In an interview with David Fricke (whose Trey Anastasio interview is in the current issue of Relix) for Rolling Stone, guitarist Derek Trucks touches on a variety of topics, including his partnership in the Allman Brothers Band with Warren Haynes and how parting ways with the Allmans took him a few tries.

“When I was out playing with Eric Clapton in ’06, that was the first time I sat down with the band and said, ‘This is going to be my last [Allmans] tour,” Trucks says. “I want to focus on my solo band.’ I was trying to find a way out that was comfortable with everybody, because it’s family and friendships. I basically gave my notice a few times. And the family loyalty pulls you back in.”

It was the music, too, that kept Trucks with the Allmans until last October’s final run at the Beacon Theatre. But, as Trucks explains, it couldn’t last. “I love that material as much as anyone on earth. But I knew you can only do it so many times and feel like you’re making a statement. That’s one of the reasons I put my Derek Trucks Band aside [in 2010]. It wasn’t out of gas yet, but I could feel it coming. I could feel my interest waning.”

Trucks also delves into his relationship with Warren Haynes as the two Allmans guitarists keeping the tradition alive. “Warren and I dove into the Allman Brothers gig at different times, but we both dove into it pretty hard and headfirst. There was so much love and respect for the Duane parts, the Dickey parts, the whole history. That was a pretty big book that we absorbed, and we lived it for awhile.”

According to Trucks, he was a big proponent of making a final Allman Brothers album, but the others, including his uncle and drummer Butch Trucks, weren’t as enthusiastic. “My uncle would always say, ‘This is a live band.’ He hated being in the studio. And I get that. But the Allman Brothers made some great studio records. To me, the one big missed opportunity with that [last] incarnation was not making another record.”

We’ll never know what could have been, but Trucks is confident in the quality that the band could have produced. “Between me and Warren, we would have crushed an Allman Brothers record.”