WEBVTT - Jason Isbell 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:15.920 Pushkin. Rolling Stone recently called Jason Isabel arguably the most 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:20.680 revered roots rock singer songwriter of his generation. Jason was 0:00:20.720 --> 0:00:23.880 born in rural Alabama to a close knit family of musicians. 0:00:24.280 --> 0:00:26.880 He played gospel and old hillbilly songs on the mandolin 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:30.760 and guitar before discovering the blues. When he was twenty two, 0:00:30.840 --> 0:00:34.120 Isabel joined southern rock band that Drive By Truckers, who 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:37.080 just had on The Show recently, and after six years 0:00:37.080 --> 0:00:40.840 with them, started out on a successful solo career. He's 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:44.320 released six albums, won four Grammys, and wrote the song 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:47.320 maybe It's Time for Bradley Cooper's version of a Star 0:00:47.479 --> 0:00:51.160 is Born, a pivotal song in the movie's plot. He's 0:00:51.200 --> 0:00:54.560 just released his newest album called Reunions, accompanied by his 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:57.800 band The four hundred Unit, and is building a solid 0:00:57.840 --> 0:01:00.160 body of evidence that he is, in fact, one of 0:01:00.200 --> 0:01:04.480 the most gifted songwriters working today. Jason and Rick Rubin 0:01:04.560 --> 0:01:06.720 met for the first time just before the interview You're 0:01:06.760 --> 0:01:10.000 about to hear. They talked about his Southern roots, his 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:13.119 approach to songwriting, and he cracks out a song called 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:16.160 Overseas from his new album that at the time no 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:22.720 one aside from his manager, had ever heard this is 0:01:22.760 --> 0:01:26.319 broken record liner notes for the digital age. I'm justin Richmond. 0:01:31.240 --> 0:01:34.800 Here's Rick Rubin talking to Jason Isabel. Rick dives right 0:01:34.880 --> 0:01:38.399 into Jason's thoughts on the spiritual value of making music. 0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:43.600 What did I ask about, do you find a spiritual 0:01:43.760 --> 0:01:49.160 relationship to music? Yes? A short answer is yes, I do. 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:53.360 You know, for all the reasons that are probably cliched 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:57.040 by now, but it's one of these things where whatever's 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:00.760 happened to me throughout my wife, be able to make 0:02:00.880 --> 0:02:05.840 music has been ultimate goal. And I think anything when 0:02:05.880 --> 0:02:10.119 you find that one purpose for yourself and you give 0:02:10.160 --> 0:02:14.000 yourself over to the process of that purpose rather than 0:02:14.040 --> 0:02:16.519 the goal of that purpose, it becomes a spiritual thing. 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:20.680 So for me, you know, I never wanted to be 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:23.639 a musician. I just wanted to make music, and every 0:02:23.639 --> 0:02:25.919 wanted to be a songwriter. I just wanted to write songs, 0:02:26.000 --> 0:02:28.240 or I needed to write songs. Some days I didn't 0:02:28.240 --> 0:02:30.720 want to, but I needed to, you know. And I 0:02:30.760 --> 0:02:34.240 think that from my personal experience, I don't know of 0:02:34.280 --> 0:02:37.800 anything more spiritual than that, you know, And that's not 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:41.480 even really discussing the connection that's on a personal level, 0:02:41.760 --> 0:02:46.520 you know, an inspect of the ritual aspect of it totally. Yeah, yeah. 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:51.120 And I think when when ritual sort of evolves on 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:54.640 its own, you know, rather than you begin with the 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:57.400 ritual and then try to find what's holy about it, 0:02:57.880 --> 0:03:01.040 you know, I think there's something that's more honest to 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:03.960 me about that interesting. You know. I never felt like 0:03:04.000 --> 0:03:06.200 I had to practice. I never sat down and thought 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:09.359 I need to work on my guitar playing today. It's 0:03:09.400 --> 0:03:11.040 just what I did when I didn't have to do 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:14.760 anything else. Did the writing did it start with the right? 