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Words by Dennis Cook
Drive-By Truckers, Son Volt & Curt Kirkwood
05.06 :: The Fillmore :: San Francisco, CA
Patterson Hood - DBT :: 05.06 :: By Andy Tennille |
If my radio were stuck on this music, I wouldn't mind. This thought burst into my head early in the Drive-By Truckers' performance during a ballsy,
retrofitted "Bulldozers and Dirt" from 1999's Pizza Deliverance. The Truckers, along with Son Volt and
Meat Puppets main man Curt Kirkwood
, proved there's plenty to be said for rotgut right, well played, well crafted rock that speaks to the daily
ache
with which we all live.
Given the unenviable task of opening solo for two powerhouse bands, Kirkwood strapped on his weather-beaten
acoustic and dug a fork into our collective consciences. Always skilled at probing things in the strangest, most
enlightening manner, Kirkwood continued his trajectory into the singer-songwriter territory of Peter Case and Kevn Kinney – rockers gone quiet who've "seen that pot of gold" and are still chasing it.
Indifferent at first, the crowd warmed especially when Kirkwood got around to "Lake of Fire," known to a generation
from its inclusion on Nirvana's MTV Unplugged session. He offered Puppets classics like "Up On The Sun"
mixed with tracks from his recent solo debut, Snow, a swell bit of introspection produced by longtime Dwight Yoakam collaborator Pete Anderson. The
man who gave us cynical slogans like "Who needs actions when we have words" plowed through a brief set marked
by parched vocals and dexterous picking. When he broke a string, he defused the restless crowd by saying, "You
think we're wasting the precious moments of this set? We're all dying."
Jay Farrar opf Son Volt
By Bob Reuter |
That no bullshit veracity permeated the whole evening, emerging more darkly with the Truckers and with a
ray or two of sunlight with Son Volt. After a year of touring behind the magnificent Okemah and the
Melody of Riot, Jay Farrar's
newest incarnation of Son Volt has gelled into a ferocious unit that teeters beautifully between tensed muscle and
ragged abandon. These guys have the knife-edge of The Who's Live At Leeds - raw power and unvarnished glory cut by undeniable
tenderness and disappointed wonder.
Everything off Okemah was thicker and more expansive than the studio versions. Allowed to evolve live,
songs like "6 String Belief" and "Atmosphere" now tear the roof off the building. The highlight of their take-no-
prisoners set was a tempestuous "Medication," which conjured - and equaled - Neil Young and Crazy Horse at their ragtag best. Fragrant as the green San
Francisco haze inside The Fillmore,
"Medication" managed to be simultaneously brutal and psychedelic. It's enough to make you send the band tequila
and mushrooms and hope they churn out their own Tonight's The Night.
The last section of Son Volt's performance veered into breezier spaces, a modern version of the sound Willie Nelson made on Atlantic Records in the '70s.
Fan favorites like "Windfall" reached out and opened us up to something believably hopeful. Farrar excels at
spelunking the black corridors of the heart to find the parts that aren't broken. He reminds us that there's still a
today and tomorrow even if we can't quite shake our yesterdays. Backed by the best line-up Son Volt has ever had,
Farrar is shining very brightly these days. It's with barely contained anticipation that one looks forward to their
showings at big summer festivals like Bonnaroo and High Sierra.
Drive-
By Truckers :: 05.06 :: By Andy Tennille |
Taking nothing away from the earlier acts, the night belonged to the Drive-By Truckers. Standing below a
creepy fanged moon and flanked by undead vultures created by longtime album cover artist Wes Freed, they looked
like trouble before they even opened their mouths. Like a heartbeat in the womb, bassist Shonna Tucker
and drummer Brad Morgan cradled us before the vast smashing assault of opener "Feb 14" landed us in
the curdled emotional muck in which they specialize. With natural grace, this band navigates the stickiest situations,
giving us something to sing about while our ex drives off with the last of our cash and what remains of our dignity.
They've worked our shit jobs, lived our messed-up romances, and survived outside their dreams for longer than
anyone should have to. There's no band alive I'd rather buy a beer.
Just before launching into "Aftermath USA," the Faces homage off their latest slab, A Blessing and a Curse,
Tucker encouraged the ladies up front to flash her. I was back by the soundboard so I didn't see if any women
offered up their boobies, but the Truckers throw the kind of party where you sort of expect to see some flesh.
Earthy road warriors, DBT encourage us to take a load off, to drink more than we might normally drink on a school
night, and to shake it without worrying about what anyone thinks.
Drive-By Truckers :: 05.06 ::
By Andy Tennille |
With three superlative singer-songwriter-guitarists (Patterson Hood, Jason Isbell, and Mike
Cooley), additional guitar mojo from pedal steel magician John Neff
(Barbara Cue), and a rhythm team rivaled only by My Morning Jacket's Two-Tone Tommy and Patrick Hallahan, there's almost too much to like.
Throughout the show, different appealing facets caught my attention. At one point it was the switchblade mean,
compact solos Cooley was tossing out. He's a leather jacket-clad bonafide guitar hero, and every time he
stepped onto the lip of the stage, folks went nuts. Other times it was the soaring, bruised-but-not-beaten voice of
Isbell. The live setting bettered the album version of "Easy On Yourself," and he broke hearts on
"Goddamn Lonely Love," a classic weepie that should be on every jukebox on earth. Isbell has a barroom perspective
mixed with urban sophistication, the bastard child of Merle Haggard and Lou Reed, who walked ably in his ancestors'
footsteps at this gig.
Isbell
& Hood - DBT :: 05.06 :: By Andy Tennille |
It is Patterson Hood who most often serves as the lightning rod for our attentions. There's no one who
loves what they do more than Hood. You can see the realization of his blessings all over his face. He's in a great
band that plays just what they want to bigger audiences all the time. You couldn't pull the grin on his shaggy face
off with a pair of tractors. As downright bleak as much of their material can be, it's presented with joy and a resolve
to keep standing up no matter how many times they get knocked down.
The Truckers frequently rumbled with the snarl and justified disgust of punk. A kid near Isbell with a GBH shirt and
a mohawk pumped his fist, chanting every word with a gusto that harked back to my own youthful wildness at Black
Flag and Dead Kennedys shows. What the Truckers do is more melodic, more finessed than punk, but it retains the
spirit. It's similarly working class but with just enough book learnin' to be truly dangerous.
With the wind at their backs, they leapt off "Lookout Mountain," providing a glimpse of a suicidal mind in its last
moments:
If I throw myself off Lookout Mountain
No more pain my soul to bear
What to eat, what to wear
Who will end up with my records?
Who will end up with my tapes?
Who will pay my credit card bills?
Who's gonna pay for my mistakes?
Patterson Hood - DBT :: 05.06 ::
By Andy Tennille |
My new punk buddy roared along, his eyes shining like he'd found Nietzsche sitting on the back of a dinged-up
pick-up truck. The feeling was only intensified by the off-the-skids encore of "People Who Died." Originally by
The Basketball Diaries' author Jim Carroll from his landmark 1980 album Catholic Boy, the song
leaps and moans with wounded excitement when DBT play it. It speaks to the influence New York City artists like
Carroll, The Velvet Underground, and other punchy city bands have had on them. The longer they keep at it, the less
the Truckers resemble the "southern rock" tag that follows them around. What this night in San Fran proved is
they're one of the purest, finest rock bands around. Leave out the qualifiers. They don't need 'em, and neither do
you.
JamBase | San Francisco
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