Rock music has never lacked for poets. What it’s always needed are better novelists. That’s where Craig Finn comes in.
The Hold Steady frontman has spent the last three decades writing songs populated by bartenders, recovering addicts, Catholic school kids, hustlers, hopefuls, and people forever one bad decision away from redemption. Listen closely and you realize you’re not just hearing songs. You’re dropping into chapters of an ongoing American novel, one where grace often arrives after last call.
This week, Finn brings that gift for storytelling to two New York stages, joining fellow songwriter Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers for performances at The Egg in Albany on July 17 and the Tarrytown Music Hall on July 18. Rather than trading separate opening and closing sets, the pair spend the evening together onstage, swapping songs, stories, and conversation. It’s a format that has become the hallmark of their “Devils in the Details” tour.
The pairing makes almost suspiciously good sense. Like Finn, Hood built his reputation in a band that understood rock songs could carry the emotional and narrative weight of great fiction. For three decades, Drive-By Truckers have chronicled Southern life with empathy, humor, and a willingness to wrestle with history rather than run from it. Finn’s geography may stretch from Minneapolis to Brooklyn while Hood’s remains rooted in Alabama, but both writers share an affection for flawed people trying, and often failing, to become better versions of themselves.
They’re also among the increasingly rare rock musicians who trust an audience to follow a story. Finn’s songs routinely unfold like short fiction, introducing fully realized characters in just a few verses before sending them careening toward moments of revelation—or disaster. Hood works a similar vein, finding universal truths inside highly specific places and lives.
That emphasis on songwriting makes these shows something different from the standard co-headlining tour. The pleasure isn’t simply hearing favorites from The Hold Steady or Drive-By Truckers, though there will surely be plenty. It’s watching two craftsmen compare notes in real time, each song answering the one before it.
Finn has been enjoying a particularly productive stretch. His acclaimed solo album Always Been found him leaning even further into character-driven songwriting, while continuing to balance solo work with The Hold Steady, whose ninth album, The Price of Progress, arrived in 2023. Later this year he’ll launch a full-band tour behind Always Been, but first comes this intimate run with Hood.
Craig Finn and Patterson Hood perform at The Egg in Albany on July 17 at 8pm and at the Tarrytown Music Hall on July 18 at 8pm.