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:18.680 Was the initial idea more focused on the writing or 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:21.919 more focused on the playing? The playing, definitely, you wanted 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:24.640 to be in a band or or be a I 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:27.040 just wanted to play all the time. And did you 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:31.239 see yourself as a singer? Always? No, No, not at all. 0:03:32.080 --> 0:03:35.360 It took a long time for that to happen. Uh, yeah, 0:03:35.440 --> 0:03:39.920 it took a long I think something about amplification, you know, 0:03:40.440 --> 0:03:43.680 made it possible for me to enjoy singing. You know, 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:46.720 when I started singing into a microphone in the studio 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:51.080 or on stage, the hugeness of that and the things 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:53.800 that I could do was mic technique, and you know, 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:57.960 manipulating the situation. I think attracted me to singing more 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:01.040 than it had in the past, you know. But for 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:06.240 the first ten years of my musical development, all I 0:04:06.280 --> 0:04:07.960 wanted to do was play the guitar. That was all 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:10.200 I wanted to do, you know, And I didn't think, 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:14.200 you know, I pictured myself playing guitar in front of people, 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:16.040 but that was as far as it went. And did 0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:18.120 you grow up playing guitar with records? Is that how 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:21.520 you learned to play? Yeah, My grandfather and my uncle, 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:25.279 my dad's little brother, they both played. My grandfather was 0:04:25.279 --> 0:04:29.800 a preacher, Pentecostal preacher in Alabama, and Pentecostal church was 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:32.760 really kind of the most rock and roll church, you know. 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:36.120 So they had bass and drums and electric guitars and 0:04:36.160 --> 0:04:38.599 stuff like that, and he played all kinds of instruments. 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:42.559 Him and all his siblings grew up playing gospel music, 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:46.080 and a couple of them were professional musicians, but for 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:50.640 the most part they were hobbyists or religious musicians. So 0:04:51.080 --> 0:04:53.400 my parents were super young when I was born, and 0:04:54.040 --> 0:04:56.280 they both worked, and I would stay with my grandparents, 0:04:56.279 --> 0:04:58.560 and my grandfather started teaching me how to play guitar, 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:01.120 and he would say, you know, you play the rhythm guitar, 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:04.240 I'll play a lead instrument. He would play claw hammer, 0:05:04.240 --> 0:05:08.120 banjo or mandolin or fiddle, and we would learn these, 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:12.240 you know, he would teach me these hillbilly songs. He 0:05:12.400 --> 0:05:17.000 liked old country songs. The more humorous the better for him, 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:20.640 you know. He liked Grandpa Jones and the Opry Stars 0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:23.320 and you know, the Heehaw Gang and all that stuff. 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:28.520 And then somehow I got interested in the blues when 0:05:28.520 --> 0:05:31.400 I was eight or nine years old, and he would 0:05:31.520 --> 0:05:34.039 reward me if I would play like rhythm guitar for 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:36.919 a couple of hours. He would take his guitar and 0:05:36.960 --> 0:05:39.760 tune in to an open tuning and play with his 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:42.839 pocket knife on his lap. And that was like my 0:05:43.000 --> 0:05:46.160 reward for that, you know. And then at one point 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:49.200 he took me to the record store and bought when 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:52.919 the Robert Johnson Complete Recordings Box came out, he bought 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:55.120 me that on cassette. But him being a preacher and 0:05:55.240 --> 0:06:00.080 me being ten or eleven years old, he overdubbed all 0:06:00.120 --> 0:06:03.480 the songs onto a blank casset, except for like like 