The Derek Trucks [ tickets ] Band has lined up an early 2009 outing to support the group's forthcoming new studio release, "Already Free."

Bandleader Derek Trucks and company--bassist Todd Smaille, percussionist Yonrico Scott, keyboardist Kofi Burbridge, vocalist Mike Mattison and percussionist Count M'butu--kick off the run with a weeklong stint on a Florida Blues Cruise later this month before launching the run back on dry land Feb. 6 in Portland, ME. The band has shows scheduled through mid-April; dates are below.

Trucks' upcoming album, "Already Free," which hits stores Jan. 13, is his band's seventh studio release. It features guest appearances by Doyle Bramhall II, Oteil Burbridge and Trucks' wife, Susan Tedeschi, and follows 2006's "Songlines."

On Election Day, Trucks and his band released a fresh re-recording of Bob Dylan and The Band's "Down in the Flood." In a press release, Trucks said the song, the first single from the upcoming album, has almost more relevance following Hurricane Katrina than when Dylan wrote it in 1967.

"I think it really turned out to be one of the most powerful tracks on the record," Trucks said in a statement. "I think lyrically it's pretty timely. 'Crash on the levee, down in the flood,' are so significant post-Katrina."

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