Drive-By Truckers are celebrating the physical release of their acclaimed second album of 2020, THE NEW OK, by sharing the official music video for their fiery cover of The Ramones’ classic “The KKK Took My Baby Away,” featuring vocals by bassist Matt Patton. Hailed by American Songwriter as “a powerful one-two punch to the gut from a band unafraid to lay their political stance out for the world to see,” THE NEW OK will be released on CD and limited red vinyl via ATO Records this Friday, December 18.
“One take, live vocal, gang shouts for choruses at the end of an 85-hour marathon session in Memphis,” says Drive-By Truckers co-founder Patterson Hood. “Bobby Matt delivered the goods. David Barbe told us we’d be glad if we did it – we are so happy we did and could include it on THE NEW OK.”
“Making the video was the kind of fun we used to have with it when I was young,” adds Patton. “It felt good to get out and raise a little mischief and not overthink it. Plus my kid really loves it, loves the Ramones, and loves to hear DBT play it.”
THE NEW OK was heralded earlier this fall by the powerful title track, accompanied by an intensely emotional official music video filmed entirely in Hood’s adopted hometown of Portland, OR, during the protests of summer 2020. “The New OK” is streaming now via YouTube.
More Praise for THE NEW OK:
“A nice surprise to guide us through these depressing times.”
– Stereogum
“Frontmen/singer/songwriters Mike Cooley and Patterson Hood along with longtime producer David Barbe craft these Southern-tinged, organically rocking songs with solid hooks and tough, sometimes tender melodies energized by the group’s typically muscular playing.”
– American Songwriter (4.5/5)
“Honest and irreplaceable…an album that serves as a manifesto of grief, righteous anger, frustration, and, in a way only the Truckers can spin, a bit of hope.”
– No Depression
“One of the greatest acts at chronicling our modern American struggle has done it again with the sudden release of THE NEW OK…The band grapple with things they and we as a society never thought we would, but having a band as plugged into the struggle
as DBT helps every step of the way towards a better world.”
– Glide Magazine
“THE NEW OK further cements my belief that Drive-By Truckers ought to be revered as one of the greatest bands in musical history…The fact that Drive-By Truckers have hit a purple patch this late in their career, so that THE NEW OK stands up as one their career highpoints, speaks volumes. Once again, a fabulous record.”
– God Is In The TV
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Drive-By Truckers’ 13th studio album, THE NEW OK arrived mere months after the release of the band’s acclaimed THE UNRAVELING, also available now via ATO Records. Originally conceived as a quarantine EP collecting material recorded in Memphis during sessions for THE UNRAVELING, the project quickly grew to include provocative new songs written and recorded over what Hood calls “this endless summer of protests, riots, political shenanigans, and pandemic horrors.” Tracks such as Hood’s “Watching The Orange Clouds” – inspired by the protests that followed George Floyd’s murder by Minneapolis police – were exchanged between Hood, co-founding singer/songwriter/guitarist Mike Cooley, Patton, keyboardist/multi-instrumentalist Jay Gonzalez, and drummer Brad Morgan and then mixed by longtime DBT producer David Barbe. The result, says Hood, is “a full album that hopefully balances out the darkness of our current situation with a hope for better days and nights ahead.”
“To call these past few months trying would be a dramatic understatement,” says Hood. “Our lives are intertwined with our work in ways that give us our best songs and performances. It is a life that has often rewarded us beyond our wildest dreams. Speaking for myself, I don’t have hobbies; I have this thing I do. To be sidelined with a brand new album and have to sit idly while so much that I love and hold dear falls apart before my very eyes has been intense, heartbreaking, anger-provoking, and very depressing. It has gone to the very heart of our livelihoods and threatened near everything that we have spent our lives trying to build. Here’s to the hope that we can make 2021 a better year than this one has been. In the meantime, here’s to THE NEW OK!”