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:06.360 Traveling Riverside, the ones that had anything that he considered 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.640 to be obscene. He took those out, you know, so 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:11.919 like to squeeze my limon. Stuff didn't make it in. 0:06:12.320 --> 0:06:14.320 Then when I was about fifteen, he gave me the 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:17.280 original box which I already had on my own, but 0:06:17.320 --> 0:06:19.160 I wasn't going to tell him that, you know, but 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:21.280 he was like, I think you're old enough for this now, 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:25.640 so he gave me the original box set. So yeah, 0:06:25.680 --> 0:06:30.000 that was is huge for me, and that was kind 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:32.080 of I mean, this was the eighties in Alabama, so 0:06:32.120 --> 0:06:36.680 it wasn't like, you know, the music was popular anymore really, 0:06:36.720 --> 0:06:39.679 but for me it was as though it was having 0:06:39.720 --> 0:06:41.960 its heyday because that's what was the music that was 0:06:42.000 --> 0:06:45.200 going on when you were growing up, Country music mostly, 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:48.520 you know, that's what my friends listened to. And who 0:06:48.520 --> 0:06:50.400 would have been the artist, just so I could picture 0:06:50.400 --> 0:06:53.880 of the era, probably early Garth Brooks, Like I remember 0:06:53.960 --> 0:06:57.200 ninety ninety one, I saw Garth at the State Fair 0:06:57.320 --> 0:06:59.920 for a dollar right before the pop Belly pig Ray 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:02.760 and I think Friends in Low Places came out like 0:07:02.760 --> 0:07:04.960 a week later, so it was you know, he was 0:07:05.120 --> 0:07:07.680 He probably never played in the Daylight again after that, 0:07:07.800 --> 0:07:11.000 but but yeah, so that that was really big. And 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.360 then my uncle had a cover band. It's great, by 0:07:14.360 --> 0:07:16.800 the way, Like, was it a great experience seeing Garth? Then? 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:20.120 It was, but I didn't know, like looking back on it, 0:07:20.160 --> 0:07:22.640 you know, back then, I thought, this guy's working really hard. 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:26.000 He's got a microphone on his head. You know, it's 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:29.560 kind of cool. But it was like the fair in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:32.120 and I kind of wanted to get on to riding 0:07:32.520 --> 0:07:36.240 fair rides, you know. But it was in hindsight, it 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:38.400 was a very I mean, they were hungry and they 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:41.720 were working really really hard, and that probably wasn't their 0:07:41.720 --> 0:07:45.200 only show that day, and they still definitely brought it, 0:07:45.320 --> 0:07:47.720 you know. But it wasn't like I looked at him 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:52.440 and thought, this guy's about to change country music significantly. 0:07:52.480 --> 0:07:55.240 I just thought, Wow, this guy's working really hard at 0:07:55.280 --> 0:07:58.120 four o'clock in the afternoon and Lawrenceburg, Tennessee. You know. 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:02.520 But then I really liked what was on the radio 0:08:02.600 --> 0:08:06.440 in those days. I mean I loved Prince and Crowded 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:11.840 House and Till Tuesday and all these really great pop songs. 0:08:11.880 --> 0:08:15.120 So there was this strange combination of that and then 0:08:15.480 --> 0:08:19.080 the arena rock and southern rock that my dad was 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:22.360 listening to. Dad was in diseasy type and skinnered and 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:26.480 these big rock bands and playing guitar. That became a 0:08:26.520 --> 0:08:28.600 big deal for me, that kind of stuff. You know. 