DBT, Atlanta, 11/27

[bruce]

So, I'm gonna be in Atlanta for Thanksgiving weekend. And the Drive-By Truckers are playing the Tabernacle on 11/27.

So, anyone up for going and meeting me and Amy there?

Bruce

[Jack Straw]

i'd be there, if i was in atlanta.

I'll buy you a flannel if you buy me a plane ticket. deal?

[itgirl]

So, I'm gonna be in Atlanta for Thanksgiving weekend. And the Drive-By Truckers are playing the Tabernacle on 11/27.

So, anyone up for going and meeting me and Amy there?

Bruce

I'll be in Atlanta. Because I live here. Do I know who the Drive-By Truckers are?

[ChainGangGuy]

Provided my roommates and I have not been ejected from 1234 Francis, I'll be in Atlanta as well.

[itgirl]

Not that I'm complaining, mind you. Fuck, I saw goddamned Rodeo Christ with Vitriola at a biker bar (although Saratoga Winners really was more like a barn). If I could stand that, I could stand anything.

[itgirl]

So, are you going to have time for Panahar when you're here?

[bruce]

So, are you going to have time for Panahar when you're here?

Maybe. Thanksgiving weekend usually looks like this:

Wednesday: drive all day.
Thursday: eat way way way too much
Friday: sleep, belch, sleep
Saturday: do something
Sunday: drive all day

So, maybe Friday, or Saturday before the show?

The Drive-By Truckers: http://www.drivebytruckers.com. These guys--whom Andrew, whom you met, turned me on to while I was in Atlanta in January--may actually believe that Lynyrd Skynyrd were the apex of human culture. They do loud Southern rock-n-roll, but with a strangely postmodern introspective twist.

For instance, from "Decoration Day":

I never knew how it all got started
a problem with Holland back before I was born
and I don’t know the name of that boy we tied down
and beat till he just couldn’t walk anymore.
But I know the caliber in Daddy’s chest
and I know what Holland Hill drives.
The state let him go, but I guess it was best
cause nobody needs all us Lawsons alive.

Daddy said one of the boys had come by
the lumber man’s favorite son.
He said, “Beat him real good but don’t dare let him die
and if you see Holland Hill run.
Now I said, “they ain’t give us trouble no more
that we ain’t brought down on ourselves”
But a chain on my back and my ear to the floor
and I’ll send all the Hill boys to Hell.

Or, and this is my favorite, "Let There Be Rock" (but maybe you have to grow up Southern to appreciate it):

(Hood / DBT)

Dropped acid, Blue Oyster Cult concert, fourteen years old,
And I thought them lasers were a spider chasing me.
On my way home, got pulled over in Rogersville, Alabama, with a half-ounce of weed and a case of Sterling Big Mouth.
My buddy Gene was driving, he just barely turned sixteen.
And I'd like to say, "I'm sorry", but we lived to tell about it
And we lived to do a whole lot more crazy, stupid, shit.

And I never saw Lynyrd Skynyrd but I sure saw Molly Hatchet
With .38 Special and the Johnny Van Zant Band.

One night when I was seventeen, I drank a fifth of vodka, on an empty stomach, then drove over to a friend's house. And I backed my car between his parent's Cadillac's without a scratch.
Then crawled to the back door and slithered through the key hole, and sneaked up the stairs
And puked in the toilet.
I passed out and nearly drowned but his sister Dee Dee pulled me out.

And I never saw Lynyrd Skynyrd but I sure saw Molly Hatchet
And the band that I was in played "The Boys are Back in Town".

Skynyrd was set to play Huntsville, Alabama, in the spring of 77, I had a ticket but it got cancelled.
So the show, it was rescheduled for the "Street Survivors Tour".
And the rest, as they say, is history.

So I never saw Lynyrd Skynyrd but I sure saw Ozzy Osbourne, with Randy Rhoads in '82,
Right before that plane crash.
And I never saw Lynyrd Skynyrd but I sure saw AC/DC
With Bon Scott singing, "Let There Be Rock" Tour.

With Bon Scott singing, LET THERE BE ROCK!

Bruce

[itgirl]

Some Southerners don't know that the current Skynyrd isn't the original.

[bruce]

Some Southerners don't know that the current Skynyrd isn't the original.

A Southern Man don't need <i>them</i> around, anyhow.

Bruce

[itgirl]

So basically you want me to see some Southern redneck show? Will this be better or worse than Rodeo Christ?

[bruce]

So basically you want me to see some Southern redneck show? Will this be better or worse than Rodeo Christ?

Dunno, I've never seen Rodeo Christ. My guess is "better," though. And it's not <i>really</i> Southern redneck. I mean, it <i>is</i> but it's the kind of redneck who reads Faulkner and James Dickey rather than just swilling beer and watching NASCAR on the TV. And don't sneer that these people don't exist: sure they do--it's just that they keep their intellectualism quite well hidden. And then one day you're talking to some guy about squirrel hunting and before you know it you've found out that he really, really likes Frank Stanford's poetry.

On the other hand, it <i>also</i> works if you just turn your brain off and pretend you're listening to latter-day (by which I mean, "like Skynrd, but written recently", not "after the plane crash-not-really-Skynyrd") Skynyrd.

But I have seen these guys, and they <i>rock</i>. Now, if you don't like to <i>rock</i>, then you probably don't want to go.

Bruce

[gsdgsd]

I'll be around, too. I have no idea what schedule I'll be working that week-- undoubtedly something hellish-- but I'll be around at SOME point.