cortez the killer wrote: I missed the part where you were attacked and I think it's safe to say that pretty much everyone on this message board who has a leaked copy will be purchasing at least one copy of HLRinD. I would be more skeptical of the casual fans who downloaded a leaked copy actually purchasing the album. Those that feel the need to lecture or admonish those on this board for having a leaked copy need to park the tall horses they are riding and stop preaching to the choir.
I probably didn't make my point well, but I wasn't lecturing or admonishing anyone.I guess I am old-school and prefer to wait for the CD's official release date. I just think that the internet has ruined the anticipation of waiting for a CD to be released.
Sorry for the feathers I ruffled, I was just wanting an honest discussion.
Respectfully, Relocated Okie
For whatever it's worth, I'm also waiting to hear the album on the 11th. It's not a moral stance and everyone that's been on the board long enough to know me understands that. I just think it's more exciting to hear a new album on the day of release. If I listen to it now it takes all the excitement out of that first spin for me.
Well said Kudzu. My boxers had a difficult day when the green onions made their appearance. I'm sure yours will too next Tuesday.
You are entitled to your opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.
- DPM
dime in the gutter wrote:i'm sure this info has probably already been posted...but i'm lazy.
who plays on this record? was it all recorded in a few sessions or over a longer period of time?
jay gonzo? ezb? neff? barbe? daddy hood?
or more unusual suspects?
i hear banjos and other strings. who's that?
I have GarageBand on my computer so I decided to record a rough sketch of the album in my office, off from our kitchen at our house. The new songs nearly sequenced themselves into a near narrative and I started passing out my GarageBand demos to various friends and relations and received near unanimous positive feedback from it.
David Hood is a session bass player who played on tons of those great Muscle Shoals soul classics back in the day. He played bass on The Staple Singers’ classic “I’ll Take You There” as well as hits by Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Bobby Womack, Bob Seger, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson and Etta James. He is also my Dad and he came over to record with me last fall and absolutely outdid himself. His playing on the title cut is just stunning and we had an amazing time working together.
David Barbe, who has partnered with me on almost everything I’ve done for about a decade now, co- produced and played bass on the rest of the album.
Kelly Hogan has long been one of my favorite people and I knew I wanted her to sing on my album. She has just recently recorded an album of her own and she and I had attempted to co-write a song for it. She sent me a set of lyrics to an unfinished song she was working on about our friend Vic Chesnutt. I loved her lyrics and set about re-writing it and turning it into a song called “Come Back Little Star” which I then sent back to her to complete, but alas she didn’t get it finished in time to make her album and upon deciding to do my album, asked her if I could finish it for my album and she agreed. She came down to Georgia and sang on it and on “After The Damage” which I also wrote with her voice in mind. Upon singing her takes she could see through the glass into the control room what she described as “A Festival of Teeth.”
As always, Brad Morgan played drums and just keeps getting better and better all of the time. As a lot of the songs were piano based (and since I’m just not a very good piano player) I was fortunate to have Jay Gonzalez playing Andy Baker’s grand piano (on indefinite loan to Chase Park Transduction) as well as Wurlitzer, accordion and Mellotron. John Neff came by to play some spot-on pedal steel and we even got Cooley in to play banjo on a couple of tracks.
My love for the Denton, Texas band Centro-matic is well known and once again I was fortunate to have Will Johnson and Scott Danbom in for a few days each to play with me. Will came in October, played some guitar and did some stunning singing. Scott came by in August and played upright piano on “Leaving Time”, then came back in early December and played the fiddle. I had always heard cello on some of these songs and for the first time got to play with Jacob Morris (Madeline, Moths and Old Smokey).
I am listening to "After The Damage" right now. I know I will probably be accused of hyperbole and being totally over the top but I'm going to say it anyway: "After The Damage" is as great as anything on John Lennon's Plastic Ono Band primal scream album. Jay's piano playing is what tipped me off. So atmsopheric.
I have nowhere else to go. There is no demand in the priesthood for elderly drug addicts
Disappear and The title track are what get stuck in my head the most. I mean like all night when I'm sleeping, I can keep hearing them. David Hood's bassline is just so damn groovy.
My other favorites are 12:01, After the Damage and Come Back Little Star. Top album of the year for me. Patterson's songwriting and singing are on a whole new level now. I keep playing it over and over.
It took until today, but it finally hit for me. This is the album of the year. Shit, album of the past two years. Patterson's in a groove here. Pulling punches at every turn.
The fiddles, banjo, and piano really make this work musically. Lyrically, when isn't this guy fucking you up? "Untold Pretties" is just a lyrical sucker punch. Much like "World of Hurt" it don't need no stinking melody.
The first 5 songs on this album equate to the strongest first half of an album I've heard in years. This just stirs up so many feelings in me. Its a perfect late summer/early fall albums that hits at your feelings of regret, loss, guilt, and anger. God damn/bless this thing.
12:01 Leaving Time Disappear (can't get that chord progression out of my mind) Better Off Without After the Damage Better Than The Truth Depression Era Heat Lightning Come Back Little Star
Clams wrote:I might be off here, but i get the feeling that Better Off Without and Pollyanna are about the same girl.
The album is about two periods in the artist's life: the early nineties when he hit bottom emotionally and the present day. In Pattersons' own life, in the early 90's he was married to wife number one. Today he is married to Mrs. Hood, the mother of his children. (Supposedly there is a wife number two around somewhere but including her would have made the album totally confusing. I think she is the subject of the song "Your Daddy Hates Me" but I digress.) So, the songs about the early 90's marriage would be based on the same woman as "Polyanna". The songs based in the current day are based on the same woman as "Santa Fe", "Back of a Bible", "I Understand Now", "Mercy Buckets","Daddy Needs a Drink" and all of the other family related songs Patterson has written since BTCD.