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:32.120 My uncle played in a cover band. They would practice 0:08:32.160 --> 0:08:35.280 in the garage and my dad and my mom would 0:08:35.320 --> 0:08:38.520 go over there and drink Margarita's and fall asleep on 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:41.280 the weight bench and they would My uncle had like 0:08:41.280 --> 0:08:44.480 a broken cry baby wah pedal and they would cover 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:47.560 like a hurricane and the wah pedal would do that 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:49.440 you know, when the pot breaks when it does that, 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:53.240 like yeah, yeah, And I remember that from probably seven 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:55.760 or eight years old, and they would play it for 0:08:55.800 --> 0:08:58.040 like twenty five minutes, so I don't think I could 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:01.480 stay awake for all of like a herring came. So 0:09:01.720 --> 0:09:04.360 it really helped. Coming from the family that you came 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:10.360 from really helped form your world of music. Yeah, yeah, 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:15.440 it was huge. I got very lucky, Yeah, very lucky, 0:09:16.679 --> 0:09:19.360 because it was just like it was second nature for 0:09:19.400 --> 0:09:22.520 them to support what I was doing. They didn't realize 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:24.559 they were supporting me. They just thought this is how 0:09:24.600 --> 0:09:27.480 we all spend time together, you know. Um. And it 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:30.520 didn't occur to me until much later on when some 0:09:30.559 --> 0:09:33.319 of those folks weren't around anymore that you know. They 0:09:33.360 --> 0:09:36.839 gave me a gift that most people never get. You know, 0:09:36.920 --> 0:09:39.880 I knew what I wanted to do from There's no astronaut, 0:09:39.960 --> 0:09:42.520 no fireman, no nothing like that. I just wanted to 0:09:42.520 --> 0:09:44.160 play the guitar for the rest of them. Do you 0:09:44.160 --> 0:09:48.600 think it was more seeing them doing it or hearing 0:09:49.400 --> 0:09:51.959 what was being played in the house? Do you know 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:56.040 what I'm saying it was? Would the same have happened 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:58.960 if it was just hearing recordings? Or do you think 0:09:59.280 --> 0:10:02.199 seeing people played a role in it? Oh? Seeing them 0:10:02.200 --> 0:10:05.679 do it definitely did the community of it, you know, 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:08.560 because we would get together every Sunday night. My grandparents 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.280 would have friends and family over to their house after 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:15.760 both church services were over, and they would bring something 0:10:15.800 --> 0:10:17.600 to eat and they would sit around and play. And 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:21.120 it was to me it was like, I don't even 0:10:21.160 --> 0:10:24.000 want to use the word accessible, because it was just natural. 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:26.520 You know. I didn't know everybody's family didn't do that. 0:10:26.679 --> 0:10:28.840 I thought everybody was doing the same stuff. You know. 0:10:28.920 --> 0:10:32.760 My parents didn't play, but they were always there and they, 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.480 you know, were always listening to music or somehow around 0:10:36.600 --> 0:10:40.880 people who were playing music in the room, and yeah, 0:10:41.080 --> 0:10:45.040 I remember, I don't ever remember thinking that looks difficult. 0:10:45.720 --> 0:10:48.839 You know, I just wanted to participate. You know. I 0:10:48.880 --> 0:10:52.760 didn't have a whole lot of friends in school because 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:57.120 I just wasn't really redneck enough in North Alabama to 0:10:57.360 --> 0:11:00.640 fall in with any of those groups. So at one 0:11:00.679 --> 0:11:03.959 point I realized, Oh, everybody thinks this is cool that 0:11:04.040 --> 0:11:06.079 I play the guitar, So I'm going to do that 0:11:06.679 --> 0:11:08.640 in front of everybody, and they'll be nice to me, 0:11:08.800 --> 0:11:11.400 you know. And that's still I'm still working. I'm still 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:18.160 going on that principle to this day. Do you do 0:11:18.200 --> 0:11:20.640 you keep a diary? I take a lot of notes 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:23.480 for songs, A whole lot of notes. Has it always 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:25.880 been the case? Have you? When did you start taking 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:28.480 notes for songs? Oh? Yeah, that's a good question. Um, 0:11:30.360 --> 0:11:34.360 probably when twenty years ago. I guess when. I when 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:37.000 I first got serious about writing songs, when I was 0:11:37.040 --> 0:11:40.400 in college and and I thought, you know, I might 0:11:40.480 --> 0:11:42.840 I might be able to do this and write some 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.679 songs that need to be written rather than just copies 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:48.120 of things that I've heard other people do. The first 0:11:48.160 --> 0:11:52.079 set of songs that I wrote, I didn't really I 0:11:52.120 --> 0:11:54.800 went to college in Memphis at University in Memphis and 0:11:55.480 --> 0:11:57.880 used to be Memphis State, and I didn't really get 0:11:57.880 --> 0:12:01.680 out and play live or you know. I saw a 0:12:01.679 --> 0:12:03.520 lot of shows and saw a lot of people perform. 