Trucker Concert Review

Friday night's DBT concert certainly did not disappoint. In fact, I would venture to say that I've never been so thoroughly rocked. Read on for a recap of the evening's highlights:

6:15ish - Chris and I had dinner/drinks at Tyler's. Chris has two baby girls at home, so it was quite an ordeal that he was able to get out of the house for an entire evening AND not have a curfew. I suspect that he had to save up - and cash in - quite a few chips. For the sake of continuity, I'm going to leave out all of the times Chris called his wife Lori to "check in". (Zing!)

7:15ish - More beers at Tyler's. We were joined by fellow Bronto Adam and his friend Chris and his special ladyfriend Lauren.

8:15ish - Chris and I walked up to the Carolina Theater. Walking through Downtown Durham at night always proves dicey and this night was no different. We walked past a severely chemically-altered woman on the corner near the old Safari Cuisine that was either A.) quacking like a duck or B.) calling Chris and me "cracker". It was hard to tell...

8:30 - The opener - Bobby Bare, Jr. - goes on. Wow - did he suck. I mean, his band seriously did not sound good. To his credit, I checked his stuff on iTunes and it is actually pretty cool. Also, it is worth pointing out that they performed a song called "The Flat-Chested Girl From Maynard County" and that Bobby Bare, Jr. is the son of - you guessed it - Bobby Bare, country music semi-legend.

9:30ish (?) - Truckers on stage. They opened with "Lookout Mountain" (< link to iTunes snippet) - a great selection to open the show. Next, they played "Cottonseed" (a surprising selection), "The Day John Henry Died" (a GREAT one), and "Puttin' People On The Moon" (my favorite DBT song to sing on my way to work). They continued with songs from "The Dirty South" and "A Blessing And A Curse" - their two latest records - for the first portion of the show.

They closed out their set with my two favorite old school Trucker songs "18 Wheels of Love" - a song detailing the true-to-life FACTS Patterson Hood's mother's relationship with a trucker named Chester and their marraige at Dollywood...by a Porter Waggoner look-a-like - and "Steve McQueen" - Patterson's homage to his childhood hero. "Bullit was my favorite movie that I’d ever seen. I totaled my go-cart trying to imitate that chase scene."

For their encore, they played an acoustic set that included "Outfit". I convulsed with glee as I sang along. After all, it is (possibly one of) the greatest song(s) ever written.

They closed the show with a fury of "Let There Be Rock", "Shut Up and Get On The Plane", "Moonlight Mile" (Yes - the Rolling Stones' "Moonlight Mile") and "Buttholeville". By this point, they were all completely drunk and had taken their rawking to super-human levels.

12:15 - By the time they closed the set, I was deaf and numb. I would rank the concert as #2 all time - just below the Stones in C-ville and just above the two nights of Wilco at UNC.

Takeaways:

  • John Neff should become the official 6th Trucker, or at least a permanent concert fixture. His work on the pedal steel added a great texture to the songs and helped center to the tonality while Patterson, Jason, and Cooley wanked on their guitars.

  • The acoustic set was a treat. It was a great change of pace, it highlighted the great vocal harmony in the group, and gave my ears a few songs to rest...

  • Jason Isbell is seriously talented. Not only is he the best natural vocalist of the 3, he can seriously play the guitar.


So that wraps it up, I guess. Thanks for taking part in my first ever "themed" week. I promise to return to more intelligent discourse in the very near future. I also promise not write about DBT again for a while...