I have not reached any conclusions but I believe "Better Off Without" is one of the songs on the new album that deal with both periods in the same song. The point is that the narrator is still the same person, marriage is still marriage, and your demons are still your demons. The difference is that at this stage in his life he is better able to cope with himself which is what makes it work, though this marriage is equally challenging, if not more so, than his failed marriage. The real challenge is that he is committed to making it work even though for an artist solitude is probably the ideal state. Fewer conflicts.
I have nowhere else to go. There is no demand in the priesthood for elderly drug addicts
Clams wrote:I might be off here, but i get the feeling that Better Off Without and Pollyanna are about the same girl.
I'm thinking Somethings Gotta Give.
If salt is what she craves, why am I so bitter?/Said that its the things I do, about me thats attracted you, but if I started doing something else what would we have left?
Leaving off "Untold Pretties" & "Fifteen Days"? Insane. "Pretties" is my favorite track. I gotta admit I didn't really care for "Fifteen Days" at first, but I absolutely love it now. I love some mellotron.
Clams wrote:I might be off here, but i get the feeling that Better Off Without and Pollyanna are about the same girl.
The album is about two periods in the artist's life: the early nineties when he hit bottom emotionally and the present day. In Pattersons' own life, in the early 90's he was married to wife number one. Today he is married to Mrs. Hood, the mother of his children. (Supposedly there is a wife number two around somewhere but including her would have made the album totally confusing. I think she is the subject of the song "Your Daddy Hates Me" but I digress.) So, the songs about the early 90's marriage would be based on the same woman as "Polyanna". The songs based in the current day are based on the same woman as "Santa Fe", "Back of a Bible", "I Understand Now", "Mercy Buckets","Daddy Needs a Drink" and all of the other family related songs Patterson has written since BTCD.
I have not reached any conclusions but I believe "Better Off Without" is one of the songs on the new album that deal with both periods in the same song. The point is that the narrator is still the same person, marriage is still marriage, and your demons are still your demons. The difference is that at this stage in his life he is better able to cope with himself which is what makes it work, though this marriage is equally challenging, if not more so, than his failed marriage. The real challenge is that he is committed to making it work even though for an artist solitude is probably the ideal state. Fewer conflicts.
"Better Off Without" is from the 90's. If you look earlier in the thread, I posted a clip of him performing it in 97.
Athens, Georgia certainly has a rich musical history. But it seems as though since the passing of Vic Chesnutt, it’s his name and influence that seems to pop up more often than anyone else’s from Athens. Do you see or feel that at all?
Absolutely. I think years from now, people will look back on this generation of musicians and bands and Vic’s stuff will be singled out. I really believe that. A future generation will discover him in a similar way that to how we’ve discovered Nick Drake. Drake’s music is so well-known now that it’s almost mainstream. I don’t know if Vic’s music will ever become mainstream, but it will be recognized as great literature. To me, he’s like Emily Dickinson, where he’ll be revered and people will study his work. I thought that even before he passed away.
When I first moved to Athens, people were constantly talking about Vic, and when I finally went to see him play, it was easy to see why he was thought of as the best writer in town. His loss was profound for Athens and for me, because he and I had become friends. It’s still a sad, sad thing and it’s still hard for me to believe he isn’t around, but his songs are, so that means he really is still around in that special way. The song on the new record that Kelly Hogan and I co-wrote, “Come Back Little Star” is about Vic. We all still miss him.
Never going back to Buttholeville. (Good luck with that!)
Smitty wrote:Leaving off "Untold Pretties" & "Fifteen Days"? Insane. "Pretties" is my favorite track. I gotta admit I didn't really care for "Fifteen Days" at first, but I absolutely love it now. I love some mellotron.
Pretties is stunning, IMO. Perhaps the most emotionally provoking track on the record.
Fifteen Days is definitely my least favorite though.
Listening to this record I really cannot come up with a favorite and least favorite list. IMO, the album needs to be listened to in its entirety to "get" just like Southern Rock Opera. The songs seem to "speak" to each other and the resulting conversation does not happen when each cut is isolated. Also, there are plenty references to other Drive By Trucker songs in the lyrics and I believe that these are not only intentional but meant as signposts to steer us in the right direction when considering this record. While Go Go Boots had what we referred to as the "accidental theme" there is probably very little that is accidental on this record.
Maybe in a year I might come to the conclusion that a certain song does not "fit". IMO, "Moved" is a good song but at the end of the first act of SRO it feels more like an appendix and that the first act properly ends with "Zip City".
I have nowhere else to go. There is no demand in the priesthood for elderly drug addicts
Iowan wrote:Fifteen Days is definitely my least favorite though.
I really like this one...what with the catchy upbeat washboard thing going on throughout and how it's kinda the complete opposite in feel and perspective from the opening track of 12:01. Its about missing home and wanting to get back to something...hope...optimism...etc... as opposed to going back home to something that's dead, where Pollyanna no longer resides.
Last edited by GuitarManUpstairs on Sat Sep 08, 2012 11:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
Never going back to Buttholeville. (Good luck with that!)
My "least favorite" is "Betty Ford" and I still love it. I agree that it should be listened to in it's entirety but I love the fact that it doesn't have to be - most of the songs stand just fine on their own.
Smitty wrote:Fifteen Days is definitely my least favorite though.
I really like this one...what with the catchy upbeat washboard thing going on throughout and how it's kinda the complete opposite in feel and perspective from the opening track of 12:01. Its about missing home and wanting to get back to something...hope...optimism...etc... as opposed to going back home to something that's dead, where Pollyanna no longer resides.
Yup - at first I wondered why it doesn't open with "Leaving Time", the more obvious bookend to "15 Days", but you summed it up nicely.
