Take The Low Road

Southern rockers The Drive-By Truckers hit the dirt.

by Shaun Brady

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Published: Jul 10, 2007

rock/pop

REFLECTING: DBT have been going acoustic with their The Dirt Underneath shows. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

By now, The Drive-By Truckers have long since overcome the goofy novelty of their name, 2001's Southern Rock Opera and three ensuing albums (and, to a lesser though not unworthy extent, their earlier efforts) having made the sobriquet synonymous with well-crafted rock 'n' roll songwriting and intelligent lyrics offering an insider's perspective on the Southern experience, often flavoring red-state storytelling with blue-state politics.

But the name is relevant when it comes to DBT's live shows � JD-fueled, marathon rawk monstrosities with a gale-force triple-guitar attack that can leave an audience feeling like they were on the receiving end of a semi-trailer hit-and-run. Those powerhouse gigs have gotten bigger, louder, harder, and ... a little bit tiresome to the guys who've been playing them almost nonstop for several years.

Enter The Dirt Underneath, a series of low-key acoustic shows that DBT has been touring over the last couple of months, workshopping new songs for their work-in-progress new album and connecting with audiences on a more intimate level, swapping stories and telling jokes in a rock band replica of a front porch jam session.

"If nothing else," says guitarist/singer Patterson Hood, "it gives us a chance to spotlight different aspects of this band that have been there all along, but might've gotten overshadowed by the big spectacle of all these loud guitars [laughs]. It'd kinda gotten a little too much about that for me, anyway."

The shows were inspired by a 2001 gig the band did on a farm in North Carolina, part of a series of informal house shows. "We got invited to do it right after Southern Rock Opera came out," Hood recalls. "We basically sat around in a semicircle in this big oversized living room and played the record in its entirety, opening it up and telling stories. We got really drunk and played for about four hours. Somebody sent me CDs of this thing last fall, and there was a spirit about it that I kinda got homesick for."

The time had come for a reinvention of the band anyway, after the departure of third guitarist/singer/songwriter Jason Isbell, who joined shortly after the release of Southern Rock Opera and recently broke away to pursue his solo efforts. (Isbell actually hits town three days before his former bandmates, promoting his great new album, Sirens of the Ditch [New West], at the North Star.)

Hood calls the split "something thats time had come. When Jason joined the band he was 22, a lot younger than the rest of us, and just really coming into his own. It was like this huge shot of adrenaline to all of us, and over five years and three records he outgrew being one of three songwriters and one of three guitar players in a band like this. It was time for him to take the big plunge and have his own band and his show and his songs."

The latest DBT line-up features the core duo of Hood and his less gregarious alter ego, Mike Cooley; the longtime rhythm section of drummer Brad Morgan and bassist Shonna Tucker; guitarist John Neff, who has often recorded and occasionally toured with the band on pedal steel; and, most surprisingly, Spooner Oldham, most famous as Neil Young's regular keyboardist.

Hood hopes that this version of the band can last, but admits that "Spooner's the wild card. He's 64 and Neil Young could call him on the spur of the moment and he'd need to go do that, because Lord knows we can't pay him what Neil Young can pay him. I'm just really honored that he's willing to use his down time to go play with us so much. He's got such a unique thing he does. He doesn't do all this fancy stuff, it's very in the pocket, almost subtle, you almost don't even know he's there except if you take it out you'd miss it. This band has never really had as much of the subtlety thing going on, especially live, as we're able to do right now, and that's a lot of fun."

(s_brady@citypaper.net)

Drive-By Truckers play Tue., July 17, 7:30 p.m., $20-$30, World Café Live, 3025 Walnut St., 215-222-1400, www.worldcafelive.com.

 

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