My best guess is that the staff at the Pabst Theater will be finding empty 22oz Pabst Blue Ribbons cans for some time to come after the Drive By Truckers came through town this Thursday. I’ve been to a lot of concerts but I’ve never seen the front four or five rows go absolutely crazy for a band in a long long time. People were jumping on stage to deliver shots after an inspiring solo and the band, in what has now become their trademark, shared a bottle of Jack Daniels on the stage.

Touring behind the release of their most recent album, A Blessing and a Curse, the Truckers made their first of two appearances in Milwaukee and left the crowd drenched in sweat and the majority running a couple minutes behind for work the next day. This show did a couple things for me. First, it solidified my opinion that Jason Isbell was the best thing that ever happened to this band. His guitar playing and singing really round out the band and make them into one of the best live acts around. Second, it provided an opportunity for me to really fall in love with the tunes from their new album. Hearing “Easy on Yourself,” was a gem of a moment with Isbell taking lead vocals as he sang, ” It’s that kind of town and you’re so far down you can’t get up. I can’t tell you what to sell and how to tow the line and when to just give up.”

Not only did the band blaze through their new material, but they also drew heavily from their previous efforts including my personal favorite, Patterson Hood’s, “Let There Be Rock,” where he recollects on his younger years of drinking, drug use, and missing Lynyrd Skynyrd. By far the highlight of the show happened at the beginning of the encore when Jason Isbell took the stage alone to play a newly penned song about a hometown friend who lost his life while fighting in Iraq. The theater was brought to a dead silence as Isbell gently guided the song to its conclusion. The yet to be recorded song, is currently seeking a studio on the road to be recorded according to its author, and I can speak for everyone around me, that it’s a tear jerker.

For those of you that missed your chance seeing the Drive By Truckers, you will have another opportunity later this summer when they play the Marcus Amphitheatre on August 3rd along with the Black Crowes and Robert Randolph. While, the upcoming show will surely lack the intimacy that the Pabst Theater provides, this band is not to be missed in any setting.

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