Drive-By Truckers Expand 'Southern Rock Opera' For Special Reissue

05-07-2024

(BHM) Drive-By Truckers will celebrate their landmark third studio album, Southern Rock Opera, with an expanded new 3xLP edition arriving via New West Records on Friday, July 26.

Southern Rock Opera - Deluxe sees the now-classic double album remixed, remastered, and re-sequenced to include a third LP featuring two sides of additional studio material and live recordings. The supplemental LP comprises Side A - Betamax Guillotine, featuring three songs recommended to play between the original album's Acts I & II including the previously unreleased "Mystery Song." The third disc's Side B - Live In Atlanta (2001) collects four tracks recorded November 24, 2001, at The Earl in Atlanta, GA during the legendary Southern Rock Opera Tour, including the unreleased bonus track, "Don't Cockblock the Rock." Southern Rock Opera - Deluxe is housed in a foil-stamped rigid slipcase with the original album packaged as a 2xLP set in gatefold and supplemental LP packaged in a separate jacket. The deluxe edition also includes a perfect-bound 28-page book with never-before-seen photos and expanded liner notes by Drive-By Truckers co-founder Patterson Hood.

"It's been nearly a quarter century since we began writing something we called Betamax Guillotine," says Drive-By Truckers' Patterson Hood. "A love letter to the 70s arena rock of our youth and a coming-of-age story about a fictitious rock 'n' roll band in the post-civil rights South. An examination of coming to terms with the conflicted emotions many Southerners have had about our home region and something that we referred to as 'The Duality of the Southern Thing.' Mike Cooley and I had played together for over a decade in a band called Adam's House Cat before forming Drive-By Truckers in 1996. We were batsh*t crazy and wildly ambitious. We couldn't afford motel rooms so we'd call out from the stage and ask if anyone would let us crash at their place. Most nights someone would oblige, then we'd stay up late, regaling them with this crazy story about an album we wanted to make. A Southern Rock Opera. It would begin with a car wreck and end with a plane crash. It would talk about Lynyrd Skynyrd and George Wallace. It would take a classic rock approach but play it with wild punk rock abandon. It will be loud as hell.

"Southern Rock Opera was released on September 11, 2001. We hit the road harder than ever, playing New York City only a month after that horrific day with the wreckage still smoldering. Over two decades later, some of the songs from SRO are still staples in our live show, and the phrase 'The Duality of the Southern Thing" is often used as a way of describing the mixture of shame and pride that so many Southerners feel about our heritage. A ridiculous album isn't going to change the world on its own, but perhaps it can provide background music and tonic for the troops as we rally to make a better South, a better country, and a better world. Love your kiddos and do the best you can."

Drive-By Truckers will further commemorate Southern Rock Opera with a wide-ranging North American tour that will see the band performing the acclaimed 2001 album along with fan favorites and other songs from across their classic canon. Presented by Live Nation, the Southern Rock Opera Revisited 2024 Tour gets underway June 7 at Indianapolis, IN's Egyptian Room at Old National Centre, and then continues into early July. The headline run (which was first announced in an exclusive Q&A with Garden & Gun Magazine) will resume October 16 at Washington, DC's Warner Theatre and then travel through a very special tour finale set for November 24 at Nashville, TN's historic Ryman Auditorium. Highlights include two-night stands at San Francisco, CA's The Fillmore (June 28-29), Minneapolis, MN's Uptown Theater (October 25-26), Chicago, IL's House of Blues (November 1-2), and Asheville, NC's The Orange Peel (November 7-8). A very special Southern Rock Opera Revisited VIP Experience will be available throughout the tour, including premium tickets, an exclusive pre-show soundcheck party, limited edition items (including a commemorative concert ticket signed by the band, VIP laminate, and Southern Rock Opera Revisited 2024 collectible patch), and more. For complete details and ticket information, please visit www.drivebytruckers.com/shows.

In addition, Drive-By Truckers have scheduled a number of top-billed festival appearances in the coming months, including Everett, WA's Fisherman's Village Music Festival (May 18), Charlestown, RI's Rhythm & Roots (August 31), and North Adams, MA's FreshGrass | North Adams (September 20-22).

"It's been 23 years since the release of the album that drastically changed our lives and 22 years since we performed it (more or less) straight through in near entirety," says Hood. "We'll be hitting the road, three guitars blazing, and telling y'all a story. It's an album we spent years writing and learning to play and then recording (in the upstairs of a uniform shop in downtown Birmingham, AL).

Southern Rock Opera was initially released on 9/11/2001 (and later reissued by Lost Highway in the summer of 2002). A lot has happened in the decades since it came out, both to the band and to the world we live in. We feel that the record, while somewhat timeless, also has a current timeliness to it considering the social and political issues of today. Instead of performing it as if it's still 2000AD, we want to make it our own, reflecting who we all are now in 2024. It's going to be intense, but also a hell of a lot of fun. We'll be playing songs from the original release, plus a small handful of songs that pertain to its themes and points of view, plus a short encore set that will be different each night. It'll be a different and very special show, and very likely the last time we'll ever do it so DON'T MISS IT!"

MAY
18 - Everett, WA - Fisherman's Village Music Festival †

JUNE
7 - Indianapolis, IN - Egyptian Room at Old National Centre
8 - St. Louis, MO - The Pageant
9 - Louisville, KY - Mercury Ballroom
10 - Henrico, VA - Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens *
13 - Raleigh, NC - The Ritz
14 - Charlotte, NC - The Fillmore Charlotte
15 - Birmingham, AL - Iron City
16 - New Orleans, LA - The Civic Theatre
19 - Houston, TX - House of Blues
20 - Austin, TX - ACL Live at the Moody Theater
21 - Dallas, TX - House of Blues
23 - Phoenix, AZ - The Van Buren
24 - Ventura, CA - Ventura Music Hall*
26 - El Cajon, CA - The Magnolia
27 - Los Angeles, CA - The Belasco
28 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
29 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore

JULY
1 - Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom
2 - Seattle, WA - Neptune Theatre
5 - Salt Lake City, UT - The Complex
6 - Denver, CO - Fillmore Auditorium

AUGUST
31 - Charlestown, RI - Rhythm & Roots †

SEPTEMBER
20-22 - North Adams, MA - FreshGrass | North Adams †

OCTOBER
16 - Washington, DC - Warner Theatre
17 - New York, NY - Irving Plaza
18 - Boston, MA - House of Blues
19 - Philadelphia, PA - Theatre of Living Arts
21 - Woodstock, NY - Bearsville Theater*
22 - Toronto, ON - Danforth Music Hall
23 - Cleveland, OH - House of Blues
25 - Minneapolis, MN - Uptown Theater
26 - Minneapolis, MN - Uptown Theater
27 - Madison, WI - The Sylvee
29 - Des Moines, IA - Val Air Ballroom
30 - Milwaukee, WI - Pabst Theater

NOVEMBER
1 - Chicago, IL - House of Blues
2 - Chicago, IL - House of Blues
3 - Cincinnati, OH - Bogart's
5 - Detroit, MI - St. Andrew's Hall
7 - Asheville, NC - The Orange Peel
8 - Asheville, NC - The Orange Peel
9 - Atlanta, GA - Tabernacle
24 - Nashville, TN - Ryman Auditorium

† Festival Appearance
* Not Presented by Live Nation