Is there one song that made you a fanatic?

[oilpiers]

Like many of the artists of the past 15 years that I am a big fan of, I found out about DBT via the internet. I followed the threads of genres on Rhapsody and discovered them. Never, ever, have I heard them on the radio. I was intrigued by the name, and listened, and was struck by some songs that made me think they were a novelty band. Think Drag the Lake Charlie, You and Your Crystal Meth, and Bob. On first listen they sound like parodies because they are so real. I remember the first time I heard "The Three Great Alabama Icons". I thought it was so different, it "sounded" like a novelty song, but the message was unlike anything I had ever heard in my life. It was mesmerizing and gives me chills to this day. When you first listen to it you don't even realize what a fantastic musical backing the amazing cultural analysis the protagonist is chirping about has. That was when I realized this was a band to take serious. I someday hope to tell the writer what the impact of this song had on me.

[Kudzu Guillotine]

Not really. The first song I heard by them was the acoustic version of "Nine Bullets" from Revival Vol. 2: Kudzu n' Hollerin' Contest. That certainly caught my attention but not to the point where I listened to it on repeat or anything. It wasn't until I joined the Guitartown email list in the Spring of '99 and met some like minded folks that I took more of an interest in the Truckers. Not long afterwards, I was sent review copies of Gangstabilly and Pizza Deliverance. Listening to those over and over again for the next month or so is what made me a fan.

[GW in IA]

I bought SRO in July of '02 based on a Rolling Stone review, and the dumb luck that the one (now gone) record store within a 2 hour drive happened to have a copy. Days of Graduation intrigued me.
Rain soaked streets like a candy wrapper.
The first song ends with dead kids and Freebird. My ears were all kinds of pricked up listening for details at the end.
10 years later My wife and I took that same drive up to see her family, second time I have ever been in that stretch of interstate.
I was, no shit, able to pick out the curve in the road we were on when the intro to Ronnie and Neil hit.
Now that I've swam in all things DBT for a while, its not usually near the top of my song list, but its the one that made me a fanatic.

[RolanK]

Like GW I also had a very strong reaction first time I heard those two songs opening SRO. I guess there was no way back after that. However, I guess what made me a real fanatic was the following months; discovering album after album of great music. Taking in a little at a time. My favorite album and songs change all the time. Right now it's probably PD and GG Allin. Also suddenly got hooked big time on Zoloft the other day. I liked it before as well, but now it's like I hear it in a different way. The fact that this is still going on after 3 years or so is probably what makes me a fanatic.

[dogstar]

First time I'd ever heard them. After this it was a slippery slope to fanaticism. Plus I think CG and UR also contributed to tipping me over the edge.

[RevMatt]

There were a handful that made me a fanatic. "World of Hurt", "Zip City", "Let There Be Rock", "Goddamn Lonely Love", "Tornados" and "Daddy's Cup"

[bovine knievel]

Heathens

[Daddy_played_poker]

Lookout Mountain kicked my ass immediately.

[beantownbubba]

Oddly enough, it was "Outfit." As I've described before, my introduction to DBT was w/ Decoration Day. The band caught my attention immediately with "The Deeper In" (is this song really about what i think it's about?, I said to myself w/ eyes bugging and jaw dropping) and every song just pulled me in deeper. But there are a lot of songs on the album and while i loved the album from the first, I didn't really jump on one or 2 songs the first couple of times through - it was more the overwhelming nature of the whole that first hooked me. The first individual song about which i said "holy shit!" and replayed immediately w/out letting the album play through yet again was "Outfit." It was by no means the last one but the subtlety and depth of the song as well as the way it describes so specifically yet so universally and exactly the mood and message Jason intended to convey just knocked me on my ass. It wasn't until later that I started learning about the band and discovered that this little ditty was by the band's third singer and writer, lol, but I thought that was kind of impressive in its way and that encouraged me to dig even deeper into the band's catalog (not that i needed much prodding at that point). And the rest, as they say...

[Clams]

For me, it wasn't any one song. It was the whole thing - the rawness, the stories, the places, the characters, the rock opera, the pedal steel, the baxendale tele and the les paul gold top, the bottle of Jack, the bad assness, the volume, the wes freed art. Like I said, all of it.

[jr29]

The first song that knocked me on my ass was "Panties In Your Purse". To be more specific, the line that killed me was "you had your stockings in your hand, panties in your purse, it was 10am, all the neighbors heard". I listened to it constantly for about two weeks. At the time everything in my life was in pretty good order, but I would listen to that song and for the 4 or 5 minutes it lasted my life seemed in disarray.

[Smitty]

the first song I was absolutely crazy about was "Angels & Fuselage"; the song that actually made me fanatical was probably "Heathens".

[Swamp]

Ronnie and Neil

[Duke Silver]

Daylight, of all songs, was what convinced me to check them out on The Dirt Underneath tour. (I had no idea Isbell was already long gone by then.) Cooley opened my first show with Carl Perkins Cadillac, and I was hooked for life.

[Iowan]

Marry Me pushed me to full blown fanatic status.

[Tequila Cowboy]

Marry Me pushed me to full blown fanatic status.

Marry Me reeled me in. The Living Bubba got me in the boat with a mighty thud.

[Beaverdam]

I think Dead, Drunk, and Naked after I first got into SRO!

[TW_2.0]

Patterson singing "Wallace" during TDU tour.

I had purchased and listened to SRO and TDS at that point, but that was my first time seeing them live. And up until that point, I was only a minor fan.

Even though "Wallace" is not even close to one of my favorite DBT songs, I'm from Alabama, and that version pushed me over the edge into obsession. The story telling, the aesthetic, the chorus. All of it.

[LastLawson]

Danko/Manuel interested me, Where the Devil Didn't Stay made me a fanatic.

[Kevidently]

I got into the band with "Birthday Boy," which someone put on a mix CD for me. I listened to that sucker for a year before buying the greatest hits. "Outfit" and "The Living Bubba" grabbed me at once, and I started downloading samples of all the albums. Weirdly enough, it was "Where's Eddie" that tipped me over. Loved the raw emotion and female voice among these male songs I was hearing. I knew then I had to buy everything. It's not my favorite song anymore - I even dig a lot of Shonna's other songs more - but it's the one that convinced me that this was a band I needed in my life.

[Iowan]

Marry Me pushed me to full blown fanatic status.

Marry Me reeled me in. The Living Bubba got me in the boat with a mighty thud.

GB and PD were the last DBT albums I bought/heard. I was fully on board prior to those albums, but they certainly drove home the Truckers' unquestionable brilliance.

[brett27295]

I don't know if it made me a fanatic, but my first favorite song was Carl Perkins' Cadillac. I became a fanatic listening to the albums, the live shows on Archive, and finally seeing DBT live. Once I did that....it was over lol.

[bnzz]

It was the first time I heard them....I was messing around the house with the Americana Music channel on Comcast in the back ground. I heard this jangly guitar deal with a story about running away with the bridesmaid and I stopped dead in my tracks and said what in the hell is that? I sat down and listened to the whole song thinking how in the hell have I never heard this band. Went out and bought DD that day.....never looked back