Last Friday night Jason Isbell blistered through his new record here in Jackson.
I first became aware of Jason through his work with the Drive-By Truckers—a band I’d scrupulously avoided for years, based on a staggeringly incorrect perception that they made jokey country rock. My friend Lula played me Decoration Day a few months ago, and while the record is riddled with gems, Jason’s “Outfit” was the diamond. It struck me in a rare way: I couldn’t stop listening to it, regretted not hearing it the moment it was burned onto plastic, wanted to play it for all my family. It can bring me to tears or damn near them, move me so strongly that a week after hearing it I was scrawling its lyrics across the back of the Sandusky Review.
Jason’s writing speaks of relationships between men in a way both macho and vulnerable—jamming together these two opposite poles, acknowledging that behind every whiskey-breathed bully is a guy who still cries when his girl’s left him. Music rarely reaches these bittersweet heights or tells those true stories; sometimes you get a glimpse of it, like when Johnny Cash covered “Hurt,” but it’s dang hard. He does it better than anybody else, stuffing his stories (they’re more story than song) with loss, love, shotguns and styrofoam cups filled with sweet tea.
I could tell you about the set list—that it was composed of nearly all the songs from his debut, Sirens of the Ditch, along with a slew of his work from the Truckers, including “Outfit,” “Manuel/Danko,” and “Goddamn Lonely Love,” or that he and the fiery 400 Unit tore through “Psycho Killer” like it was a lost Skynyrd B-side where they tried their hand, successfully, at New Wave. Or I could just let you listen to a live version of his “Dress Blues,” and tell you that when he played it in Jackson—to a rowdy and booze-soaked crowd of Southern boys and girls—it stilled them, brought them to silence. This is why:
I gotta pick this up—“Manuel/Danko” is one of my favorite DBT songs, but I’d never really paid attention to who wrote/sang what before.
Great post, gorjus.
I’m glad you went to this show. As much as I love DBT —and I’m a recent convert, like you—I think Jason’s work stands on its own pretty well. I find it telling that the themes you talk about that are so present on this record that comes out right about the time Jason and Patterson parted ways from DBT. This is a highly vulnerable record, and these are songs that would be hard to pull off with a band without being cheesy, or insincere.
But as it is, the songs are pure and direct and brutally honest. This one in particular breaks my heart.
FWIW: There’s a great 2 disc bootleg from the soundboard of a DBT’S show at Hal and Mal’s March 28, 2003 highlighted by a rare live performance of “Sandwiches from the Road” from Ganstabilly, their first lp, “The Southern Thing” from Southern Rock Opera, the aforementioned “Outfit”, and a mashup of “Steve McQueen/Ain’t Talkin’Bout Love.”
My favorite DBt’s MP3 rarity is a cover of “Hey Ya” from San Francisco’s Bottom of the Hill club.
Hope to see Isbell Friday in Oxford.
Excellent summation, gorjus. I couldn’t have said it better myself!
Damn man, “Dress Blues” is some powerful stuff. Sounds like it was a great show.
It’s Danko/Manuel btw Haunting song – particularly if you’re familiar with Danko and Manuel