Isbell sings about his split from musician Amanda Shires on his latest album, Foxes in the Snow. "What I was attempting to do is document a very specific time where I was going through a lot of changes," he says.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: Who is Jason Isbell and why is he significant in music?
This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. My guest Jason Isbell was described in Variety as the poet laureate of American rock. The quibble I have with that is that I'm not exactly sure I'd call it rock because there's country and folk music blended into many of his songs. Maybe the word Americana more suits him. He's won nine Americana Music Awards and six Grammys.
Chapter 2: What is the story behind Jason Isbell's album 'Foxes in the Snow'?
His lyrics are as well written as a good poem or short story. They're often very personal, and that was especially true of his album Southeastern, which was released in 2013 and was his first album since Getting Sober. It's also true of his new album, Foxes in the Snow, on which he sounds especially naked because it's solo. His band, the 400 Unit, sits this one out. It's just Isbell and his guitar.
Some of the songs are about the blame, anger, and guilt when a relationship ends and about the exhilaration of falling in love again. His ex-wife, Amanda Shires, is also a songwriter and singer and violinist who performed with Isbel. She's written her own songs about the cracks in their relationship.
Chapter 3: How does Jason Isbell's personal life influence his songwriting?
They were in a 2023 documentary together called Running With Our Eyes Closed, which is about the making of Isbel's 2020 album, Reunions, on which she played fiddle. The film also ended up being about the tension in the marriage, which was exacerbated during the COVID lockdown when they spent more time together than they ever had.
Jason Isbell got his professional start with the band The Drive-By Truckers. Before we hear some of the relationship songs, let's start with a song that opens the album. I love this one. It's called Bury Me.
Chapter 4: What are the themes explored in the song 'Bury Me'?
Bury me where the wind don't blow, where the dust won't cover me. Where the tall grass grows. Or bury me right where I fall. Tokyo to Tennessee. I love them all. See the windmills turn up 55. Still got so much to learn. Still feel alive. No lonely girl is all I need.
Tie me to this world Make me believe Well, I ain't no cowboy But I can ride And I ain't no outlaw But I've been inside And there were bars of steel, boys And there were bars to sing And there were bars with swinging doors For all the time between
That was Bury Me from Jason Isbell's new album, Foxes in the Snow. Jason Isbell, welcome back to Fresh Air. I love this album. Congratulations on it. And I love this song. And I hope I don't mangle this, but I want to quote some of the lyric. This is the chorus. I ain't no cowboy, but I can ride. I ain't no outlaw, but I've been inside.
And there were bars of steel, boys, and there were bars to sing. And there were bars with swinging doors for all the time between. That's so great because you're talking about a jail with bars of steel, music, which has bars delineating each segment, you know, each like four notes or whatever. And bars with swinging doors, those are like old Western saloons that have those swinging doors.
And you were a drinker for years. So that's just, it's like, were you in jail too?
I have been to jail. Yeah, never for longer than a day and never for anything violent. But, yeah, I have been. For drinking too much? Yeah, just from drinking and yelling and hollering at people who were also drinking.
So you imagine you managed to incorporate some of your own story into this kind of cowboy song.
Yes, yes. But it's also there are – I'm attempting to work on different levels sometimes. It's not necessarily an allegorical song, but there are pieces of this song that are directly about me, and there are details that I pull from my own life. Yeah.
you know, the swinging doors line, I mean, that could be, you know, I'm sitting here looking at a gate out the window right now, and that could also be gates. And there is at least one very, very famous set of gates when it comes to right and folk music. But... Is it by the Gates of Heaven? I am, indeed, yeah, in a death song. You know, so it's the kind of thing where...
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Chapter 5: How does Jason Isbell feel about writing songs after a breakup?
And then I interviewed her in 2022 when she had an album out that included a couple of songs about fractures in the relationship. And your new album includes songs about factors in your relationship and ending a relationship, the pain of separating, the guilt of all of it, falling in love with someone new after. And listening, I sometimes think like, am I supposed to be taking sides here?
Because I like her songs. I like your songs. I can see both sides, you know. It's kind of like friends of yours are breaking up and you're supposed to choose who stays your friend afterwards, you know. And then I thought, like, no, that's not what I want to do.
What I want to do is really enjoy both of your songs and appreciate each point of view and know that there's things in each of those points of view that I identify with. So I want to talk with you about writing these songs, but I also don't want to trespass on your privacy. So let's find a way to talk about it without getting too personal and making anyone uncomfortable.
We need an audio intimacy coordinator.
I love that idea. Start something new. So I guess the first thing I'm wondering is, if you write a song that is critical of the person who you've been married to and who's the mother of your daughter, do you feel guilty about it? Do you fear, is there a form of self-censorship that comes in because you don't want to hurt the other person? Or do you just write what you want to write?
And I think this is something that particularly memoirists run into all the time.
