WEEK OF DECEMBER 5-11
Arts & Entertainment art, film, music, stage, books and other signs of civilization...
Universal Drawl By Jeremy Morrison
Photo Courtesy of High Road Touring
Mike Cooley is on the road again. Alone. "I wouldn't want to tour by myself all the time," the musician said. "You know, I understand that comics, it drives them crazy after a point because they tour by themselves all the time. That's why they die to get into television or something." He wouldn't want to do it all the time, but on occasion, Cooley does enjoy taking a break from fronting Drive-By Truckers alongside bandmate Patterson Hood to play a quick string of solo shows. This November, he hit a few such dates out West before heading back to play a few down South this month, including in Pensacola. Looking ahead to his return to Pensacola State College's Ashmore Fine Arts Center, Cooley said he appreciates the intimacy solo shows offer. "It's something I do once or twice a year, and it gives me a chance to do the
songs a different way," he said. "Sometimes I get ideas for writing new stuff—getting into a quieter thing and forcing myself out of what I'm used to. It's fun." For more than 20 years, Drive-By Truckers has laid down a raucous, soulful soundscape that depicts a Southern United States in all its rich complexity. It's a world painted in vivid prose and set to music that ranges from a rage to a whisper. It's a world that flirts with descriptives like Southern Gothic but then coyly avoids any genre pigeonhole. Cooley said the Truckers never set out to be a particularly Southern band. They just wrote what they knew. "It was just who we were. It was just what we were familiar with," he said. "It's what's been around us all our lives. It's our family; it's our schoolmates; it's our coworkers; it's the boss you had, the first job you had, you know?" While much of the Truckers' catalog
wonders if the country is still "maybe, kind of deals with Southern subjects and stothe voice of reason a lot of the time when the ries, Cooley said that over the years, he's world seemed to be going crazy." learned that the band's songs speak to a "Up until now, we've been the ones kind of rural-urban cultural divide that crosses taking the lead away from crazy, and now we're regional and even national boundaries. kind of leading the charge toward it," Cooley "The more you learn, the more you said. "That's what bothers me the most." learn every place is the same. And it's not Looking toward the future, the musician just America. I've seen it in Europe," Cooley expresses a skeptical optimism about the said. "Cities are cities. Rural areas are rural long-term and a feeling of hopelessness for areas. And people who inhabit them are the near term—"If you're bothered by what who and what they are. The set of values you see now, hold on, it's gonna get a lot worse and the differences in those set of values before it gets better, no doubt about it"—and are the same. The only thing that changes wonders when he'll be able to stop writing is the language and the accent." While the Drive-By Truckers have never protest songs and return to telling stories. "Family, your life, where you are in your shied away from political material—2001's life. And stories, there's always stories. It's double album "Southern Rock Opera" not always easy to think of the ones that are prominently featured George Wallace—the going to make the best songs or the ones to band has in recent years put out work with write down, but stories, stories of people, real an unmistakable message. Among other issues, the most recent album addresses race people," Cooley said. "I'd hate to lose sight or just lose all ability to just tell those stories and relations and gun violence. to talk about life and family and growing, lovCooley points out that the "American ing and losing, things that are real, things that Band" album came out in 2015, prior to are real and universal." {in} the election of Donald Trump and what he views as further societal erosion. Even as the band wrote songs that touched on issues that would develop into flashpoints, he never fully saw the craziness coming. WHAT: A solo show with Mike Cooley of the "I kind of feel stupid for not seeDrive-By Truckers ing it," Cooley said. "Now, I look at it, WHEN: 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, Dec. 11 and it's like the writing was on the wall WHERE: Pensacola State College, Ashmore Fine as plain as day. Where we ended up Arts, 1000 College Blvd. was not some freak turn of events. It COST: $11 was almost inevitable I think." DETAILS: performingarts.pensacolastate.edu The issues that America appears to be wrestling with worry Cooley. He
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