Drive-By Truckers with The Old 97s – The Phoenix Concert Theatre (Toronto, Ontario, Canada – November 2, 2013)

Old 97’s and DBT barnstorm through TO in thrilling double bill

For this music fan, Saturday night’s Toronto two-for of the Drive-By Truckers and Old 97’s was a double-bill to kill for.

The Old 97’s ripped on through like a Texas tornado first. One minute  there. The next, they were gone. They left their musical mark. After a trademark southern welcome of “Hey Everybody,” the band broke right into “504.” From playing “shitty little bars” around their Dallas home – as they sing about in this rollicking number from their debut Hitchhike to Rhome (1994) – to a major-label deal on Elektra, and now back to their new home on ATO Records, through all the typical music industry highs and lows, what has never ebbed is the band’s passion to play live. As guitarist  Ken Bethea told me after the band’s barn-burning one-hour and 15 minute set, that’s where the money is made. Twenty years since these country-punk rockers started this musical ride, the band carries on with the same bravado.

Rhett Miller, with his trademark windmill guitar strumming on his acoustic, shook his hips like a gringo Shakira. At one point, Miller asked the crowd, “Anyone here a fan of Bob Dylan?” This lead into Miller’s take on Dylan, “Champaign, Illinois,” a tune from The Grand Theatre Volume One. Introducing “Let The Whiskey Take The Reins,” from the same record, Miller said: “Sometimes I make good decisions, sometimes I make bad decisions, and sometimes I leave it to a higher power!”

The Merle Haggard classic “Mama Tried,” which the band recorded on their debut disc, sounded as good when sung by bassist Murry Hammond as when Haggard first penned this hardcore country song. 1997s Too Far To Care was also well represented with “Big Brown Eyes,” “Niteclub” “Barrier Reef” and “W. TX Teardrops.” They closed with a raucous version of “Time Bomb,” that left the concertgoers wanting more.

Miller told Rolling Stone last week, speaking of the band’s next record, “we are not going gentle into that good night.” The band’s barnstorming performance in Hogtown last night backed up this sentiment famously penned by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas. The passion and swagger is still strong. The songs sound just as good – or even better than that night more than 15 years ago when I first discovered the band at The Horseshoe Tavern. The Old 97’s still have a lot of music and passion burning inside. Here’s hoping they return to Toronto again soon.  

Following their set, Miller, Hammond, and Bethea chatted with fans as if they were old-time friends. For nearly 40 minutes, they posed for pictures, shared tales from the road and life as touring musicians, and signed autographs before the Drive-By Truckers (DBT) took the stage.

It’s clear most of the crowd came to see DBT. By the time the Southern rockers arrived, copious cans of beer had been consumed. Testosterone teemed in the air. One female fan said to another arriving earlier in the evening, “Nice to see another woman here.” The statement was appropriate. Like most DBT shows, the males dominate. The more than 1,000 in attendance crammed the stage and stood four or five deep in the balcony. Buddies swilled Buds and sang along at the top of their lungs to every song.

From the opening chords of Mike Cooley’s classic “A Ghost To Most,” from Brighter Than Creation’s Dark, DBT brought the same passion as the Old 97’s just with a little more noise. Through all the line-up changes over the years, the same brand of southern-friend hard rock remains. As do the same poetic songs fueled by hard liquor written by Cooley and Patterson Hood. And, just like the Old 97’s, the faithful fans inspire them to keep this ride going.

Fists pumped in the pit. Fans flung requests like rockets throughout the show. DBT rewarded attendees with more than two hours of hits and passionate playing. Highlights included: “Marry Me” from Decoration Day (2003),  and “Where the Devil Don’t Stay” and “Lookout Mountain” from The Dirty South (2004).

Shortly after midnight, Hood laid his guitar down on the stage. The band exited to chants of “DBT.” The guitar tech put his hand to his ear to get the crowd to cheer louder, but it wasn’t necessary.

DBT returned for an encore of a half-dozen songs that included a cover of the Rolling Stones “Wild Horses,” followed by two more sing-a-long numbers: “Let There Be Rock,” and “Hell No I Ain’t Happy.”

Nearly four hours after this double-bill to kill began, this fan sure left happy — happy to have heard two of my favorite bands sharing the stage on the same night. And, happy too, that rock ‘n’ roll, like the Old 97’s, and DBT, is alive and well in Toronto, and nowhere near ready to go quietly into that good night.