SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Jason Isbell likes to challenge himself. More specifically...
JASON ISBELL: You know, I like to give myself some rules.
DETROW: The singer and songwriter has a new album out this week, and it's different - his first all acoustic solo effort. That's intentional.
So the rule was just you and an acoustic guitar? That's the rule?
ISBELL: Yeah, no overdubs, no harmonies, nothing like that. Just I had to be playing it and singing it at the same time.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "EILEEN")
ISBELL: I wound up recording a record in New York, and I wanted to walk into a studio in the Village with a single guitar and a notebook and come out of there with an album, like people used to do in the '60s.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "EILEEN")
ISBELL: (Singing) Started out like it always starts. Try to hold the hunger back. You don't anticipate a broken heart. Can't see nothing but the track.
DETROW: The result - a stripped-down album of songs that often feel personal. Now, the songs Isbell writes have always felt pretty personal. It's a big part of his appeal. But coming in the wake of a recent divorce, songs about the angry pain and second guessing that come with breakups and songs about the thrills of new relationships - the topics stand out.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FOXES IN THE SNOW")
DETROW: The new album is called "Foxes In The Snow." When Isbell stopped by the NPR studios the other day, I started by asking him about that evocative image.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FOXES IN THE SNOW")
ISBELL: (Singing) I like her friends. The ones I know. They leave drops of blood like foxes in the snow.
It came out of, I think, the idea of holding two concepts in your mind at once - that things can be really, really, really, really bad and difficult and challenging, and still, you can have an infinite amount of gratitude. You know, politically, socially, culturally, you know, you got to be able to pay attention. Like, I'm not going to turn the news off, but I got to stay on the right side of that point of diminishing returns. I can't just curl up in a ball and think the world sucks and America's awful and we're all going to die.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: So I have to keep that gratitude in my mind at the same time. And, you know, "Foxes In The Snow" is - you know, a fox is a dangerous animal. And when I lived out in the country, we had chickens, you know? And every couple of days, I'd be out yelling at a fox in the front yard. It'd be headed toward the chicken coop. And it's not the fox's fault. It's a fox.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: You know? And...
DETROW: They're increasingly my favorite animal. They're so beautiful.
ISBELL: They're so beautiful, but they're vicious, and that's the thing. You hold those two things in your mind at the same time, that your life and also yourself, your situation, your circumstances, but your choices can be very beautiful and also very vicious simultaneously.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FOXES IN THE SNOW")
ISBELL: (Singing) For all the boys I could have been, all the fights I didn't win, they put me here against her skin. She can see me.
DETROW: You touched on politics a little there, and I wanted to ask you about that because you're somebody who, whether it's social media, or sometimes in your performances, or in your music - you performed at the Democratic Convention last year - you're a politically active person. It's kind of a weird political time right now, and I think a lot of artists are choosing to be less political than they were before.
ISBELL: Yeah.
DETROW: How are you thinking about this moment?
ISBELL: Choosing is doing a lot of work there because for some of us, it's more of a choice than it is for others.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: You know, I think there are some people who are afraid. And they're afraid that if they speak out, then it's going to be even more difficult for them to feed themselves, feed their families and keep doing the work they want to do. For me, I'm - I don't have a whole lot of fear of that. I know there's enough people out there that are going to continue to consume the work that I make, and that's going to be fine for me. So I feel motivated to say more. You know, it's terrible. You know, Trump's terrible. He's a terrible leader. He's a terrible person. This is a terrible time. And it's easy for me to say.
DETROW: People are still going to come to your shows. People are still going to listen to your music.
ISBELL: Yeah, nobody's going to come up and punch me in the face, you know? I mean, maybe. Maybe they will, but good luck, you know? I'm pretty far left, but I got a good right. So good luck.
(LAUGHTER)
ISBELL: But...
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "RIDE TO ROBERT'S")
ISBELL: But, yeah, the truth of it is, I feel very strongly for a lot of people who aren't in those circumstances, and it's so hard to break through and make a living making music now as it is.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "RIDE TO ROBERT'S")
ISBELL: (Singing) Everything's green right now. Tennessee at the end of June. You get a day to come down. We'll ride to Robert's in the afternoon.
DETROW: Can we talk about the songwriting for a little bit?
ISBELL: Yes, please.
