Ok. I was wrong. Forgive me. It was a gut reaction to what, at the time, seemed like a catastrophic shake up in the lineup of a band that was very dear to me. Jason Isbell has left the Drive-By Truckers (as anyone who has listened to the show in the last couple of months had heard me rant and philosophize about, along with Brad Rice's departure from Son Volt….to tour with f**king Keith Urban of all people). Anyway like I was saying, initially I was upset considering the loss of Isbell's excellent songwriting and considerable guitar chops. I mean this was guy that penned "Outfit", "Decoration Day", "The Day John Henry Died", "Danko and Manuel", "Never Gonna Change", "Goddamn Lonely Love", "Easy On Yourself", and "Daylight". These were stand out songs on excellent albums. He brought a soaring pop sensibility to the more rustic leanings of Hood and Cooley, playing precise and clean lead lines, often on slide. Anyway enough on why I was wrong. There was, as it turns out, a considerable upside to all this.
First off Isbell's solo album, Sirens In the Ditch. SITD finally saw release on July 10th on New West records (also DBT's label). Considerably more diverse musically than Isbell's DBT output, SITD features Isbell playing among other things vastly more acoustic guitar and keyboards (piano, wurlitzer, B-3) than he ever did with DBT. Songs like "Down In the Hole", "In A Razor Town", and "The Magician" are great acoustic songs that see Isbell playing not only acoustic guitar, but dobro and banjo as well. "Hurricanes and Hand Grenades" features an even greater stylistic leap, as Isbell mines the musical history of his home town of Muscle Shoals, AL (where he recorded the album). An instant classic, the song stands up tall to the considerable Muscle Shoals catalog. This is what Patterson was referring to in "Ronnie and Neil", when he says "that sweet soul music…that Muscle Shoals sound".
The emotional core of the album is the back to back "Chicago Promenade" and "Dress Blues". The latter of which is a great protest song and has been performed at numerous Isbell solo shows as well as by DBT. Anyone familiar with the ragged solo electric versions that Isbell was doing at his solo shows may take some time to adjust to the slick arrangement the song has been given here (I know it took me awhile). Isbell has given the song a beautiful arrangement with weeping pedal steel, acoustic guitar, and excellent background vocals by both former wife Shonna Tucker and Angela Hacker. The song is incredibly powerful and its lyrics both lament the war and speak to the emotional damage it causes, all the while elegantly depicting the south throughout the lyrics. "Chicago Promenade" begins with Isbell alone with the piano before expanding out to include the full band, the song was written about the recent loss of Isbell's grandfather and seems to be one of the most personal songs on the record.
However, all that being said about new musical territory and all that, there are several songs on here that wouldn't be out of place amongst Isbell's more rock material with the Truckers, including the opener "Brand New Kind of Actress", as well as "Try", Grown", "Shotgun Wedding", and the closer "The Devil Is My Running Mate". Every member of DBT excepting Mike Cooley makes an appearance here including Patterson Hood (co-produced, guitars, piano), former wife Shonna Tucker (backing vox, bass), John Neff (pedal steel), Brad Morgan (drums), Spooner Oldham (B-3), and even DBT producer David Barbe stops by to add keys to "Shotgun Wedding".
I can't recall an acoustic Isbell song on a DBT record; even the slower "Goddamn Lonely Love" and "Decoration Day" were exclusively electric. So, the acoustic songs are both a surprise and the best songs here. The electric songs sound a little weaker with the DBT 3 guitar attack and perhaps purposefully so, as at the time this was recorded it was supposed to be a solo side project. Anyway, the record is excellent and everyone should make plans to catch Isbell's solo tour in a town near you.--- I plan on catching one of the dates he's doing with Centro-Matic in North Carolina.
Part 2 of Why This Isn't A Catastrophe
I went up to Asheville last Friday (07/13/07) to catch DBT do a Dirt Underneath Tour date (w/ half rock show). It ended up being more like a ¾ rock show, but was still rather excellent. They opened up with "Tornadoes" a great song, which got about half the audience singing along almost louder than Hood's vocal. Hood was dressed initially in a nice suit jacket and seemed in good spirits (he shed the jacket for the rock show). In fact the whole band seemed to be enjoying themselves more than previous shows with Isbell, Cooley actually smiled and performed more guitar histrionics than I had ever seen out of him before. This was the first time I had seen the band, where they have not been passing a handle of whiskey around (there were buckets of beer laid out for them). Cooley, however, did chain smoke through the entire show (minus his vocals) in the no smoking venue.
Isbell leaving ended up meaning two things for the band. One, more Cooley vocals, which was huge positive, especially during the acoustic portion of the show as Cooley hit two early high points with "Space City" (making the hair on the back of my neck stand up) and the hilarious/sad/poignant "Panties in Her Purse". The other major effect was that there was a lot more space in the songs allowing for a clearer distinction between Cooley and Hood's guitars as well as Neff's pedal steel and Shonna's bass and backing vocals. I don't know if it was the venue (Asheville's Orange Peel), but this show was vastly superior to DBT's last show with Isbell, which I attended (Charleston's Music Farm…acoustically resembling a tin can). The whole band sounded great and for the first time John Neff's pedal steel was clearly audible throughout (probably partly due its prominence during the acoustic set). Shonna was also filling in for lots of Isbell's background vocals and did excellent job.
This show was easily the best of the three DBT shows I've been to, without even trying really.
PS. Hood was awesome as usual, funny, engaging, and on top of it vocally. His highlights were "Sinkhole", "Dead, Drunk, and Naked", "Angels and Fuselage", and especially "Bulldozers and Dirt".
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