Decoration Day (album)
Encyclopedia
Decoration Day is a rock
album released by Drive-By Truckers
in 2003. The album was recorded mostly live over two weeks at Chase Park Transduction Studios in Athens, Georgia
, and was produced by noted producer and former Sugar bassist David Barbe
. The album is the Truckers' fifth, including their live album Alabama Ass Whoopin', following the critically acclaimed Southern Rock Opera
. The album features a more mellow, stripped down, and reserved sound compared to Southern Rock Operas heavy hitting southern rock. Decoration Day is the first album to feature Jason Isbell
on guitar; he would record two more albums with the band before leaving to pursue a solo career in 2007.
Guitarist and songwriter Patterson Hood describes Decoration Day as being lyrically a "pretty dark" record, though he notes that the band "had so much fun making it, and I think that kind of comes through". Three of the album's songs - "Heathens", "Your Daddy Hates Me" and "Give Pretty Soon" - are referred to as being Hood's "divorce trilogy", dealing with what Hood himself refers to as the "emotional fallout" that follows divorce. He has stated that Decoration Day is "more or less...an album about choices, good and bad, right and wrong, and the consequences of those choices." Seven of the album's tracks were first takes, while about five songs were seconds takes.
As is the Truckers' trademark, a number of Decoration Days songs deal with elements of southern
folklore. The title track, written by guitarist Jason Isbell, tells "a story that's rumored to be true" of two families involved in a passionate intergenerational feud which has gone on so long that few can remember why such hatred exists between them. Isbell wrote the song just three days after joining the band while touring in support of Southern Rock Opera.
Isbell's "Outfit" describes the advice given to him by his own father, advising him, among other things, to have fun but to avoid intravenous drugs
, to call home for his sister's birthday, not to sing in a "fake British accent" or to make The Beatles'
faux pas and claim to be "bigger than Jesus
".
Furthering the focus on interfamilial relations - albeit in a much different way - is Hood's "The Deeper In", which tells the story of the only two people in the United States
to be serving prison time for consensual brother/sister incest
. This somewhat cryptic title is actually part of a tongue-in-cheek expression -- "The closer kin, the deeper in." Isbell plays electric mandolin through a Ampeg Gemini amp. "The Deeper In" signals John Neff's return to recording with the band following his absence from Southern Rock Opera.
, Decoration Day was eagerly anticipated and, upon its arrival, very well received. The album garnered excellent reviews from critics like Robert Christgau
of The Village Voice
as well as publications such as SPIN Magazine, Pitchfork Media
and Rolling Stone
. Decoration Day would go on to place on many publications' "Best of 2003" lists, including the Village Voice's influential Pazz & Jop
poll, No Depression's
"40 Best Alt. Country Albums of 2003", Rolling Stone's "Critics' Top 10 of 2003" and Amazon.com's
"Top 100 Editors' Picks of 2003".
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
album released by Drive-By Truckers
Drive-By Truckers
Drive-By Truckers are an alternative country/Southern rock band based in Athens, Georgia, though three out of six members are originally from The Shoals region of Northern Alabama, and the band strongly identifies with Alabama. Their music uses three guitars as well as bass, drums, and now...
in 2003. The album was recorded mostly live over two weeks at Chase Park Transduction Studios in Athens, Georgia
Athens, Georgia
Athens-Clarke County is a consolidated city–county in U.S. state of Georgia, in the northeastern part of the state, comprising the former City of Athens proper and Clarke County. The University of Georgia is located in this college town and is responsible for the initial growth of the city...
, and was produced by noted producer and former Sugar bassist David Barbe
David Barbe
David Barbe is an American musician and producer/engineer from Athens, Georgia and director of the Music Business Certificate Program at the University of Georgia. He is chief of Chase Park Transduction studio in Athens...
. The album is the Truckers' fifth, including their live album Alabama Ass Whoopin', following the critically acclaimed Southern Rock Opera
Southern Rock Opera
Southern Rock Opera is the third studio album by the alt country band Drive-By Truckers. It was a double album and released in 2001. Covering an ambitious range of subject matter from the politics of race to 70s stadium rock, Southern Rock Opera either imagines, or filters, every topic through the...
. The album features a more mellow, stripped down, and reserved sound compared to Southern Rock Operas heavy hitting southern rock. Decoration Day is the first album to feature Jason Isbell
Jason Isbell
Jason Isbell is a singer, songwriter, and guitarist from Greenhill, Alabama, near Muscle Shoals.-Background:Almost all of Isbell's family, except his parents, were musicians, and his father was an avid music listener...
on guitar; he would record two more albums with the band before leaving to pursue a solo career in 2007.
Guitarist and songwriter Patterson Hood describes Decoration Day as being lyrically a "pretty dark" record, though he notes that the band "had so much fun making it, and I think that kind of comes through". Three of the album's songs - "Heathens", "Your Daddy Hates Me" and "Give Pretty Soon" - are referred to as being Hood's "divorce trilogy", dealing with what Hood himself refers to as the "emotional fallout" that follows divorce. He has stated that Decoration Day is "more or less...an album about choices, good and bad, right and wrong, and the consequences of those choices." Seven of the album's tracks were first takes, while about five songs were seconds takes.
As is the Truckers' trademark, a number of Decoration Days songs deal with elements of southern
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
folklore. The title track, written by guitarist Jason Isbell, tells "a story that's rumored to be true" of two families involved in a passionate intergenerational feud which has gone on so long that few can remember why such hatred exists between them. Isbell wrote the song just three days after joining the band while touring in support of Southern Rock Opera.