DETROW: You came on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED right before "Southeastern" came out, which is a really interesting moment to hear you talk about things right before this big defining album, you know, hits the world. And you were talking about how personal so many of these songs are, and you were talking about the songwriting process. And you said it's really hard to write a really personal song. It's a visceral experience. You're putting yourself out there. You've been doing that for 10 years since...
ISBELL: Yeah.
DETROW: ...You said that. Has that changed over the decade?
ISBELL: It's still difficult.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: But I think I keep it difficult. I think I make steps to keep it hard, you know?
DETROW: Like what?
ISBELL: Like, I keep revealing things that I don't feel comfortable revealing.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: And, like, when I finished this record, I called my best friend. I said, am I crazy? Like, is this nuts? This feels so uncomfortable to me. And he...
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: ...Said, no, no, no. If you didn't have that question, you wouldn't be doing your job. That's your job. It's not everybody's job, but it's yours and the one that you've committed to and the way that you relate to your work and to the rest of the world. So yeah, you have to let those things out.
But I don't think it's gotten any easier. I don't know that it's supposed to. You know, if I ever make an album and I don't look back at the end and think, oh, my God, I've revealed too much, then I feel like I probably haven't made an album that I should sell and tour.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GRAVELWEED")
DETROW: You're giving an opening there because I do want to ask you about some of those things that you feel like you might have revealed too much of. One particular song I wanted to ask about - "Gravelweed."
ISBELL: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GRAVELWEED")
ISBELL: (Singing) I wish that I could be angry, punch a hole in the wall, drink a fifth of cheap whiskey, and call and call and call.
DETROW: I feel like a lot of your fans are going to hear that song, hear the chorus, in particular, and hear that song as almost - it's a bookend song, the end of a relationship song. And talking about love songs that hit different now than before, they're going to hear that and think about the big changes in your life.
ISBELL: Yes, of course. Yeah, I'm sure. And, you know, I think the truth is always forgiving. If I'm telling the truth and I'm doing it in the right way, then it means I'm zooming out far enough to get past bitterness. You still have anger. You can still be sad. But like Tom T. Hall said in his songwriting book, you know, if you're bitter, you're showing your own hand. You're weakening the perspective of the narrator in the song, and I think you're weakening your own perspective in your life.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GRAVELWEED")
ISBELL: (Singing) And now that I live to see my melodies betray me, I'm sorry the love songs all mean different things today.
There are things about the relationship that I'm grateful for, you know, big changes that happened in my life. Things would not have gone the same way if anything had been different. That's just how it always goes. But I just try to be honest about it, and I try to be - I try to zoom out a little bit and get past any kind of resentment and look at it for what it was and what it is.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DON'T BE TOUGH")
ISBELL: (Singing) Don't be tough until you have to. Take your heartbreak on the chin.
DETROW: A few times in this conversation, you've talked about looking back. And I'm wondering, you look back when the relationship is over, and so much - at least to outsider's perspective, so much of your heart and soul of that relationship lives in different lyrics of songs.
ISBELL: Yeah.
DETROW: No regret about that at this point?
ISBELL: No, I don't think so. No, no regret about the songs, no regret about that. The thing that I wish that people understood is this is not a true crime podcast. And it seems like more now than ever before, because we're all in contact with each other...
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: ...People feel like they can connect the dots and they can come up with some kind of story. And that's not what art is. That's not what songwriting is because, you know, songs are not arranged that way. We can take pieces and images and parts of stories and move them around and put them wherever we want to put them, and there's no fiction or nonfiction shelf in the record store. And I think the mistake happens when people listen and start trying to connect the dots.
But that's not my responsibility. That's not my job, you know? My job is to make these images, these narratives, these pictures, happen. The song exists separately from my life. Of course, both of them feed each other, but this is not my diary.
DETROW: Yeah.
ISBELL: I'm a songwriter. I mean, I guess people need a mystery to solve.
DETROW: Well, that's why those podcasts are so popular.
ISBELL: Those podcasts are doing big numbers. I should have done a murder podcast.
DETROW: There's always the next day.
ISBELL: (Laughter)
DETROW: That's Jason Isbell. His new album is called "Foxes In The Snow." Thank you so much.
ISBELL: Thank you. I appreciate it, Scott. Thanks for having me.
DETROW: Thanks for coming by.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DON'T BE TOUGH")
ISBELL: (Singing) And if you want it, go and get it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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