Jason Isbell reflects on divorce in “Renards in the snow”: NPR

No matter how many love songs exist in the world, Jason Isbell says that there is always room for one more.

“What I am trying to do is document my own experience closely, putting my own fingerprint on these songs,” explains the singer-singer-songwriter. “Everyone looks at the moon, but we all look at it from a different place.”

Isbell started his professional with the training truckers, but separated from the group in 2007. He has since directed the group of Unit 400, but his latest album, Foxes in the snowis a solo effort. He was described as a divorce album, with songs on his break in 2024 with his compatriot musician Amanda Shires.

“During the first listening, you could reject this disc and say that these words are very simple in relation to the things I have written in the past,” explains Isbell. “What I was trying to do is document a very specific period when I was going through a lot of changes really, very quickly. And I suffered a lot. I felt a lot of shame.”

Although some of the words sound angry, he does not criticize the Chips externally.

“The record is to grow and change as me, myself and not on the accusation of Amanda or any other individual person of any reprehensible act,” he said. “I don’t think there are really criticisms. … I think the perspective, empathy for the other person begins to sink over time.”

Strengths of the interview

By playing old love songs now, since the end of marriage

I can. I can’t either (at) some nights either, and it really feels good too. Just because I have the impression of being able to organize a show that is satisfactory for me and the public without putting this one. … The old songs, they mean different things for me now, because I have a step back, and the emotions that I feel now when I play these songs, they are not the same as they were when I wrote them. It is certainly not this kind of obsession. There is more nostalgia for the person I was when I felt this way. There is also a love document that I had for someone, and I have the impression that it was reciprocal at the time. I mean it’s just art. Our lives change. And the difficult part for me is not to write about it – the difficult part is to make the decisions that led me to peace. It is very, very difficult. But I will not simply whine for the rest of my life. … Writing songs and looking at how the meanings of these songs evolve over time is just art.

By bringing persistent thoughts to live on death during its breakdown with chires

I call it my “Hillbilly brain”, but it goes to the worst scenario possible in many situations. I spend a lot of time thinking about death, not in a sad or frightening way, but in a way that, I think, well, I have already done so many things and I could see so many things and that might not necessarily be in the plans for me at the beginning. So I am very, very grateful for the time I had and I think that the song deals with this, among others.

There was certainly a time early after Amanda and I had separated, when I was driving in the car and the radio was not on and I was alone and I just heard myself say aloud … “Is it going to kill me?” And I didn’t even know I was thinking about this question, but I heard it bounce back on the windshield. … Everything is brief – so, if in short, but it is so beautiful.

On his song “Bury Me”

I had written a song on Molting, a song on the passage of one stage of your life to another. And sometimes this is metaphorically characterized as death. But also, I remember this album by Robbie Robertson where there was a song he spoke of: “It’s a good day to die”, and it was chanted again and again. And I remember thinking how grateful to feel. And I think that “Bury” deals with the Renaissance and change, but it also deals with gratitude, because it is good, if I died today, then I had a good time.

After being invited to leave his group Drive-By Truckers, in 2007, for poor behavior induced by alcohol

I unleashed myself because I was postponing with the trauma of my childhood, and at the time, it was much easier to blame it in a rock and roll group, because it looked like a gang, you know? It was good. I felt like, okay, I am with these guys, they are older, they smoke cigarettes, they drink whiskey. … It motivated me not only to have more confidence, but also it made me feel that I could push my own limits and test my own limits a little. But … The truth was that I just resumed to become an adult, unraveling these nodes and concluding an agreement with a community where I would treat them fairly and hopes the same thing in return.

In calculation with the trauma of his education

Having grown up around so many deeply conservative and deeply religious people, I think it is a trauma, in itself. I think that many people in America are treated with this now because I think being deeply conservative and traditional in your values ​​is children’s abuse. And I had to face it because I felt so much guilt and so much shame. I had to reconcile myself with myself, be able to sit with myself and think, you do not deserve to go to hell just for existing, no matter what someone told you. And your body, your feelings, those that belong to you. These should not be judged by someone else who walks on this earth. Your behavior, your actions, a fair game. But your feelings are yours, and it was traumatic for me to hear the opposite.

By being sober for 13 years and writing “It Fason”, a song about sobriety

You think it is difficult to write a love song, to try to write a fucking recovery song and not to look like a bumper sticker. It’s very hard. But you must be personal, and you must be very small. … I worked hard on this song to make sure … that it scans properly, that it seems conversational, that it does not seem forced, as if you track syllables in the place where they do not belong. And if you can do it, you will cut a lot from your cliché potential. … You can use lyrics and sentences and a subject that has been covered so much in the past, but if you make it sing well, then people forget that they listen to a song.

Therese Madden and Susan Nyakundi produced and published this interview for Broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Hazel Cills adapted it for the web.