PRINTEmbracing the future
February 21, 2008 | 12:00 a.m. CST
The first time I heard the Drive-By Truckers, it was in an ex-boyfriend’s 10-year-old Honda Civic. Their breakthrough Southern Rock Opera had just been released. The song fit so well with driving on an Atlanta street covered by trees drooping with the weight of summertime kudzu and flanked by rows of rusted-out warehouses that we both wanted to stay in the car and drive in the heat to listen just a little while longer.
It wasn’t much later that I went to see the Truckers live. The musicians’ unkempt beards and age-worn jeans said it all: These guys weren’t just constructing a southern image. They were from the south, proud of where they grew up and stayed true to their roots. Although our cover story explains the band has made some significant changes over the past year and a half, it also explores how a new lineup and tunes haven’t altered the Truckers’ Southern soul.
The band’s transformation came after a bottle of whiskey and some soul searching, a process many go through at one time or another. Although there’s no mention of being driven to drink while Ragtag’s owners worked to build capital, revamp a historic building and prepare for a major move, it’s not difficult to imagine there were moments that could have required it. Through the transformation, it would have been easy for them to lose sight of Ragtag’s original position in the community — a gathering place for film lovers that feels like a home away from home — but Ragtag co-founder David Wilson has kept the theater’s roots in mind and endeavored to create a space that preserves Ragtag’s position in the community.
Sometimes, for people, bands and even movie theaters, it can take a little change
to remember what it was all about in the first place. — LAYLA BELLOWS
