Although only recently joining the impressive roster at Lost Highway Records (Lucinda Williams, Ryan Adams, Willie Nelson, O Brother, Where Art Thou?), Drive-By Truckers’ two-disc tour-de-force Southern Rock Opera is already something of a legend in indie circles. Via self-released copies, the opus has garnered critical praise from Rolling Stone, The Village Voice, No Depression, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune and more since autumn of 2001.

Whether born of madness or genius (to be fair, most likely both), Southern Rock Opera explores--and attempts to untangle--what the Truckers’ Patterson Hood refers to as “the duality of the Southern thing” through the tragic career arc of a semi-mythical Southern rock band, one “Betamax Guillotine.” Loosely based on Southern rock’s star-crossed heroes, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Betamax Guillotine takes a bumpy, pitfall-laden path to the top, crashing cars into trees, hoisting lighters, draining bottles, selling gear and checking in with the likes of Neil Young, Skynyrd, Bear Bryant, AC/DC and George Wallace en route to its tragic fiery conclusion.

Southern Rock Opera interweaves greed, ambition, revelation, destruction, substance abuse, passion and, ultimately, deliverance. It’s part coming-of-age tale, part pop-culture mythology and part political history lesson--all delivered over a sizzling, pan-genre buffet of hell-raisin,’ ’70s-era rock’n’roll.
It was more than six years ago when the seed of SRO was first planted. Hood (the son of famed Muscle Shoals session bassist David Hood) and pal Earl Hicks began kicking around the idea of addressing the complex character and mind-boggling stereotypes of the South through a screenplay format. As the Drive-By Truckers came together and developed over the years, Hood (primarily, with contributions from Mike Cooley and Rob Malone) slowly assembled and set aside tunes for the project. The keyword throughout was "contradiction."

“The most consistent thing about the South,” Hood asserts, “is how contradictory it all is.”

As more and more ideas were added to the mix, the screenplay transfigured into a rock opera, but was still a work-in progress. Drive-By Truckers released three discs of flinty, high-energy roots-rockers (Gangstabilly, Pizza Deliverance and the "live" Alabama Ass Whuppin') before deciding they were finally ready to assemble "the Southern Rock Opera."

Malone moved from bass to guitar to give DBT (along with Hood and Cooley) Southern rock’s requisite three-guitar attack, and Earl Hicks replaced Malone in the rhythm section, joining drummer Brad Morgan.

“We went through a real rough time making the rock opera,” said Hood. “The year we were recording it in particular was pretty much a nightmare experience. Whenever we had time off from the road, we’d take two weeks to record more of it, then head right back out on tour. It was brutal; of the band’s four couples, two got divorced and another guy broke up with his longtime girlfriend during the making of it. The other married couple managed to survive.

Malone left DBT to pursue his own musical interests shortly before the second leg of the Southern Rock Opera tour in November of 2001, and talented singer/guitarist Jason Isbell stepped into the front row. “Jason brings in a breath of fresh air, and we’ve all kind of fixed our personal lives, so, it’s a good time right now,” said Hood.