(Photo credit: Danny Clinch)

Acclaimed alt-country band Drive-By Truckers has announced the release date for their upcoming album American Band. Scheduled to release on September 30, the album is available to pre-order here.

The definitively Southern band has always considered its music to be highly political. In today’s election cycle, the issues on everyone’s mind are race relations, cultural integration, gun violence, and corrupt politicians. While previous releases by the band always took a metaphorical approach to political issues, (for example, by talking about race issues through a George Wallace era storytelling lens) this time the band is speaking much more directly. The lack of these narrative devices set these songs firmly in the middle of the current political arena, allowing their messages to be unhindered by a false interpretation. One song, written by Mike Cooley, has been released and can be listened to below. The song is unique, concise, and poignant, but still has the leftovers of the quintessential Drive-By Truckers sound.

DBT considers American Band to be a “musical reset button” for not only their own sound, but for what they see as the massively growing tensions between various groups of people in this country. The band fears for their countrymen, and hopes to use their music to start conversations that could bring people together instead of driving them further apart.

2016 marks the band’s twentieth anniversary, and the fact that it coincides with an election year provides them with the perfect platform to tear down what others see as “truly American”. They view true American ideals as those of inclusiveness and diversity, and as such, hope to communicate those ideals as an “American Band”.

American Band
01. Ramon Casiano
02. Darkened Flags on the Cusp of Dawn
03. Surrender under Protest
04. Guns of Umpqua
05. Filthy and Fried
06. When the Sun Don’t Shine
07. Kinky Hypocrites
08. Ever South
09. What It Means
10. Once They Banned Imagine
11. Baggage

Catch Drive-By Truckers and more at this years Lowdown Hudson Festival.