Drive-by Truckers (DBTs) and ‘loud’ are practically synonymous but the 200 people who witnessed this benefit show from 2006 at Plan 9 Records must all be wearing hearing aids by now. Through the years and certainly during that era the DBTs were often quoted as having a ‘three-pronged guitar’ attack. Yet, in many cases herein they deliver a four-pronged barrage of dense, reverberating guitars backing their raw, impassioned vocal delivery of their signature literate songs, 25 of them. The two-hour set features the classic Drive-By Truckers lineup of Mike Cooley (guitars), Patterson Hood (guitars), Jason Isbell (guitars and keys), Brad Morgan (drums), John Neff (electric guitar and pedal steel), and Shonna Tucker (bass) and was recorded live in its entirety at Plan 9 Records in Richmond, VA.
Plan 9 Records July 13th, 2006, was delivered digitally for the first time on July 13th, marking its 15th anniversary. Double LP vinyl and double compact disc editions featuring extensive liner notes written by Patterson Hood will be released on Friday, August 6th. Plan 9 Records July 13th, 2006, was previously issued as a limited “bootleg” version for Record Store Day Black Friday last year. Immediately selling out, the limited version became a sought-after item by fans. The new vinyl version will be available on color vinyl and will feature updated packaging including the original poster art for the performance by the band’s longtime designer, the celebrated artist Wes Freed.
This one has quite a back story. The now-legendary performance served as both a celebration of Plan 9 Records’ 25th Anniversary, but also a ticketed benefit concert for The Harvey Foundation. On New Year’s Day, 2006, Kathryn and Bryan Harvey and their two children were brutally murdered in their home in part of a horrific crime spree that made national news. The Harvey’s were a part of a community that welcomed Drive-By Truckers with open arms and the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment was created by their friends and family to provide music, visual art and performing arts enrichment in the greater Richmond area. Drive-By Truckers’ Patterson Hood would later write the song “Two Daughters and a Beautiful Wife” in tribute to Bryan and his family for 2008’s celebrated Brighter Than Creation’s Dark.
Patterson Hood said in his accompanying liner notes, “Our pay was a case of PBR and two bottles of whiskey. There wasn’t a drop left by the end of the encore. They pushed back all of the record shelving to make room for a little over 200 people and cut us loose to play a two hour plus set. Loose and raggedy at times, yet somehow also tighter than shit. It was by far our favorite show of the year and all these years later, I think it is one of the best performances from that era of the band.”
As Hood says in the liners, this was the last album of the Jason Isbell era. The band had just issued A Blessing and A Curse, a strong but rather uneven album as one might expect from three different songwriters – Hood, Cooley, and Isbell. Yet to most diehard DBT fans it was a disappointment compared to Decoration Day and The Dirty South, both brilliant efforts. It is well documented that the band was a dysfunctional hard-drinking unit during this period. Isbell and Tucker were headed for divorce. Neff left shortly after these dates. Perhaps this show let them set aside the undercurrents of tension at least for a couple of hours as this is clearly their rawest, most unbridled live performance on record (notwithstanding bootlegs). The power is unarguable, but they may have benefitted from mixing that made the vocals more prominent as they are often overwhelmed by the aforementioned guitar barrage.
We know that Hood has long been the principal songwriter and naturally, he has 12 of the 25 but in their democratic way, he shares the mic with six from Cooley and five from Isbell. There is also one early collaborative band tune, and a scintillating cover of The Rolling Stones “Moonlight Mile” (appropriate given so many comparisons to The Stones and the rawness of Exile on Main Street). Five selections come from A Blessing and A Curse, with Pizza Deliverance, Decoration Day, The Dirty South, Southern Rock Opera (SRO), Gangstabilly, and Alabama Ass Whuppin’ all represented. The strongest sequence arguably comes in the second half with four songs from SRO with “Moonlight Mile” sandwiched between Cooley’s “Shut Up and Get on the Plane,” Hood’s “Ronnie and Neil,” Hood’s “Let There Be Rock,” and Cooley’s “Zip City.” It’s all here – the interlocking fireworks power of Cooley, Hood, Isbell, and Neff on guitars with Neff’s pedal steel imbuing more than a few tunes – one of rock’s best drummers in Brad Morgan, the vocal harmonies and pulsating bottom from Shonna Tucker, and an enthusiastic audience who knows these tunes intimately.
The current incarnation of the band still plays loud but in many ways sounds much more refined than this edition. Hood claims this is the best live recording of the band during this era. In terms of live material, this writer prefers Live from Austin, TX recorded two years later with the similar personnel sans Isbell, with multi-instrumentalist Jay Gonzalez. So, technically Hood may be right. As he says, “When you think you have it turned up a little too loud, reach over and turn it up a little bit more.” More than anything, this is testament to the fact that the DBTs were and still are America’s best hard rock band.
One Response
Neff did not leave until almost six and a half years after the Plan 9 show:
http://threedimesdown.com/2012/12/27/exit-stage-neff/