Artist: Old 97's
Record Review from web archive December 1, 2008
Old 97′s
[Editor's note: This review begins our monthlong look back at some of the year's best records. More details here.] If gravity is a natural force that pulls things toward each other, anybody remotely familiar with the stories of most bands must figure that it’s inevitably loses its power over time – usually, a short time. [...]
The Long Way Around - Feature from Issue #75 May-June 2008
Old 97′s – More fun in the new world
Like so many songs by the Old 97′s over the years, the last song on their new record Blame It On Gravity spins a yarn about a love affair, but this love doesn’t go bad, and for once, the object of affection isn’t female. There are no stick-leg girls, pretty as pennies; no timebombs or [...]
Waxed - Record Review from Issue #52 July-Aug 2004
Old 97′s – Drag It Up
Of the half-dozen records the Old 97′s have made over the past decade, “Drag It Up is our most personal,” guitarist Ken Bethea writes in a brief band biography that accompanied press mailings of the group’s new disc. He’s right on target in his assessment; that much is obvious simply from the inclusion of “Coahuila”, [...]
Miked - Live Reviews from Issue #50 March-April 2004
Old 97′s / Damnwells – Bowery Ballroom (New York City, NY)
If the Old 97′s mini-”comeback” tour was intended to prove anything, it was that the foursome is indeed still a band — an issue that could have been in some doubt given frontman Rhett Miller’s 2002 solo album The Instigator and the absence of new 97′s material since 2001′s Satellite Rides. So maybe it was [...]
Waxed - Record Review from Issue #32 March-April 2001
Old 97′s – Satellite Rides
With each new album, the Old 97′s inject less and less twang into their rambling Texas rock. Or do they? On their fifth full-length (and third for major-label Elektra), this sly quartet catapults into full-on pop territory, tossing out hooks and flaunting their harmonies, and seemingly edging further from their alt-country foundation. But Rhett Miller [...]
Miked - Live Reviews from Issue #22 July-Aug 1999
Old 97′s / Picketts – Roseland Theater (Portland, OR)
“Isn’t it kinda cool that no one has to go to work tomorrow?” asked Old 97′s singer Rhett Miller midway through his band’s blistering two-hour set, a reference to this show falling in the midst of Memorial Day weekend. “When I was a kid, I used to hate Sundays. School was back in on Monday, [...]
The Long Way Around - Feature from Issue #21 May-June 1999
The Old 97′s – You can’t please everyone, so you’ve got to please yourself
Almost all of them arise out of nothing, these unlikely collectives we call rock ‘n’ roll bands. Rarely are they set in motion with some grand master scheme finessed over weeks of research and planning; rather, it starts with two or three folks sitting around an apartment one day talking about their favorite bands and [...]
The Long Way Around - Feature from Issue #9 May-June 1997
Old 97′s – The Year Of The Old 97′s
It struck me right outside of Waco, Texas, that world-famous American center for the furthering of religious understanding and human compassion. On my way down Interstate 35 in the early morning hours bound for Austin and the annual cacophony of music called South By Southwest, I was wrestling with a musical riddle of the caliber [...]
Town and Country - Shorter Artist Feature from Issue #2 Winter 1995
Old 97′s – They’re a pain in the neck
“I’m laid up right now,” explains Rhett Miller, lead singer and guitarist for the Old 97′s. “I have a muscle spasm in my neck. There’s a muscle in your neck that’s 6 inches long, and mine spasmed and became 2 inches long.” It’s not that unusual an injury, actually — but how many people have [...]
Miked - Live Reviews from Issue #3 Spring 1996
Old 97′s / Freight Whaler / Two Dollar Pistols – The Brewery (Raleigh, N.C.)
Nowadays, it seems almost every musician in the incestuous Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill Triangle music scene moonlights in at least one country band. Two of the Triangle’s better side-project bands opened this show for Dallas’ Old 97′s, who were as charming as ever (imagine an alternate version of the movie “Revenge of the Nerds”, in which the [...]
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