MUSIC- Drive By Truckers ‘American Band’
Straight out of Georgia, Alabama, everyone’s favourite musician’s on the road are back with a truly accomplished rock album- as poignant and political as it is wonderful to hear.
Drive-By Truckers
American Band
ATO Records
30th September
This could well be the most fitting album title you’ll ever come across. Depending, of course, what other album titles you have already, or are destined to, come across. Stupid points aside, with this outing everyone’s favourite Georgia-born road rockers have very much struck gold.
Not just a clever name then, we veer from the uptempo rock and rollers like Surrender Under Protest, to more journeyman fair like Once They Banned Imagine, poignant, not to mention relevant lyricism runs through every line and verse. Perhaps best shown at its most personal and intimate with When The Sun Don’t Shine, and at its most universal and far reaching on the references to murders of minorities at the hands of U.S. police in the epic, anthemic What It Means, the complete work delivers a powerful message.
without ever becoming preachy or self-righteous. At once a celebration of Americana, and a rejection of much of what the country represents today, it’s one of those rare beauties. And yet it achieves this without ever becoming preachy, self-righteous, or remotely unappealing. In an era wherein anything remotely political is seen by many corners of the music industry as outsider art, and to be treated as such, it’s reassuring if nothing else to see a straight up rock band making comments about the subjects that need comments.
