Southern Rock Operaby Drive-By Truckers

Concept albums can be very ambitious projects. There have been alot of really good ones made (Rush's 2112) and some not so good (Styx "Killroy Was Here"). It can be a tricky slope to sled on when you tackle something that can have such enormous artistic potential. When Drive- By TRuckers decided to make a double album about a fictional band (Betamax Guillotine) following in the footsteps of Lynard Skynard there was alot of potential for disaster. For a very young band who had yet to accomplish much, it was a bold endeavor for sure. The results stand the test of time, though, but there are a sizeable bone of contention I have always had with this record. To put it plainly, I think the dialogue tracks take away from the overall piece of work. I get what they were trying to do, but I dare anyone who listens to this more than once to listen through and NOT skip of the few "talking" tracks here like "Wallace", "Moved", or "The Three Alabama Icons". I have played around with different track listings here, and you could compress the whole album into one killer 80 minute cd of music that tells the whole story and rocks your behind off at every turn while doing so. DBT should have just done that, but I suppose that is a mute point because with today's technology anyone can make that 80 minute killer album themselves on their home computer, like I have. For that reason, I give SRO four stars out of five. But, I give MY version a definite five stars! That classic concept album is all there to begin with, it's only up to the listener to find it by sorting through all the rubble.