Isbell's "Outfit" describes the advice given to him by his own father, advising him, among other things, to have fun but to avoid intravenous drugs
Drug injection
In substance dependence and recreational drug use, drug injection is a method of introducing a drug into the body with a hollow needle and a syringe which is pierced through the skin into the body...
, to call home for his sister's birthday, not to sing in a "fake British accent" or to make The Beatles'
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
faux pas and claim to be "bigger than Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
".
Furthering the focus on interfamilial relations - albeit in a much different way - is Hood's "The Deeper In", which tells the story of the only two people in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to be serving prison time for consensual brother/sister incest
Incest
Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...
. This somewhat cryptic title is actually part of a tongue-in-cheek expression -- "The closer kin, the deeper in." Isbell plays electric mandolin through a Ampeg Gemini amp. "The Deeper In" signals John Neff's return to recording with the band following his absence from Southern Rock Opera.
Critical reception
Having been brought to the attention of many critics through the success of Southern Rock OperaSouthern Rock Opera
Southern Rock Opera is the third studio album by the alt country band Drive-By Truckers. It was a double album and released in 2001. Covering an ambitious range of subject matter from the politics of race to 70s stadium rock, Southern Rock Opera either imagines, or filters, every topic through the...
, Decoration Day was eagerly anticipated and, upon its arrival, very well received. The album garnered excellent reviews from critics like Robert Christgau
Robert Christgau
Robert Christgau is an American essayist, music journalist, and self-proclaimed "Dean of American Rock Critics".One of the earliest professional rock critics, Christgau is known for his terse capsule reviews, published since 1969 in his Consumer Guide columns...
of The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...
as well as publications such as SPIN Magazine, Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
and Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
. Decoration Day would go on to place on many publications' "Best of 2003" lists, including the Village Voice's influential Pazz & Jop
Pazz & Jop
The Pazz & Jop critics' poll is a poll of music critics run by The Village Voice newspaper. It is compiled every year from the top ten lists of hundreds of music critics...
poll, No Depression's
No Depression (periodical)
No Depression was a bi-monthly magazine that covered a broad range of roots music, including alternative country and Americana.-History:...
"40 Best Alt. Country Albums of 2003", Rolling Stone's "Critics' Top 10 of 2003" and Amazon.com's
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
"Top 100 Editors' Picks of 2003".
Track listing
- "The Deeper In" (Hood)
- "Sink Hole" (Hood)
- "Hell No, I Ain't Happy" (Hood)
- "Marry Me" (Cooley)
- "My Sweet Annette" (Hood)
- "Outfit" (Isbell)
- "Heathens" (Hood)
- "Sounds Better in the Song" (Cooley)
- "(Something's Got to) Give Pretty Soon" (Hood)
- "Your Daddy Hates Me" (Hood)
- "Careless" (Hood)
- "When the Pin Hits the Shell" (Cooley)
- "Do It Yourself" (Hood)
- "Decoration Day" (Isbell)
- "Loaded Gun in the Closet" (Cooley)
Band
- Mike Cooley – guitarGuitarThe guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
, vocalsSingingSinging is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments... - Earl Hicks – bassBass guitarThe bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
- Patterson Hood – guitar, vocals
- Jason IsbellJason IsbellJason Isbell is a singer, songwriter, and guitarist from Greenhill, Alabama, near Muscle Shoals.-Background:Almost all of Isbell's family, except his parents, were musicians, and his father was an avid music listener...
– guitar, vocals - Brad Morgan – drumsDrum kitA drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....
Additional Personnel
- David BarbeDavid BarbeDavid Barbe is an American musician and producer/engineer from Athens, Georgia and director of the Music Business Certificate Program at the University of Georgia. He is chief of Chase Park Transduction studio in Athens...
– producerRecord producerA record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
, engineerEngineerAn engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
, mixer, guitar, keyboardsKeyboard instrumentA keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...
, WurlitzerWurlitzerThe Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to simply as Wurlitzer, was an American company that produced stringed instruments, woodwinds, brass instruments, theatre organs, band organs, orchestrions, electronic organs, electric pianos and jukeboxes....
, upright piano - Scott Danborn – fiddleFiddleThe term fiddle may refer to any bowed string musical instrument, most often the violin. It is also a colloquial term for the instrument used by players in all genres, including classical music...
- Clay Leverett – harmony
- John Neff – pedal steel
- Spooner OldhamSpooner OldhamDewey Lindon "Spooner" Oldham is an American songwriter and session musician. An organist, he recorded in Muscle Shoals, Alabama and at FAME Studios on such hit R&B songs as "When a Man Loves a Woman" by Percy Sledge, "Mustang Sally" by Wilson Pickett and "I Never Loved a Man" by Aretha...
– WurlitzerWurlitzerThe Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to simply as Wurlitzer, was an American company that produced stringed instruments, woodwinds, brass instruments, theatre organs, band organs, orchestrions, electronic organs, electric pianos and jukeboxes....
, soloist - Shonna Tucker - upright bass (on "Sounds Better in the Song")
Chart performance
| Chart | Provider(s) | Peak position |
Certification | Sales/ shipments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Billboard Top Heatseekers Top Heatseekers Top Heatseekers refers to either of two separate "Breaking and Entering" music charts issued weekly by Billboard Magazine: the Heatseekers Albums chart or the Heatseekers Songs chart. They were introduced by Billboard in 1993 with the purpose of highlighting the sales by new and developing musical... (U.S.) |
Billboard Billboard (magazine) Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis... |
29 | Not certified | N/A |
| Billboard Top Independent Albums (U.S.) | 27 | |||