Well, where am I being critical?
Um, the song I'm about to play, for example, which is Gravel Weed. I was a gravel weed and I needed you to raise me. I'm sorry the day came when I felt I was raised. So it's kind of like you needed her to help you get through a period. And now, like, you don't need her anymore because you got through it.
Well, now, I didn't say that I'm sorry the day came when I was raised. I said I'm sorry the day came when I felt like I was raised.
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Chapter 6: What is the significance of the song 'Gravelweed'?
So let's play the song. And I'll say, I'm from Brooklyn, and I had to look up what a gravel weed was.
It's like the tree, the crack in the sidewalk, you know.
Well, I looked it up, and it looks like it grows really tall with flowers.
It does, yeah.
In the part of the country where you're from, which is Alabama.
Right.
Okay.
Her dad's a florist. Not a florist, but he grows commercial flowers, and so they would call it a trash plant. All right. Not me. That's not a metaphor. Yeah, we're not doing the job right now. We're just talking right now. The gravel weed itself would be the kind of plant that you would pull. You know, you would pull it up out of the gravel so your gravel would look nice and neat.
And most people would do that. Some people would say, well, that grows very tall and grows flowers if you let it grow.
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Chapter 7: How does Jason Isbell continue to find originality in love songs?
I was a gravel weed and I needed you to raise me And you couldn't reach me once I felt like I was raped And now that I live to see my melodies betray me I'm sorry that love songs all mean different things today
That's Jason Isbell, Gravelweed, from his new album, which is called Foxes in the Snow. I want to quote another line from there, which is, But now I've lived to see my melodies betray me. I'm sorry the love songs all mean different things today.
Can you talk about that a little bit, having written love songs about one person and then written, inspired, I think, by the same relationship songs about the relationship ending? How do those old love songs sound to you now? And do you still play them? Can you still play Cover Me Up, for instance?
I can, yeah, yeah. And the old songs, they mean different things to me now because I have hindsight, you know, and the emotions that I'm feeling now when I'm playing those songs they're not the same as they were when I wrote them. You know, they're certainly not that sort of obsession. There's more nostalgia for the person that I was when I felt that way.
And there's also a document of love that I had for someone, and I feel like that was reciprocated at the time. And, you know, I mean, that's just art, you know. Our lives change. And the hard part for me is, It's not writing about it. The hard part is making the decisions that lead me to peace. That's very, very difficult, but I'm not just going to whine for the rest of my life.
I have been given too much already for that.
So many love songs and breakup songs have been written in every genre for centuries. How do you find new things to say, new words to use in a love song? I mean, Ira Gershwin even wrote a lyric, what can you say in a love song that's never been said before?
Mm-hmm. Which is a beautiful lyric. That's one way to do it. What I try to do is closely document my own experience. Even though I think my audience might not recognize themselves in this story, usually what winds up happening is I come up with something that I might not be saying a new thing.
I might not, you know, everybody's looking at the moon, but we're all looking at it from a different spot. And so I'm trying to say instead of this is what the moon looks like, I'm trying to say this is what the moon looks like from right here. And, you know, also you don't have to say anything new, to tell you the truth. You don't. You can combine words and melodies in a way that sounds familiar.
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Chapter 8: What is the message of Jason Isbell's song 'True Believer'?
I think my rule is as long as you don't know who you're ripping off before the song comes out, then you're okay. Yeah.
I want to play another track from your new album, and this is called True Believer. Do you want to say anything about writing this song before we hear it? This is another relationship song, another breaking up or broken up kind of song.
No, I like the melody and the chorus on this one. This is one where I... My daughter, Mercy, she's nine. She likes to listen to the pop hits of the day on her way to school and back home. And so I've been listening to a lot of the current pop hits and thought, man, I need to write this big, huge melody to go with this really sad song. So I like that melody a lot.
Yeah, I do too. Thank you.
Take your hand off my knee, take your foot off my neck. Why are y'all examining me like I'm a murder suspect? If I got a little loose, I just forgot to be afraid. But I started out a true believer, babe.
A lot of dangerous memories, a lot of bars in this town But oh, to have loved and lost and then still stuck around But I heard God in the rhyme and I crawled out of the grave And I guess I'm still a true believer, babe All your girlfriends say I broke your heart and I don't like it. There's a letter on the nightstand I don't think I'll ever read.
Well, I finally found a match and you kept daring me to strike it. And now I have to let it burn and let it be.
So that's Jason Isbell from his new album, Foxes in the Snow. The song is called True Believer. You had asked me earlier, like, give me an example of a line where I sound critical of my ex or of an ex. So from the song we just heard, two separate lines, take your hand off my knee, take your foot off my neck. And then all your girlfriends say, I broke your bleeping heart and I don't like it.
There's a letter on the nightstand. I don't think I'll ever read it. So that sounds, it sounds angry and you sing it angry. Yeah.
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