The New/Old South: Drive By Truckers

Intro: The Essential Drive By Truckers
How about a band with not one, but three verified songwriting aces’s? Sounds good to me. And no, they're not the Beatles.


I'd like to diversify my music content a bit, and discuss some other artists that are not Bob Dylan.

Who are the Truckers? They hail from the music hotbed of Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and are known to generally play alt-country, rock, folk, and blues. Their de facto leader is Patterson Hood, but the band has been strongly influenced by two other songwriters: Jason Isbell and Mike Cooley. Isbell, who is much younger than Hood and Cooley, was separated from the band sometime around 2007. Just like the Beatles, the band seems to follow the rule "if you write the song, you sing it". DBT is deeply rooted in, yet critical of, southern culture. In fact, they invented the idea of “the duality of the southern thing”. The band works hard, aren't afraid to play guitar solos, and do not shy away from the politics of the working class.


Patterson Hood: Patterson has a lovable persona: the comic book nerd from the south that feels he needs to constantly prove he's the smartest person in the room. He's outgoing, ambitious, and talkative.
Mike Cooley: Cooley is the mysterious outsider, writing slick songs and exploring the wicked side of human nature. He’s down to earth and prefers to stay out of the spotlight. Some argue he’s perhaps the sharpest songwriter in the group. Hard to say.

Jason Isbell: Isbell is a natural. He studied literature and poetry, is not the least bit cocky or arrogant, and has a sweet as molasses southern drawl. Though he is no longer in the band, he has continued to churn out stellar songs on a regular basis. He very publicly recovered from alcoholism sometime around 2011, and one can definitely tell from his songwriting: he went from flying high to shooting through the stratosphere.

I'll write more extensively on each song, but here is my list (broken down by songwriter) of the best songs in the DBT family. The list is in chronological order, somewhat. In total, there are 24 songs, 8 for each artist. 


Patterson Hood
Mike Cooley
Jason Isbell
Heathens
First Air of Autumn
Alabama Pines
The Righteous Path
A Ghost to Most
Danko/Manuel
Three Great Alabama Icons
Bob
Never Gonna Change
Used to be a Cop
Sounds Better in Song
Dress Blues
Sands of Iwo Jima
Perfect Timing
Different Days
Depression Era
Primer Coat
Relatively Easy
12:01
Cottonseed
The Life You Chose

Comments

  1. It would be nice if you included more info, like year of release and which record contains each song. Good conversation starter though, thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's actually a great idea. I plan on working on a future post with that information. Thanks for reading! For now, I'd say the best DBT album is either 2008's Brighter than Creations Dark or 2003's Decoration Day. As for Jason Isbell, his solo albums "Something More than Free" and "Southeastern" are amazing.

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