For years,
Mike Cooley has been the
George Harrison of
the Drive-By Truckers, the guy who contributed two or three fine songs to each
DBTs album while frontman
Patterson Hood penned the bulk of the band's repertoire. That changes with
English Oceans, the band's tenth studio album, where
Cooley gets co-star status for a change -- he penned six of the album's 13 tunes, and sings lead on
Hood's "Til He's Dead or Rises." By accident or design, the increased presence of
Cooley's songs gives
English Oceans a feel of call and response, as
Cooley's smart but plainspoken style faces off against
Hood's more artful approach as they both spin tales of characters struggling to make sense of the world around them. While the album opens with a world-class rocker,
Cooley's "Shit Shots Count," which could pass for a Dixie-fried outtake from
Exile on Main St., for the most part
English Oceans finds
the Truckers in a thoughtful, low-key mood, with the guitar firepower dialed back a bit and both writers imagining characters whose lives range from the poignant ("Primer Coat," "When He's Gone") to the bitter ("The Part of Him") to the tragic ("Made Up English Oceans," "When Walter Went Crazy"). Subtlety has never been this band's biggest selling point, but on
English Oceans the Drive-By Truckers show they can pare back their arrangements and create something more atmospheric without stripping their songs of what makes them powerful;
Jay Gonzalez's spectral keyboards add a wealth of detail to "Made Up English Oceans" and "Hanging On," and drummer
Brad Morgan and bassist
Matt Patton are a rhythm section that can rise to any challenge these songs present. Ten albums and 18 years on from their first show,
the Drive-By Truckers are still capable of mixing things up and showing off new sides of their skill set, and that's certainly the case with
English Oceans, which shows them making wise use of all their talents -- not just
Mike Cooley. [A Deluxe Edition added a DVD.] ~ Mark Deming
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