AOTW, Killers and Stars

[Cole Younger]

I can't remember exactly when I found out about Killers and Stars. I do remember being excited by the knowledge that there was a Patterson solo album out there but I was so busy going through the Truckers' catalogue and having such a blast getting bowled over by the astounding volume of great songs that it got shoved to the back burner and somehow forgotten. It didn't show up on my radar again until the release of Murdering Oscar. I was reading interviews with Patterson about that record and he mentioned having done one solo record already. I meant to buy both at once but for whatever reason, that didn't happen.

Soon after that my wife and I were in Athens with two of our best friends to watch our Georgia Bulldawgs whip the Volunteers of Tennessee. It just so happened that Patterson was playing a solo show at the Melting Point that Friday night. We got up there Friday afternoon like we always do and I know the show was discussed but for reasons that I can't remember we didn't end up going. I could kick myself as I've seen clips from that show and it was jam up. Once again the songs from Killers and Stars and I just missed each other.

I finally bought the record when we were in Athens for homecoming the year of all the snow and ice. That Friday I picked up a copy in Skoolkids records which sadly I can no longer do. I loved Skoolkids because of their huge section dedicated to local bands and artists. I bought my first Bloodkin record there too. We went to the show that night and soon after getting back to our room, my wife fell asleep. I was worn out too but still way too jacked mentally from the show and sleep wasn't an option. Nothing on TV and I remembered the records I had bought.

I remember having bought at least two others that day but I only remember that Killers and Stars was one of them. I took it out of the bag and opened it up. The strange and wonderful cover art had caught my eye in the store but I examined more closely with a smile on my face. I found the liner notes and I started reading. I don't know if y'all are like me and look forward to the liner notes but I sat there in a chair in the Holliday Inn in Athens and read those liner notes twice. I thought about what I had read and then immediately read them a third time.

Pattersons description of the set of circumstances that served as the impetus for writing and recording the songs on that record as well as the time period in which they were written were haunting to me because I could relate to it in a really personal way. This is a very personal record for him and it is for me too. He described it as his "personal exorcism" record. He went on to explain that the record was done in his house in Athens with him alone on his guitar. The Truckers had just finished Southern Rock Opera. He and his band mates were fighting. His marriage to his then wife had recently come to an end. He was going through a very lonely, stressful, and depressing time and was feeling, "pretty freaked out and isolated." He decided to channel these feelings into song and do some self administered therapy or exorcism through music. Boy could I relate. I sat there in my hotel room still psyched from the rock show I had just witnessed but also being flooded by memories, many of them unpleasant. I shut the liner notes and looked at the starlet on the cover staring back at me. I knew right then, having yet to hear a note of this record that it would be a special one for me. Killers and Stars.

I finished up an enlistment in the Marine Corps on May 11 2004. It was a day that I had been anticipating for a few years and one that I had always thought would serve as the beginning of a really happy time. It's a gift from the Almighty that we can not see what's coming down the tracks. After getting out of the Corps, me and my then wife, moved back to our hometown in Ga. The trouble started immediately. I did two deployments, one in Afghanistan and another in Iraq. I barely beat out a stop loss by the skin of my teeth. I returned home feeling like a stranger. I found that I was having trouble relating to my old friends who had been going to college while I was gone. I also was having that problem with my family. I
Was glad to be out of the Corps but I didn't belong here anymore. I wasn't sure where I did belong.

My then wife and I could barely even be in the same room without fighting. I had to take job working nights. The combined stress of not really knowing what to do with myself now that I was out, my inability to relate to people I had once been so close to, and a disinigrating marriage began to take a toll on me. Within six months of getting out of the Marine Corps, my wife and I were separated and would soon divorce.

In those liner notes Patterson describes the time surrounding the creation of Killers and Stars as very dark and the record itself as "a sparse document to a shitty time." After finding myself single and basically alone, things began to spiral downward. I started drinking A LOT. I did some things I really regret to some good people who were just trying to be nice to me. At that point though, I didn't care. I was angry at everyone and everything for reasons that I didn't fully comprehend and wouldn't until a few years later. I remember telling someone, " I would never commit suicide but I have some idea of what drives people to it." I self medicated with a lot of alcohol and with women. Then I ended up buying a record by a band called Driveby Truckers. My life didn't majically get put back together with the first spin or anything crazy but the music of the Truckers helped get me through a very dark period. Killers and Stars.

I'm conflicted on this record because I realize that Heat Lightning is Patterson's best solo work. But this one is so personal that it will always be my favorite. Patterson said that besides him and his acoustic guitar, Earl Hicks loaned him some recording gear and that was the extent of it. He recorded the songs but didn't think of what he had as a finished record. He did press up some copies of it to sell at some solo shows and then booked a tour in Texas. The details of that are a little hazy but I do remember him giving a shout out to two of the guys from Slobberbone for allowing him to stay with them if I'm not mistaken and just generally looking out for him during a rough time.

