Twenty-three years ago, the Drive-By Truckers released Southern Rock Opera. It was the third studio album for the fledgling band and has since become one of the greatest albums of all time. The Truckers have long been known to wear their hearts, beliefs and political views on their sleeves, but Southern Rock Opera is where they brought it all to the forefront.
Although proud Southerners from Alabama, founding members Patterson Hood (lead vocals, guitar) and Mike Cooley (lead vocals, guitar) were not blind to that region’s long and checkered past. To embrace what they loved about the South required them to also acknowledge its faults. As Hood so aptly sang in “The Southern Thing,” it was the “duality of the southern thing.”
Twenty plus years on and Southern Rock Opera still resonates today. Unfortunately, the duality is no longer limited to the South; it’s now an American thing. For all its greatness, America is a country flawed. It’s a country divided. Divided by race, gender, sexual orientation and politics. It’s easy to be proud of our glory, but can we “stare down the shame”? Sometimes I fear it’s too much to ask. The tensions seem too high and the lines drawn too deep.
Music, however, is often the great equalizer. And for two and a half hours on a beautiful November evening in Chicago, it was just that. With the exception of two songs (“Moved” and “Cassie’s Brother”), the Truckers revisited the entirety of Southern Rock Opera – albeit in a slightly different order and with some additional songs of protest and social change mixed in, such as “Ramon Casiano,” “Surrender Under Protest” and “The New OK.” Interspersed throughout the songs, Hood was not afraid to draw parallels between the issues addressed in Southern Rock Opera and those that still permeate through America today. Did he or the crowd solve any of our societal problems in a single night? No, but from the reaction of the crowd, there wasn’t a single person in attendance who was afraid to stare down the shame. It’s at least a start.
All images: © Derek Smith / High Voltage Concert Photography for American Blues Scene
