Drive-By Truckers

Patterson Hood is back in the studio making the rock record that might just excite you to the most in 2010. The reason is that his band, The Drive-By Truckers, are only limited by their imagination, he says, and that they’re ready to simply make an “in-your-face” record that will inform the live show.

Building on last year’s Brighter Than Creation’s Dark, the boys are in a new era for DBT with a live DVD from Austin City Limits, a new b-sies collection called Fine Print and a solo record for Hood – Murdering Oscar - all hitting store shelves in ‘09. It’s a cleaning of the back room closet to make room for a new sound and life stage.

We recently spoke with Patterson to get the details on the new album, why Murdering Oscar took so long to come out and what we can expect as the band moves forward.

SSv: What kind of details can you give us about the new Drive-By record?

Patterson Hood: It’s a big rock record. A big, big rock record. It’s epic. I think it’ll be out in February and I think it’ll be a good one.

SSv: What’s the feel heading back into the studio this time around compared to other times?

Patterson: We’re more comfortable than ever. This time around, things are much easier. The band had a lot of growth last year. When we made Brighter Than Creation’s Dark, I thought it was a huge growth for the band in so many directions. It was about really learning how to play well with each other, letting the music breathe, things like that. This time, we just came back and just rocked the fuck out of it. This is a much more aggressive rock record that hopefully utilizes the lessons that we learned the last time around. It’s gonna be fun. It’s going to be fun to take it out on the road, too. It’s going to make for a very good show, that’s for sure.

SSv: How prepared are you heading into the studio or do you save most of the work for the studio itself?

Patterson: We went in with a lot of songs. Everyone pretty much demoed the songs at home by themselves and then brought them in and we played them for each other. We worked them up pretty quick and recorded them pretty quick and just did one or two takes. It’s been a lot of fun that way.

SSv: I want to talk about Murdering Oscar a bit. The songs have been around for quite a while, but do you think that time was vital for them to come out in the right way?

Patterson: Yeah, I suppose so. I guess it’s a better record for everything that happened to it, even though a lot of that wasn’t my choice. I’m stubborn enough of a guy that I like to get my way and my choice, but I have to acknowledge that it’s a better record than if it would have come out in ‘05. [Laughs] If nothing else, that time allowed me to write “Pride of the Yankees” which is such an important song for that record and it was a little after the fact. It was worth it all for me to have it on there.

The timing hasn’t been good for me on the nuts and bolts level for having time to properly go out and promote this record. I just haven’t had that opportunity. I went out for a little less than three weeks in June and that’s pretty much all of the time that I’ve had to devote to it. That’s a shame because I do think that’s a really good record and I think if I had six months to go out and work it, I could sell a lot more of them and do it more justice.

So that’s a bummer to me, but I do love what I’m doing. I’m very busy with my band and the Truckers are having an amazing run right now. The band’s playing better than ever, and we’re excited about our new record. We’re playing shows with Booker and having fun with that. We’re putting out a lot of other things that have been in the pipeline for a while, like the Austin City Limits thing and The Fine Print, which is all cool.

But I do wish I had a little more time to devote to the album, because I am so proud of how it turned out. It was a lot of fun and it was great to go out with that band. We’re all really good friends, so it’s a great camaraderie.

SSv: What specifically was different from this year’s release versus if it would have come out four years ago?

Patterson: The biggest change is “Pride of the Yankees” because I wrote that after the fact. “Randy” was written later too and added in, but I don’t think it was as essential as “Pride of the Yankees.” That song is just so important. It may be the song I’m most proud of anything on it, even. We took our time mixing it and I did sing a lot of it again.

In the course of time making that record and then coming out, I think I really grew as a singer, particularly with making Brighter Than Creation’s Dark. That was the first Trucker record where we really took the amount of time and care with the vocals that we wanted. In doing that, I think I really learned a lot about how to sing in the studio and really put a lot into a song. So I got to go back and utilize some of that to the service of Murdering Oscar.

SSv: It seems that having Murdering Oscar out there and the ability to finally put “Pollyanna” out there…

Patterson: It’s been that kind of a year. With the Austin City Limits thing out as well, it’s just been that kind of year. We wanted to do a live album for a number of years. We did Alabama Ass Whuppin’ in ‘99 and then put it out in 2000, but the band has changed so many times and the only thing out there with this band is the Live at the 40 Watt from the Dirty South Tour and, honestly, it wasn’t a particularly good night. Even at the time, I didn’t think that performance was up to our standards. It was in the bottom 10% of all we played that year. That was one of the lesser shows.

So as time passes, it’s grown on me because it documents that era. It holds up as that. But I’ve never been really proud of that show. So it’s good to have a DVD come out and captures the band on what I consider a pretty “on” sort of night. We were on fire at Austin City Limits. We were just so excited to be there and all of that added up to it.

SSv: Did you hesitate to release the 40 Watt gig, even at that time?

Patterson: It’s probably the only thing we’ve ever put out with our name on it… you know, I’m not ashamed of it, but we did it to make somebody else happy rather than to make ourselves happy. It’s just the way that it was. The reason the show was filmed was because we were filming a video that weekend and it was the only reason we could do it. We had a film crew come in for the video for “Never Gonna Change” and since they were already there filming to gather footage for that, the label had the idea to put it out and record that show.

At that time, relations already weren’t great, but we thought it was something that we could be agreeable about and just say ‘yes’ and just do it and maybe it would make relationships better. But I’ve never been totally in love with the record and so now that Austin City Limits is out, it’s the better record. Then again, I’m glad there is some documentation of that era of the band because that era is no more and the band is very different now than it was in ‘04, so I’m glad you can buy a DVD that captures even an off-night during that time. After all, an off-night from that year is still a pretty good show.

SSv: With The Fine Print, the solo album and the live album, it seems a new era. Then you say you’re doing this new album that’s rocking harder than ever. Does it seem like that blank slate to you?

Patterson: Yeah, I hope so. I really hope so, because I definitely feel that way. Brighter Than Creation’s Dark was very literally a new era for the band making that record and a lot of what we were going through that time. What we’re doing now is not such a huge departure from that record as much as taking the things we learned making that record and making a new type of record with that. We have the same line-up that made the last record, so we’re just taking it and making it better.

We made the last swampy record and learned those lessons on how to get that sound. So we want to take those lessons and apply that to making a big, loud, in-your-face kind of record. It’s been a long time since we’ve made one of those kind of records and they’re certainly nothing like the one we’re making now.

SSv: Does that come with a new sense of freedom? That’s what it sounds like.

Patterson: Sure. Absolutely. The line-up of this band, we could do anything with it. Everyone is so versatile and limber and flexible. I really think that for the first time, our only limitation at this point is our imagination. It’s whatever we can think of to do, we can pull it off right now. And that’s such a great feeling.

SSv: Yeah, that’s a place a lot of bands don’t get to.

Patterson: Yeah, we’ve been together 24 years. We’ve had some really good bands along the way. I’ve got nothing but good things to say about every era of this band. I’m very proud of what the original line-up did and what the four-rock four-piece did and Southern Rock Opera changed our lives and moved us to a different size thing. Then the three albums and five years with Jason Isbell was just magical. I couldn’t be prouder of that, especially Decoration Day. I think that really holds up.

But right now is something different altogether. It’s something that I’m really proud of and really excited about.

*Illustration by Jason Horning

No related posts.

Tagged as: Georgia, Southern Rock

blog comments powered by Disqus