Baggage: Essential DBT # 6 (Hood)
"Baggage", the last song of DBT's most recent release American Band , is Patterson Hood's tribute to the late Robin Williams. Per usual, Hood is able to use an event, character, or person as a highway to open up the land and explore additional themes. Here, Hood relates William's tragic suicide to his own struggles with depression. A stark electric guitar riff opens the song and seems to almost stand there as a monument in the desert. It's a powerfully sad riff, and is eventually accompanied by Cooley's desert flare of a lead guitar. The band fills in with a slight key change during the chorus. Hood starts the song by singing "I was listening to the radio/ When they said that you were gone/ Already feeling more than a little down/ Mood swings run rampant/ On both sides of my family/ Like an albatross I carry around" . Again, Hood is able to weave together diverging narratives to paint a masterpiece. Great song, indeed. Here it sung here over ...