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:07.480 And then I was working at a restaurant and one 0:12:07.480 --> 0:12:09.320 of the guys that worked there at the restaurant with 0:12:09.400 --> 0:12:11.280 me had had a show booked and he asked me 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:13.600 if I wanted to open for him at this coffee 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:16.560 shop downtown, and I said, yeah, I'll do that, And 0:12:17.240 --> 0:12:18.880 I didn't have any songs written. I thought, well, I 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:20.920 don't want to just play cover songs. So I wrote 0:12:21.200 --> 0:12:25.640 like forty minutes worth of songs like overnight pretty much, 0:12:25.679 --> 0:12:28.959 you know, just flipping back and forth between different songs, 0:12:29.000 --> 0:12:34.080 and I wrote enough material timed it out so I 0:12:34.080 --> 0:12:36.400 could go do my opening set, you know, and that 0:12:36.600 --> 0:12:39.200 those songs got I got my first publishing deal off 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:42.000 of those, and you know, I wound up demoing them 0:12:42.040 --> 0:12:46.240 and it got me a lot of attention, you know, locally. 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:48.600 I was able to take a draw and quit working 0:12:48.720 --> 0:12:51.880 regular jobs and all that kind of stuff from that batch. 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:56.520 Do the meanings of the songs change for you over 0:12:56.600 --> 0:13:00.400 time or do they tend to stay the same The 0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:06.720 meanings don't change for me, but the significance of them 0:13:06.840 --> 0:13:11.080 changes and everything around them changes. You know. It's like 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:12.880 an object in a room. Like if you were to 0:13:12.920 --> 0:13:17.000 watch a scene in a movie where somebody filmed, say 0:13:17.040 --> 0:13:19.679 an ashtray sitting in the middle of a room, but 0:13:19.760 --> 0:13:22.400 they you know, they did it like time lapse, where 0:13:22.400 --> 0:13:24.800 you saw it over the course of twenty years. The 0:13:24.880 --> 0:13:27.400 ash tray would be the same, but the significance of 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:30.160 the ash tray in the room would be very different. 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:36.280 The context keep context keeps changing. Yeah, And I think 0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:38.040 for me that's the best way for it to work, 0:13:38.080 --> 0:13:40.280 for me to be able to deliver songs from fifteen 0:13:40.360 --> 0:13:43.680 or twenty years ago, because you know, I got sober 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:46.720 about seven and a half years ago, and my work changed. 0:13:46.800 --> 0:13:49.320 And how did that happen? What was the motivation to 0:13:49.360 --> 0:13:52.560 get sober? I knew that I needed to. Um. I'd 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:54.800 been drinking a lot for a long time and doing 0:13:55.679 --> 0:14:00.800 various drugs, and I fell in love with my wife, 0:14:00.840 --> 0:14:03.880 my current wife, who was not my wife at the time. 0:14:03.920 --> 0:14:06.200 I say current wife because she wasn't my wife at 0:14:06.280 --> 0:14:08.240 the time, not because I have plans on her not 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:12.200 being in the future. UM, Amanda. I knew she wasn't 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:14.560 gonna put up with that shit, you know, And and 0:14:15.320 --> 0:14:17.600 I think everybody I'd been with in the past would 0:14:17.600 --> 0:14:20.560 put up with it, and she wouldn't. And I thought, well, 0:14:20.720 --> 0:14:22.840 I'm gonna have to do something, or she tell you 0:14:22.920 --> 0:14:27.120 that you just felt it. Um, Well, they all tell 0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:30.240 you that, I don't think. I don't know. I haven't 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:33.240 had that experience. Well okay for me, they all told 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:35.240 me that, but this time I believed it, you know, 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:41.120 and you know I can't. I came to her one 0:14:41.200 --> 0:14:43.040 night when we were just dating and we were on 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:45.880 the road together. She's a musician also