Photo Credit: Brantley Guitierrez
Drive-By Truckers have announced today’s premiere of “The Driver,” the latest track from their upcoming 14th studio album, Welcome 2 Club XIII. An official lyric video is streaming now at YouTube. Welcome 2 Club XIII arrives via ATO Records on Friday, June 3. Pre-orders are available now.
A hypnotic introduction to the album’s sprawling autobiography, “The Driver” kicks off Welcome 2 Club XIII with a darkly thrilling epic punctuated with lead-heavy riffs and Mississippi-bred singer-songwriter Schaefer Llana’s unearthly backing vocals.
“Around the same era of Club XIII, I spent a lot of time driving around late at night when I couldn’t sleep,” says founding member/vocalist/guitarist Patterson Hood, “listening to music loud and often having a beer or two. Sometimes during those drives I’d have these epiphanies about what to do with my life – like listening to Tim by The Replacements not long after it came out and deciding to drop out of school to try and make this whole band thing work.”
Welcome 2 Club XIII also includes the spirited, horn-blasted “Every Single Storied Flameout” and the album’s swinging centerpiece, “Welcome 2 Club XIII,” both available now at all DSPs and streaming services; the latter track – which pays homage to the Muscle Shoals honky-tonk where founding members Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley got their start – is joined by an official music video streaming now via YouTube.
Arriving as Drive-By Truckers enters its 26th year, Welcome 2 Club XIII marks a sharp departure from the trenchant commentary of The Unraveling and The New OK (both released in 2020). Produced by longtime Drive-By Truckers collaborator David Barbe and mainly recorded at his studio in Athens, GA, Welcome 2 Club XIII took shape over the course of three frenetic days in summer 2021 – a doubly extraordinary feat considering that the band had no prior intentions of making a new album. Featuring background vocals from the likes of Margo Price, R.E.M.’s Mike Mills, and Mississippi-bred singer/songwriter Schaefer Llana, Welcome 2 Club XIII was recorded live with most songs cut in one or two takes, fully harnessing Drive-By Truckers’ freewheeling energy. Songs like the softly stunning “Wilder Days” see the band – whose lineup also includes keyboardist/guitarist Jay Gonzalez, bassist Matt Patton, and drummer Brad Morgan – looking back on their formative years with both deadpan pragmatism and profound tenderness, instilling each song with the kind of lived-in detail that invites bittersweet reminiscence of your own misspent youth.
“Cooley and I have been playing together for 37 years now,” Hood says. “That first band might have failed miserably on a commercial level, but I’m really proud of what we did back then. It had a lot to do with who we ended up becoming.”
Drive-By Truckers are currently celebrating Welcome 2 Club XIII with a marathon live schedule, including top-billed festival dates, and North American, European, and UK headline tours. For complete details and ticket information, please visit www.drivebytruckers.com/shows.
CONNECT WITH DRIVE-BY TRUCKERS:
DRIVEBYTRUCKERS.COM | FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | TWITTER | YOUTUBE
