Interestingly, he chooses to open the album with its biggest track, the nearly seven-minute-long Elsewhere on the album, Isbell tries some different things, with varying degrees of success. His longtime band — the 400 Unit — sounds great, but of course they do. It loves the illusion of musical spontaneity, of untamable, unbridled passion that somehow manages to land perfectly on the beat. Verse two starts similarly, but then it mentions how the river "Protect[s] me from my neighbor / All his jealousy and greed" and closes with "Take the body to the delta / Hide the weapon in the weeds." The singer-songwriter's seventh album continues his reign as one of Americana's master craftsmen.In music criticism, one often runs into trouble when trying to describe sustained, consistent excellence. Erik Nelson's gorgeously restored Pacific War color footage in There is so much wonderful creative music these days that even an apartment-bound critic misses too much of it. It's a smart way to subvert what is a very pretty, easygoing song. It conspicuously uses they/them pronouns for this prospective life partner, which is unsurprising considering that Isbell and Shires wrote the "first lesbian country love ballad" for Brandi Carlile to sing on Shires' female country supergroup the Highwomen in 2019. Fans are now able to relive Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit‘s September 2017 concert at Colorado’s Red Rocks Amphitheater, as the entire performance has … Musically, the album continues where The Nashville Sound left off—a mixed bag of guitar-heavy rockers and acoustic ballads. © Copyright 2020 Variety Media, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media, LLC.

Read Next: Diana Krall Dips Into Final Tommy LiPuma Sessions for New Album, Previewed With an Irving Berlin Classic (Listen) "Running With Our Eyes Closed" has a late-night, '80s rock vibe, with guitar tones characteristic of that decade and some very conspicuous '80s-style synths. Violinist/backing vocalist Amanda Shires, … The 400 Unit also features drummer Chad Gamble, keyboardist Derry deBorja and guitarist Sadler Vaden. It takes an artist with Isbell’s confidence, earned through years of sustained excellence, to know when to leave well enough alone. Another stellar album for Jason Isbell with the 400 Unit. Isbell is, of course, up to the challenge. Its excellence is of the entirely unrevelatory kind, and Isbell’s brilliance has become so commonplace that one risks taking it for granted.Why is that? Perhaps part of the problem is that criticism often has a contentious relationship with the notion of craft. "River", on the other hand, is a piano and fiddle-heavy pop-country ballad that pulls a subtle switcheroo on the listener. It's an interesting experiment, but it turns '80s slickness is not the 400 Unit's biggest strength.

This show has been rescheduled due to concerns regarding COVID-19. The whole album sounds larger than its predecessors, but manages to keep a sense of intimacy. Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit New show date! Underestimate that at your peril. Music criticism is rarely more useful than when it manages to pinpoint the exact moment in an artist’s trajectory when the planets all align perfectly, a major breakthrough occurs, and a career-defining masterpiece is born. It’s less adept at recognizing the toil and precision and trial-and-error it takes to give off that illusion. There’s no clever narrative reversal here; no subversion of the form; no real surprises. It's tender and heartfelt, with a chorus that says, "It's easy to see that you'll get where you're going / The hard part is letting you go." Photo: Alysse Gafkjen / Courtesy of Sacks & Co. In his hands, complex melodies sound simple, and he knows how to delay resolving straightforward chord progressions just long enough to make them sound new. Isbell's vocal performance is consistently warm and sweetened by Amanda Shires' harmonies.

Here is jazz from the last 18 months that shouldn't be missed.Still going strong at 86, blues legend Bobby Rush presents "Dust My Broom" from an upcoming salute to Mississippi blues history, Dreamy bits of sunshine find their way through the clouds of dreams dashed and lives on the brink of despair on "Blue Coast" from soulful rockers the Brevet.