He returned from Texas, the truckers embarked on the SRO tour, things began to move a lot faster and he all but forgot about this little record. Every so often he would meet someone who had a copy. He intended to flesh it out a little better but ended up releasing it as it is.

The songs are pretty bleak not surprisingly. There is some great gallows humor there too. In so a lot ways this is very much like Nebraska to me and I mean that in a really good way as that was the only Springsteen record I would listen to for years. The arrangements are spare, the songs are the battered emotions of the writer and the characters he uses to convey what he was going through. Now, for anyone still reading, the songs.

1. Uncle Disney-There is a story that Walt Disney either wanted to or actually did have either his brain or all of him cryogenicly frozen and wanted to be thawed out at some specified date. I don't know of any of that is true or if its just an odd urban legend. Put Patterson takes the strange story and puts it to good use here. I'm just guessing at his motivation for using this as a story telling device but I'm guessing that part of him wished he could take a nap and wake up when things in his life weren't so tumultuous. I remember saying to my cousin one night, "man I wish I could go to sleep and wake up when this is all over." There also seems to be some political commentary here. This record predates the Iraq war but it was just after 9/11 and the beginning of Afghanistan. "Someone will be held accountable for 40 years of decisions made." I love the finger picking on this song.

2. Rising Son-I know that Patterson and his dad have always had a great relationship sans their disagreement over his love of the "chocolate vomits". I don't know if he's talking about himself here or not but he has said his dad didn't want him to become a musician and this song seems to address that. He also talks about not wanting to pass up the pleasures offered him by this life as a musician. I was partaking in the pleasures of large quantities of alcohol and women and was not doing it in a good way. My dad quietly watched, tried to talk some sense into me but ultimately knew I would have to find my way out of it. Rising son? Sometimes you have to sink a while first. There is some great guitar playing here.

3. The Assasin-Wow. I had just left the Corps. It was tough adjusting to normal life. I didnt relate to the narrator in very literal way but I get what Patterson was saying here. He would later give this song to Jason Isbell. It's a disturbing song to say the least.

4. Pay No Attention to Alice-After the bleakness of Assasin, Patterson lightens the mood with some great dark humor with this awesome Tom T. Hall cover. It's a sad but funny account of a man who lives with an alcoholic wife. He almost seem to be throwing up his hands and laughing at her. I came to feel that way too at some point. There is a war reference here too. "Talk about the war I was a coward. Lets talk about good things like fishing and raising hell." I wasn't a coward but I sure prefer to talk about fishing. I can identify with the cavalier "ran the van into a ditch aw man don't sweat it." I reached a point where I didn't care about anything. You get there when it seems like everything has gone wrong. Patterson seems to be expressing that same frustration.

5. Belinda Carlisle Diet-is there a more hilarious title to a song? The narrator talks about heaping chemicals on top of pain rather than dealing with the problems in his life. I guess Patterson has been there too.

6. Fire-Patterson describes the end of a relationship and how ugly it can be. This could be about the end of his marriage or it could be how he was feeling about the turmoil surrounding the band at that time. The narrator takes a certain amount of responsibility for what is wrong in this particular situation. Patterson uses arson, specifically the burning of the narrators home as a really rich metaphor for the ugliness of a relationship running aground. I certainly identify. Been there and done that. "Smells like something burning. The red hot coals of hell. Give them something to talk about and the stories they will tell. About how he was a good man. And how far he fell. But you'll know I'm coming by the smell." Man I have been there.

7. Hobo-this just may be the most heartbreaking song I have ever heard. The story goes that Elvis said Hank Williams' I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry was the saddest song ever written. I agreed until I heard Hobo. Patterson describes the loneliness and isolation that he felt at the time from the point of view of a guy who hops trains. "There was this woman once that I loved a whole bunch but that was ten million miles ago." That was just how I felt. "Now when I die they'll find me in hear. I hope that they bury me some place nice. Away from the noise, away from the ice, away from the things that have haunted me for all of my life"

8. Miss Me Gone-Patterson gets a little more literal here. No burning houses or tales of the hobo life. Just a guy expressing regret over the end of a relationship but also paying tribute to what was good about it and facing the hard truths there. "We just picked a crazy time to run across each others'path. But I'm awful glad we came. There comes a time for cutting losses...I'll be sad but I won't be the only one. You're gonna miss me when I'm gone." Really love the guitar on this one. Probably ties with Alice for my favorite song on the record.

