Live with Jason Isbell

Ah, live music. How sweet it can be.

Other than bluegrass or folk bands playing at kid-friendly outdoor venues, I have not been out to see some real live music in far too long. No excuse. At least no good ones.

But this past week, I joined my friends Erik and Ed at the Mission Theater to take in a pure and simple night of rock and roll with Jason Isbell, a former member of one of my favorite bands, the Drive-By Truckers. He's out on tour promoting a gem of a solo album, Sirens of the Ditch.

 

 www.jasonisbell.com     

The scene was surprisingly mellow, considering that the show was free and that past DBT shows I've been to in Portland have been relative mob scenes. We had no problem getting in, finding a table even, and watching and hearing pretty much every detail of the show.

A singer/songwriter named Jeremy Fisher opened the show with a pretty mellow set of acoustic tunes backed up by a pretty keyboard player. I know some of his stuff from various late-night radio shows, so it was good to put a face with a voice.

The second act was a southern singer by the name of Will Hoge, whose full band included bass, drums, keys, a lead guitar, and his own rhythm guitar. The music was intense and driven, heavy, southern-flavored rock with plenty of slide guitar and crashing drums. But Hoge's voice, with its powerful rasp and soulful current, was clearly the light. Think  Joe Cocker and Lenny Kravitz, Gregg Allman and Chris Robinson of the Black Crowes. It was hard not to be entranced when he sang quiet numbers like the spot-on anti-war paean "Bible vs. Gun" or "When I Can Afford to Lose"; hard not to be overwhelmed by the guitars and heartbreak of songs like "Silver or Gold."  I'm a new fan.

And then Isbell came on with his band, the 400 Unit, which includes bass, drums, guitars, and subtle keyboards. He opened with the first track off his new album, "Brand New Kind of Actress," and filled his set with a good mix of cuts from said album as well as some of his best material from his DBT days, including "Decoration Day," "Never Gonna Change," and one of my all-time favorites, "Outfit." Isbell's also got an incredible indictment of the war called "Dress Blues," about a high school friend of his who was killed in Iraq two days before he was to ship home for the birth of his first child. I wish more of these songs about the war would get some airplay, but at least they're out there, somewhere.

So it was a fantastic night of the kind of music that really resonates with me: honest and real; lyrical and literary; subtle at times, loud and forceful at others. It was the kind of night that inspires any musician to pick up his guitar, get behind his drums, or grab a pen and start making music that matters. 

Here's to more nights like these.