A new team of Truckers on the road, eager to rock 'n' roll

Patterson Hood, the de facto leader of The Drive-By Truckers, is feeling good about making music again.

Such has not always been the case.

"This band has been going 12 years, and during that time I've been through just about every emotion a sane or insane man can think up, as well as going through a bunch of band members, brain cells and a round or two of wives and domiciles," Hood said in his thick Southern drawl, the result of being born and raised in Alabama and coming of age in Athens, Ga.,

"Being in a rock 'n' roll band is dysfunctional by nature, but ours might even be a special case. There are times we don't like each other, but we always love each other. We've finally learned to embrace our flaws. Hell, we've turned most of them into songs. And I feel revitalized -- born again in the rock, if you will, pedal-to-the-floor, ready to roar. Here recently, we've been doing the best shows of our lives -- and we done some pretty fine shows in our time."

He laughed. "Or least the parts I can still remember. Some were that good."

Hood is as Southern as cotton gins, backwoods whisky and fat possums sprawled on a two-lane blacktop highway. Music is the family trade; his father, David Hood, was the bassist for the famed Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section, an exceptional group of musicians that has backed everybody from Aretha Franklin and Wilson Pickett to Traffic and Bob Dylan.

"I probably saw stuff I wasn't supposed to, did things I was told not to, and heard a lot of amazing music that I didn't fully appreciate for years. I had to protest my roots to come to celebrate them."

No band in the last 30 years has so effectively celebrated Southern musical traditions -- integrating the punk ethos of the 1980s -- as have the Truckers. Entire albums, ambitious albums, have been defined by the band's love of loud guitars and the often shadowy heritage of the Deep South, a place of odd dualities that exists by its own rules and maintains its own mythology.

Such Truckers' albums as Southern Rock Opera (2002), Decoration Day (2003), The Dirty South (2004), and this year's Brighter Than Creation's Dark drew near-unanimous praise from critics around the world, besotted by the band's hard-rocking attack, the dark tales of Southern living and the superb songwriting of Hood, Mike "The Stroker Ace" Cooley and, for a time, Jason Isbell, who left the band before Brighter Than Creation's Dark.

The period leading up to Isbell's departure -- he was then married to the band's bassist, Shonna Tucker -- is not one that Hood recalls with fondness. Multiple marriages splintered, the road did indeed seem to go on forever, and, despite lavish critical praise, a loyal fan base and the tired band's forge-on work ethic, money was not being made.

Cooley sarcastically said in a 2004 interview that "we're not in the music business, we're in the T-shirt business." Only one of the band's eight albums has sold more than 100,000 copies. "I have never received a royalty check, but I know we've sold albums," Hood said. "That's like asking me to understand something that is not understandable. We stayed afloat by playing live and merchandise sales. And when you stay out on the road, everything starts to get crazy.

"The sound of A Blessing And A Curse (2006) is the sound of a band on the verge of breaking up, trying to find common ground, and find each other again."

In 2007, the band came off the road to "take care of business and deal with everything," Hood said. Isbell left as his marriage to Tucker ended -- he is one of seven players to have left the band since 1996. Everybody retreated, renewed or restarted home lives, had some kids -- then decided to do a short acoustic tour, "The Dirt Underneath Tour," with the legendary Spooner Oldham on piano.

"We didn't know what would happen," Hood said. "What did happen is that we reinvented ourselves in front of an audience. It was a cathartic experience, and one that I am proud of having done. We learned to take everything that rolled our way on its on terms.

"It was a different dynamic when we went in to do Brighter Than Creation's Dark. John Neff, who had been playing pedal-steel with us, moved up front to guitar. Shonna started contributing some really good songs and has emerged as a great singer who brings another dimension to what we do. And we have started bringing a friend of ours, Joe Gonzalez, out to play keyboards.

"Brighter Than Creation's Dark is a different album, in a way, for us, but I think it is our most consistent and is easily my favorite. The fans seem to love it."

Hood said that the band plans to start recording a new album in January. In the meantime, the band is heading out on the "Rock And Roll Means Well" tour, a manageable tour (in three-week increments) with The Hold Steady. It promises to be the sort of evening of inventive, narrative and heartfelt music that is emblematic of all that is great about rock 'n' roll.

"A good time will be had by all," Hood said. "Each band, though different, shares a certain attitude -- and we intend to flaunt it with ferocity."

If you go

The Drive-By Truckers and The Hold Steady will perform as part of their "Rock And Roll Means Well" tour at 8:30 p.m. Monday at the Lincoln Theatre in Raleigh. Tickets are $23. Visit www.catscradle.com or call 919-967-9053.