The Point Welcomes:

Old 97’s

A Tour de Point Show

Tuesday, March 31  ~  Doors: 7:30 PM / Show: 8 PM

Higher Ground | South Burlington, VT

– Tickets and Event Info –

The thirteenth studio album from Old 97’s, American Primitive arose from what vocalist/guitarist Rhett Miller refers to as a “de-evolution” of the legendary Dallas-bred band. “As much as I want us to calm down and grow up, the songs that felt right for this record were mostly big and loud and brutal and dirty,” says Miller, whose bandmates include bassist Murry Hammond, guitarist Ken Bethea, and drummer Philip Peeples. Arriving just months before the 30th anniversary of Hitchhike to Rhome—a powerhouse debut that played a vital part in pioneering the alt-country genre—the result is a gloriously rowdy body of work, revealing a veteran band more attuned than ever to the raw and reckless energy of truly timeless rock-and-roll.

With its title lifted from a bit of fictional art criticism in Stephen King’s psych-horror novel Duma Key, American Primitive merges its unvarnished sound with the punchy yet poignant storytelling signature to Old 97’s, radiating a rambunctious joy even as Miller’s lyrics contend with complex questions of love and mental illness and the routinely daunting state of the world. Produced by Tucker Martine (My Morning Jacket, The Decemberists, Neko Case) and featuring iconic guest musicians like Peter Buck of R.E.M. and Scott McCaughey of The Young Fresh Fellows and The Minus 5, the album took shape in a series of deliberately whirlwind sessions at Flora Studio in Portland, Oregon. “This was the first record we’ve ever done with zero pre-production,” Miller points out. “It’s us working completely on instinct, leaning on 30 years of playing together to come up with something on the fly rather than overthinking any of our choices.”

A distinctly literary lyricist who’s authored a number of children’s books and written for publications like McSweeney’s and The Atlantic, Miller threads American Primitive with so much lived-in yet dreamlike detail, such as on the sublimely blistering “Masterpiece” (“So I sank to the bottom of the hotel pool/You drank sunshine like you always do/Then it rained broken glass on your paperback/The ink ran and so did I, never said goodbye/Just fade to black”). “Magic” serves up a jittery piece of power-pop echoing the anguish of grasping for salvation, while “Western Stars” presents an intimate portrait of pained isolation inspired by an epic Alfred Lord Tennyson poem that Miller memorized in high school. Equal parts sprawling rumination and freewheeling joyride, the album also spans from the stripped-back benediction of “Incantation” to the sweetly skewed whimsy of “Honeypie” (a loping and lighthearted love song featuring McCaughey on piano and Buck on mandolin). And on “Estuviera Cayendo,” American Primitive closes out with an instrumental reprise of “Falling Down,” beautifully reimagined on flamenco guitar by guest musician Jeff Trapp.