ROUTES & BRANCHES
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
September 4, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
For this week's Lookback Machine Episodes, we select thirty (30) songs from throughout the career of the Old 97s. In sound and in composition, the Dallas quartet has remained incredibly consistent since their inception in 1992. Featuring Murray Hammond (bass), Philip Peeples (drums), guitarist Ken Bethea, and fronted by Rhett Miller, the band has embraced strains of country and punk, folk and pop across thirteen full length records, including one of the strongest live albums in our kind of music, 2005's Alive & Wired. For our list, we included no covers, no live tracks (though we were tempted!), and nothing from 2018's Love the Holidays.
As a writer and a frontman, Rhett Miller is a peerless proponent of pop music, and we could devote an Episode to his seven solo collections as well, where that pop component to his songcraft is isolated and emphasized. While earlier records like Too Far To Care and Satellite Rides showcase Old 97s at their best, it can be argued that more recent sets such as this year's American Primitive continue to be dynamically relevant. There is something of the Replacements in the band's reckless abandon, and a nod to the Ramones in their commitment to simplicity. While Old 97s' influence on our kind of music is inarguable, there are surprisingly few acts who can be tagged as direct sonic descendants (perhaps foremost among them, the Vandoliers).
This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the release of Old 97s' debut, Hitchhike To Rhome, a document that portrays the quartet at their fiery inception. While music must change and evolve in order to survive, there are those among us who would welcome a young band with that kind of energy and edge with enthusiastically open arms.
OLD 97s: thirty favorites
- "4 Leaf Clover" Hitchhike To Rhome (Old 97s, 94)
- "Wish the Worst" Hitchhike To Rhome
- "If My Heart Was a Car" Hitchhike To Rhome
- "Victoria" Wreck Your Life (Bloodshot, 95)
- "Timebomb" Too Far To Care (Elektra, 97)
- "Barrier Reef" Too Far To Care
- "Big Brown Eyes" Too Far To Care
- "Oppenheimer" Fight Songs (Elektra, 99)
- "Murder (Or a Heart Attack)" Fight Songs
- "Rollerskate Skinny" Satellite Rides (Elektra, 01)
- " Buick City Complex" Satellite Rides
- "Question" Satellite Rides
- "I'm a Trainwreck" Grand Theatre Vol 2 (New West, 01)
- "Perfume" Grand Theatre Vol 2
- "Won't Be Home" Drag It Up (New West, 04)
- "The New Kid" Drag It Up
- "Adelaide" Drag It Up
- "Dance With Me" Blame It On Gravity (New West, 08)
- "Color Of a Lonely Heart Is Blue" Blame It On Gravity
- "Every Night Is Friday Night (Without You)" Grand Theatre Vol 1 (New West, 10)
- "Champaign, Illinois" Grand Theatre Vol 1
- "A State Of Texas" Grand Theatre Vol 1
- "Longer Than You've Been Alive" Most Messed Up (ATO, 14)
- "Let's Get Drunk & Get It On" Most Messed Up
- "Most Messed Up" Most Messed Up
- "All Who Wander" Graveyard Whistling (ATO, 17)
- "Those Were the Days" Graveyard Whistling
- "Bottle Rocket Baby" Twelfth (ATO, 20)
- "Somebody" American Primitive (ATO, 24)
- "Magic" American Primitive
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