The Fool on Every CornerWhether battling valiantly from behind the enemy lines of his dive-bar-underground past or blowing the doors off sold-out theaters as heâs done with Drive-By Truckers for the last decade, Mike Cooley has proved his mettle time and time again. Heâs rock & roll incarnateâMick and Keith rolled into one impossibly cool, soul-howling, guitar rattlinâ ball of genuine unapologetic grit and swagger. At least thatâs how it seems gazing up from the crowd at a packed DBT show.So how did this modern-day rock hero feel about temporarily ditching his band and rolling back the volume for the unaccompanied acoustic performances that would become his debut solo record, The Fool on Every Corner?âWhen you donât do it normally, itâs terrifying,â Cooley admits...
read more
The Fool on Every CornerWhether battling valiantly from behind the enemy lines of his dive-bar-underground past or blowing the doors off sold-out theaters as heâs done with Drive-By Truckers for the last decade, Mike Cooley has proved his mettle time and time again. Heâs rock & roll incarnateâMick and Keith rolled into one impossibly cool, soul-howling, guitar rattlinâ ball of genuine unapologetic grit and swagger. At least thatâs how it seems gazing up from the crowd at a packed DBT show.So how did this modern-day rock hero feel about temporarily ditching his band and rolling back the volume for the unaccompanied acoustic performances that would become his debut solo record, The Fool on Every Corner?âWhen you donât do it normally, itâs terrifying,â Cooley admits. âI try to relax, but Iâll probably never be able to sit down in a chair on stage as easily as I sit down on a toilet behind a closed door. Thatâs the goalâsomewhere in between,â he deadpans. âI set the bar high.âDespite his bad nerves and tongue-in-cheek penchant for self-deprecation, Cooley shines on this bare-bones live set, tossing aside his guitar pick and playing almost everything with his fingers. âStrip it, strip it, strip it down,â he says, alluding to the mantra that guided these performances. âWhatâs left is the song and nothing else.âAnd what a set of songs Fool is, comprised mainly of re-imagined DBT classics like âShut Up and Get on the Plane,â âMarry Meâ and âWhere the Devil Donât Stay,â as well as understated renditions of deep-cut Cooley ballads such as âPulaski,â âEyes Like Glueâ and the weary yet ominous âLoaded Gun in the Closet.â This intimate new record offers fans a peek behind the curtain at what these songs might have sounded like in their most nascent state. All of them save for opener â3 Dimes Down,â Cooley says, were originally written on acoustic. âThe words just come out easier when you play an acoustic guitar,â he explains.The Fool on Every Corner was recorded by longtime DBT producer David Barbe during a three-show run last March, beginning with a two-night stand at no-frills Atlanta rock club The Earl and closing at swank Athens, Ga., venue The Melting Point. âThe second show at The Earl was a chaotic night,â Cooley recalls. âWe didnât have the audience seated, for one thing. Of course, you can pack a lot more people in there if you have âem standing, but for acoustic shows, I prefer to sit âem down and calm âem down if I can.âThis proved an impossibility in the boisterous barroom.âI was thinking, âWeâre not gonna get anything outta tonight. The crowd is just too loud.ââ As it turns out, almost everything that ended up on Fool came from that rowdy night. âItâs that way every time Iâve ever recorded live,â Cooley says, shaking his head. âThe night you think bombed or wasnât as good, inevitably, will be the one that comes across best on the recording.âPeppered throughout this gem of a record are Cooleyâs charmingly candid asides, a few revealing admissions about the writing process, the songs and the characters who populate them, the odd banjo joke, a disarmingly sweet cover of Charlie Richâs âBehind Closed Doorsâ and the never-before-released original, âDrinking Coke and Eating Ice.â The latterâan almost-whispered tragicomic reflectionâwas included, Cooley says, because he wanted to offer something new for fans. Plus, it was something heâd been wanting to get off his chest. Carved from a hodgepodge of ideas heâd been scribbling down over a two-year period, the DBT guitarist sees the song as a metaphor for the last 25 years of American culture and where itâs gone. âThe girl in the beginning is America,â he says. âShe doesnât look as good as she used to. Sheâs let herself go. For all the wrong reasons.âLike the weathered protagonist in âDrinking Coke,â the 46-year-old Cooley has also seen his share of hard-traveled miles, though the outcome for him has been decidedly more positive. After spending much of his young life scrapping in the rock & roll trenches, heâs become one of the best songwriters of his generation, having amassed a catalog of songs that can go toe-to-toe with any of his contemporaries. Along the way, he and Drive-By Truckers have become an acclaimed, enduring lynchpin of American rock & roll. And now, with The Fool on Every Corner, Cooley begins the latest chapter in his impressive career, uncompromising as always, and more thankful than ever.âIâm lucky as hell,â he says. âNo doubt about it. Iâm not rich, Iâm probably not gonna be, and Iâm totally cool with that. But Iâm making my living, and I do what I wantâI do it my way. Iâve got an awesome family, a bunch of great friends, loyal fans. And I think about that every day. It just would be immoral for me not to.â
show less