9. Phil's Transplant-Another one about what happens inside a relationship that was once good when one or both people change. Patterson could have been addressing any relationship in his own life. The story is told from the point of view of a man named Phil's wife who seems a little frightened by the change in her husband. This song is like a Stephen King short story. It describes how my first wife must have felt when I came home from the Persian Gulf and it sure describes how I felt when I got back home. She was different somehow too. The guitar on this is downright creepy. It sounds like something bad is just over the horizon.

10. France's Farmer-One Word, CREEPY. Not real sure of where he was going with this one. I think maybe its a rumination on just feeling out of place and out of sorts. I spent a few years feeling like that.

11. Old Timer's Disease-A story of a vet and what the horrors of war can do. People come home and living a normal life isn't easy and the families are all alone in trying to help them deal with it. Me and Patterson are far apart politically most of the time. But the dude is so great on issues like this. "Forty two and my grandad was drafted by the army. They sent him off to fight over in Germany. Left my grandma at home with a brand new baby boy...now grandad's lost his mind cause he'd rather not remember anymore."

12. Cat Power-A really odd song that stands out among a collection of odd songs. The narrator seems angry at a woman. That's all I'm really sure of there. As for me, I was really a jerk to some women who were good to me during my dark period.

And there you have it. Very dark. Very personal. But all these years later the story has a happy ending. Patterson went on the SRO tour. His band released a string of records of absolutely astounding quality. He co fronts the greatest rock and roll band in the world. But more importantly he remarried and is now a father. And me? I got it together too. I quit trying to put Coors brewery and the Jägermeister folks out of business. I still enjoy a beer but its celebratory now. Not done to numb anything. And a few years after things went bad I crossed paths with this hot little country gal I graduated from high school with. Amazingly she was single. We're married now and have the sweetest little baby girl you've ever seen. Life is good. No matter how rough it gets y'all, don't ever give up. Because it WILL get better. Patterson and I are both proof. See y'all at the shows.

[dime in the gutter]

boom!

[John A Arkansawyer]

This is the only one I don't have, and now I sure wish I did.

[Tequila Cowboy]

Phenomenal write up CY! It's interesting how certain records speak to us in such a personal manner that they don't ever let go. Your story on how Killers & Stars is one of those for you is going to stick with me for a while. Way to go man.

For me this is one that I don't put on a lot but every time I do I wonder why I don't listen to it more. It's really a great album. I like virtually every song with The Assassin, Uncle Disney and Miss Me Gone being the standouts for me. I guess if I had to say why I don't listen to it more it's because it's not a record, as Cortez pointed out to me once, to listen to "when the house gets quiet and dark", and yet that's exactly the best time to listen to it. A conundrum. In contrast I can listen to Murdering Oscar & Heat Lightning almost any time or place. Still I love the record and love how each of the solo albums are such distinctly different works.

[gutshot]

Rising Son...one of my favorite dark-horse tunes of the whole DBT-&-related-solo-works catalogue.

Agree with CY on the guitar work.

[Zip City]

Like Jason's version of The Assassin better......wish he still played it live.

Rising Son is amazing

[beantownbubba]

Damn, CY. A tip o' the hat to you. You're gonna blow the "strong silent type" thing if you keep this up.

Proof, if any was needed, that music is much more about emotional connections than technical chops.

[rawkshow]

really good writeup man...i read somewhere (and the lyrics seem to make sense to it) that "cat power" is about chan marshall. no idea about the backstory but she is from the atl area so quite possible that patterson & her ran in the same circles and stuff...

[beantownbubba]

"cat power" is about chan marshall.

Yes, definitely. Meant to say that.

[Cole Younger]

Thanks y'all. Right after I clicked on submit I thought, "aw man I should not have done that. Too much personal information." I was nervous about it. But I really didn't know how else to review this one. It is that personal to me.

I guess my cover is blown bubba. Lol.

Can't wait to see y'all in August.

[Kudzu Guillotine]

Nice writeup, Cole.

I think I mentioned this back when this movie first came out on DVD but it immediately reminded me of "The Assassin". "What good is an assassin who just can't follow through?" Definitely not an action flick but I thought it was a very well executed character study (no pun intended).

[Gang Green]

Cole, great write-up and thanks for sharing your story. Must have sucked to be pulled right back when you thought you were done, but you had to do what you had to do. Funny, your story, obviously, reminds me of two Jason Isbell songs, Soldiers Get Strange and Tour of Duty. Pretty obvious comparisons. I gobbled-up killers and stars a couple of months before Murdering Oscar was released. The first time I saw Jason Isbell and 400 Unit live in the fall of 2009 I got to sit with him at the bar and talk to him before the show. I asked him about the Assassin, which he was still playing live and which he played that night. I said why do you play this song its kind of disturbing. He didn't agree, he said it's allegorical, then we didn't get to finish the conversation. Looking back the message is pretty obvious.

