A movable feast

You can take the picnic out of Texas, but you can’t take Texas out of the picnic – not entirely, anyway.

Willie Nelson’s Fourth of July Picnic will again serve up a heaping helping of Lone Star-style sounds.

But for the first time since its inception in 1973, the event will take place outside its home state – at The Gorge Amphitheatre, as part of Nelson’s regular Northwest tour.

The “picnic” (not a feast of food, but music) became a Texas tradition, from the lawsuits, arrests and fires of the early, wild days to the more sedate, family-friendly outings of late.

The Gorge show will look a little different from its predecessors down south.

Those Texas picnics were all-day affairs – sometimes on multiple days, and often on multiple stages. They offered a familiar cast of Nelson’s old “outlaw” buddies – Billy Joe Shaver, David Allan Coe, Ray Wylie Hubbard et al – along with such big-name guests as Bob Dylan and Neil Young.

Wednesday’s concert, starting at 4:30 p.m., features four supporting acts selected by promoter Live Nation: Son Volt, Old 97’s, Drive-By Truckers and Amos Lee.

Both Son Volt and Old 97’s are pioneering alt-country groups that re-formed in recent years.

Son Volt, which started in 1994 as an extension of founder Jay Farrar’s work with Uncle Tupelo, has branched out into more broadly textured sounds (keyboards, horns) and increasingly political lyrics.

Old 97’s bring true Texas street cred, having originated in Dallas in 1993. The band took a back burner to frontman Rhett Miller’s solo career in the early 2000s, but released a new studio album in 2004 and a live set the following year.

Drive-By Truckers came to prominence with the 2001 double album “Southern Rock Opera,” loosely based on Lynyrd Skynyrd’s rise and fall (from the sky). The onetime country raunch-rockers have mellowed somewhat in recent years.

Mellow is the word for singer-songwriter Lee, who’s been called the male Norah Jones in comparison to his jazz-folk Blue Note labelmate.

Whatever comes before, once Willie takes the stage and strikes the first few chords of “Whiskey River,” it will be clear what the evening is all about.

And the underlying philosophy of the festival will likely remain the one that Nelson outlined to his hometown Austin American-Statesman last year:

“I wanted to have it on the Fourth of July, because it was too hot to fight,” he explained. “The hippies and the cowboys can get together, and everybody can get along, and that’s exactly what happened.”