with the legendary Allman Brothers and then on his own, both as a solo artist and with his band Gov’t Mule. Haynes holds an annual Asheville concert, the Warren Haynes Christmas Jam, every December. That event brings in big stars for a night of music, which benefits the Asheville chapter of Habitat for Humanity. Through the Christmas Jam and its attendees, Haynes has donated more than $1 million to the home-building nonprofit.

That’s a long way of saying that it’s rare to see Warren Haynes in Asheville outside the Christmas Jam. It’s also rare to see Warren Haynes jamming with all the incredible local talent we have here in Asheville. So, for example, Warren joining in with Lyric on a Fugees tune, or Warren jumping in with his nephew’s hip-hop band Free Radio or Warren spicing up the Three Davids trio of David Holt, David LaMotte and David Wilcox is really something special.

These photos of the event are by Asheville photographer Stewart O’Shields for Ashvegas.com.

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