[Iowan]

Really interesting write up on a great, and underrated album. I always enjoy hearing the stories behind what music does for folks.

[Cole Younger]

Cole, great write-up and thanks for sharing your story. Must have sucked to be pulled right back when you thought you were done, but you had to do what you had to do. Funny, your story, obviously, reminds me of two Jason Isbell songs, Soldiers Get Strange and Tour of Duty. Pretty obvious comparisons. I gobbled-up killers and stars a couple of months before Murdering Oscar was released. The first time I saw Jason Isbell and 400 Unit live in the fall of 2009 I got to sit with him at the bar and talk to him before the show. I asked him about the Assassin, which he was still playing live and which he played that night. I said why do you play this song its kind of disturbing. He didn't agree, he said it's allegorical, then we didn't get to finish the conversation. Looking back the message is pretty obvious.

Yeah those two songs are favorites of mine and he totally nailed it. One additional point/clarification. I worded a particular sentence badly. It makes it sound like I was out and then had to go back in and do two deployments. Thankfully THAT didn't happen. I had done my deployments and then come home and that's when things started to unravel. I apologize for the confusion .

[LastLawson]

Damn, now I have to buy this album. Great write-up Cole!

[Gang Green]

I just wanted to say a few words about Francis Farmer since her picture graces the cover of Killers and Stars. I became very interested in Francis Farmer's career after seeing the movie "Francis" with Jessica Lange (I'm sure my interest was spurned by my intense crush on Jessica Lange at the time who had also just stared in Tootsie). Susan Blakely portraid Farmer in a well reviewed TV movie. As we all know Patterson Hood is an intense movie buff, and Francis Farmer is considered one of the great tragedies of the movie and theater industry. She was beautiful, talented and maybe extremely intelligent. There's been several conflicting accounts of Farmer's life, but, at a minimum, she was one who had trouble fitting in, and/or whose behavior was considered odd for the times. Maybe she was crazy, intelligent, rebellious or ahead of her times. According to a couple of books, it was said she had a lobotomy and/or was the used for drug experimentation and was abused in mental hospitals. Not sure if any of this has been proven to be true. Do we really know Francis Farmer?

[brett27295]

There are some days when I think "The Assassin" is the greatest song Patterson has ever written. The line "what good is an assassin who just can't follow through" gives me the chills every time!

There are some killer versions of Jason singing it, both when he was still with DBT and at some of his early solo shows. I have heard a rumor that Jason recorded a studio version for his first solo album, but I've never heard it.

[RolanK]

Outstanding write-up, CY. Reminded me I need to spend more time with this album.

[bovine knievel]

Great job, CY! I'll be listening to K&S now.

[dogstar]

My local record shop owner says that this is coming out for the first time on vinyl at the start of December

[uncle rickey]

Amazon says it'll be released on 11/17 stateside; 180 gram vinyl, with new liner notes by Patterson. Hmm.

[Swamp]

Got mine Friday night! Don't miss DTR. Killer show.
Didn't know about the new liner notes. Reading them now.

[Tyler]

Is this going to hit retail distribution at some point or is it just merch? Amazon doesn't have it.

[Kudzu Guillotine]

Is this going to hit retail distribution at some point or is it just merch? Amazon doesn't have it.

As mentioned above, it's listed at Amazon with a release date of November 17th.

[jimmyjack]

About time!

Now...do I order this from Amazon or will there be a special deluxe package thingie from dbt.com?

[beantownbubba]

About time!

Now...do I order this from Amazon or will there be a special deluxe package thingie from dbt.com?

I'm sure the package will include deluxe guaranteed late delivery.

[headhunter]

This is a no-brainer. I ordered my copy.

[alquina]

Just ordered my copy...can't wait!

[headhunter]

Wow, does this one sound awesome on vinyl. The stripped down nature of this record really sounds beautiful and stark on a turntable.
Even Patterson in the liner notes writes...

"Recently, New West suggested releasing in on vinyl. Lots has been said about how much vinyl sounds on big production records but somehow, to me, it seems to make even more of a difference on lo-fi recordings like this. The physical analog cutting of the lathe somehow takes away so much of the digital harshness, adding a warmth and depth that makes it an altogether better listening experience."

Go buy the vinyl, it is great late year addition to what has been a fantastic year with DBT.

Oh, and in the liner notes, PH notes that he wrote the blurb about the album on the inner sleeve of the record during the Summer of 2014 - in Huntington NY. I know I got to spend that night with a bunch of DBT friends and family at The Paramount 10 mins from my house.

[brett27295]

Picked this up on vinyl this weekend, vinyl is flat and dead quiet. Very enjoyable in this format .