Drive-By Truckers - Patterson Hood Interview

Magnificent storytelling and soul-staining southern rock will reel you through The Dirty South (New West), Drive-By Truckers’ intelligent, rebel roused ode to the mythological South. On tracks like “The Day John Henry Died,” “Carl Perkins’ Cadillac” and “The Buford Stick (The Legend of Sheriff Buford Pusser),” Drive-By Truckers scrape grit off prized local legends, exposing a southernly code of conduct that is possibly outdated…possibly not?

“I love modern day mythology,” says Drive-By Trucker's, Patterson Hood. “The old days brought tales of John Henry and Staggalee, folks no doubt loosely inspired by real life folks, but told through the years with all of the baggage and exaggeration that people add to tales as they pass them down the line from generation to generation. Now-a-days it is all sped up by movies, TV, tabloids and now the Internet. John Wayne, Patty Hurst, John Wayne Gacy, and the like, all compete for our collective consciousness. In the South there has been Bear Bryant, Wallace, Buford Pusser, and Jimmy Carter, who have all become larger than life figures in southern culture, or perhaps represent the South in American culture. As an artist, I have long been drawn to the various sociological aspects of icons and in recent years have made a couple of albums talking about the ones associated with the South and how they have shaped peoples views of this region. I'm also interested in how they have shaped southerners views of themselves.”

Drive-By Truckers looked to folklore surrounding their own Muscle Shoals, Alabama hometown for inspiration. So The Dirty South transports you, Greyhound bus-style, to a county the band describes in it's liner notes like this: “It’s a tough place to make a living. But we ain’t complainin,’ just doing what we got to do. Trying to raise our kids and love our women. Do right by the ones we love. But don’t fuck with us or we’ll cut off your head and throw your body over a spillway at the Wilson Dam.”

But Muscle Shoals’ criminal survival instinct isn't unique. A fact Hood nods to with “Puttin’ People On The Moon.”

“‘Puttin’ People On The Moon’ was written about the economic woes of my home region,” says Hood, “But it could easily have been set in any number of downsized and out-sourced industrial towns in our country. Likewise, this story is largely set in the past, but it hasn't gotten any better in many towns.”

Addressing universal doldrums with beneath-the-Mason-Dixon-line-reasoning is a Drive-By Truckers specialty. The band blares seedy rock about homeland characters, like the guy running numbers because he’s out of work. Mary Alice dying of cancer with no medical insurance. And Daddy gambling on a stump in the woods hoping to change fates’ fortune. Great anthems include “Never Gonna Change,” where the Truckers hail, “We ain’t never gonna change/So shut your mouth and play along,” and “Boys From Alabama.” Other standout tunes include, “Danko/Manuel,” with its heartbreaking refrain, “I ain’t living like I should,” and “Goddamn Lonely Love,” where Hood sings, “So I’ll take two of what you’re having and I’ll take all of what you got/To kill this goddamn lonely, goddamn lonely love.”

Hood is particularly proud of “The Sands Of Iwo Jima,” written about his 84-year-old Great-Uncle who saw terrible things fighting at Iwo Jima, yet somehow came home this amazing person.

“I have spent thousands of hours writing about all of these folks who have screwed up and done some terrible things and I wanted to write about somebody wonderful,” says Hood.

Celebrate the New Year with The Drive-By Truckers at Bowery Ballroom on Dec 31 and Jan 1.

Originally published in The Aquarian Weekly 12/29/05.