Welcome 2 Club XIIIis the fourteenth studio album by American rock bandDrive-By Truckers,released on June 3, 2022. The album's title references one of the venues where the band first played near Muscle Shoals, Alabama. The autobiographical nature of the album's lyrics presents a contrast to the more politically charged songs from the band's previous albums.[2]It features vocal contributions from Schaefer Llana,Mike MillsofR.E.M.,andMargo Price.[3]
The album received a score of 78 from Metacritic, indicating generally positive reviews.[3]American Songwritergave the album 3.5 out of 5 stars and wrote that "while Welcome 2 Club XIII has been described by the band itself as autobiographical in nature, it still manages to retain the populist appeal that drove those earlier efforts." John Amen ofBeats Per Minutewrote thatWelcome 2 Club XIIIshows the Drive-By Truckers "temporarily setting aside their polemical blowtorches, instead mindfully venturing into vivid inventories of their own lives, choices, and karmic trajectories." He added, "Club XIIIperhaps marks the end of an era, for DBT and the broader culture, suggesting that our outward-moving attention, while politically and socially significant, has to yield at some point to self-assessment. "[4]Other reviews fromAllMusic,Glide Magazine, andPopMatterspraised the album's raw sound and autobiographical lyrics while noting it lacks the direct political commentary of their previous three records.