Live! Drive-By Truckers @ House Of Blues (Boston, 4/2/10)

I once had a friend who got to interview The Hold Steady, and he told Craig Finn that their band and the Drive-By Truckers were the only bands he saw live that year who smiled. That is absolutely still true. Despite how gritty and depressing the Drive-By Truckers’ music can get, Patterson Hood still looks like the happiest person on the planet, smiling ear to ear, seemingly happy to be around and playing music. But Friday night at their show at Boston’s House of Blues, the audience got three bands who smiled.

Each band brought something unique, but could all be described as having a very obvious, joyous connection to sounds of the past. The Truckers, having spent time as a backing band to Bettye Lavette and Booker T, have links more direct than most. Those collaborations highlight the kind of soulfulness that makes them a band worth listening to. They’re not a particularly diverse band, playing in a strain of southern rock that relies on downtrodden stories. Cory, in his review for Ted Leo’s The Brutalist Bricks, asked ““What the fuck: why can’t they just do what I like them for?” Well, the Truckers are the band that has been doing what their fans like them for, nothing more and nothing less. There’s a point where one song intro might sound like another, but their craftsmanship and talent for story songs lends itself to consistent songwriting.

Part of that might be because they have at least two equally strong songwriters. Patterson Hood may be the Trucker most often cited as the band’s leader, but he and guitarist Mike Cooley switched back and forth throughout the night, treating lead singer duties like a baton. Their voices and personalities become clearer on stage: Patterson, an exuberant musician with an ear-to-ear smile; Cooley, a showman more willing to strut to the front of the stage to show the audience exactly how blazing his solos look on the fretboard. Bassist Shonna Tucker got to add two of her own songs to the set: “(It’s Gonna Be) I Told You So” and “Home Field Advantage.” Her songs, heavy in their own right, added a sweetness and further diversified the overall sound. Combined with Patterson’s raspy yelp and Cooley’s craggy voice, the band sometimes felt like a three-headed beast spewing depression and encouragement wherever they looked.

They opened with the one-two punch of “Drag the Lake Charlie” and “Two Dimes Down,” and the set smoked without ever looking back. The band seemed to lean heavily on the recent The Big To-Do -- 6 songs out of 22 -- but they reached back throughout their heavily populated discography over the course of the night. Other than promoting their newest album, things seemed to spread out evenly. There’s something to be said about the strength of their craftsmanship, when just about any random combination of songs can be made into a setlist. Such is the nature of the ever-changing setlist that on most nights, not every song is going to be a favorite, but a few gems and surprises will turn up anyway.

That said, things ended as they should with “Let There Be Rock,” the band’s love letter to concerts and rock stars who died too soon, and a cover of “Rocking in the Free World.” The latter is a fitting end; Neil Young and the Drive-By Truckers both have a knack for taking really bitter subject matter and making it into anthems. “Let There Be Rock” dedicates its verses to concerts by dead rock stars. Perhaps it’s fitting that the last original song the Truckers played reaches a denouement at the line, “Bon Scott singing/Let There Be Rock tour,” while the audience sings along, a bitter, anthemic elegy to the fallen frontman.

Langhorne Slim opened the show with a too-brief five-song set of roots rock, a sort of Otis Redding by way of Blonde On Blonde blend that sounded natural and, more importantly, passionate. While gyrating and stomping around the stage, he and his band fired up the crowd by sheer exuberance. A too-loud kick drum marred the set slightly, for those too close at least. There wasn’t much singing along with his “Ooh ooh ohh” choruses and call-and-response portions, but he took it with a smile. He’d won over a lot of the people around me, at least. “Maybe next time,” he joked.

Lucero‘s most recent studio album feels a bit like something Bruce Springsteen might make if he grew up during the punk era. Live, though, they have a more soulful country-tinged sound. They don’t attack things with a punkish speed, but their midtempo stomp has a heaviness to it that recalls the energy and resilience of punk. Friday night, they proved to be a band with more of a light ska feel, an amalgamation of Americana. Really, if the entire night -- all three bands -- could be summed up, it would be in the phrase “an amalgamation of Americana.”

Drive-By Truckers:

• Official Site
• MySpace
• Last.fm
• JamBase

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About the Author

Jere is not from Chicago. Nor is he from Parts Unknown. But he sure loves to hear things. Follow him on Twitter!

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