and a songwriter, 0:14:45.960 --> 0:14:48.480 and I told her I needed to quit drinking. I 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:53.000 didn't think I could do it on my own, and 0:14:53.040 --> 0:14:56.120 she said, well, if you're sure about that, then you know, 0:14:56.240 --> 0:14:58.360 we'll do what we need to do to make sure 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:02.240 you quit. And I repeated it again a couple days later, 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:04.080 and she said, all right, that's it, you know. So 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:08.240 she called Tracy, my manager, and my mom and a 0:15:08.280 --> 0:15:11.040 few other friends who she didn't really know very well 0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:14.080 at all, in the middle of the night and said 0:15:14.400 --> 0:15:18.440 he needs to go to treatment. And Tracy made the 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:22.600 arrangements and you know, the accountability of my family and 0:15:22.640 --> 0:15:26.160 my friends. Knowing that I was serious about it caused 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:28.880 me to fulfill my end of the bargain. And I 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:32.160 went in, you know, thirty six hours later and haven't 0:15:32.160 --> 0:15:34.160 had a drink since. That's great, and it sounds like 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:36.560 you wanted it to happen, So yeah, that's a big 0:15:36.600 --> 0:15:38.800 piece of it. It is. And I got lucky because 0:15:38.880 --> 0:15:42.640 you know, I don't have it genetically, and I know 0:15:42.720 --> 0:15:44.480 a lot of people struggle. You know, a lot of 0:15:44.480 --> 0:15:47.520 people go to rehab multiple times and they fight and 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:49.840 they fight and they just can't get a handle on it. 0:15:49.880 --> 0:15:53.280 But well, for whatever reason, you know, knock on wood, 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:58.640 I haven't really had that much desire. There are moments, 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:02.720 but they pass, you know, and I've learned to be 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:08.440 grateful enough to talk myself out of those those moments. 0:16:08.480 --> 0:16:12.040 You know, count the things that have happened since the end, 0:16:12.080 --> 0:16:14.040 and pretty soon you're like, yeah, I don't really need 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:15.960 a drink right now. Maybe I just need to go home. 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:18.640 We'll be right back with more of Rick's conversation with 0:16:18.720 --> 0:16:26.120 Jason Isabel after the break. We're back with more from 0:16:26.200 --> 0:16:30.600 Jason Isabel. Would you say that your writing is more 0:16:30.720 --> 0:16:35.880 of an intellectual process or is it something else. Yeah, 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:39.800 it's more intellectual for me. I mean, you know, the 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:46.200 inspiration Like I've used this quote before, but Chuck Close said, 0:16:46.360 --> 0:16:48.960 inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show 0:16:49.000 --> 0:16:51.400 up and get to work. And I love that because 0:16:51.760 --> 0:16:54.720 if you're not inspired, then you're not an artist. You're 0:16:54.720 --> 0:16:57.880 not paying attention, you don't have the level of awareness 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:01.200 that you need to have to create. Eight. Um, So 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:05.240 that's a constant you know. Inspiration is like like heart rate, 0:17:05.280 --> 0:17:08.639 it's always running, it's always there, and all the things 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:11.360 that I consider to be sort of magical and mystical 0:17:11.720 --> 0:17:17.119 about the process are constant. You know. That's that's I 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:20.160 think part of the character of being a creative person 0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:24.199 that I think I walk to the grocery store with 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:27.440 the same level of mysticism as I write a song. 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:31.920 You know. Um, it's all process. It's it's a way 0:17:31.960 --> 0:17:35.000 of being in the world exactly. It's yeah. So I 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:41.439 don't you know, I don't think about creating as a 0:17:41.480 --> 0:17:46.440 supernatural or preternatural or um as an experience that that's 0:17:46.520 --> 0:17:50.600 disconnected from the mathematics of creating. You know, Creating for 0:17:50.720 --> 0:17:54.360 me is solving puzzles. Now, there are when you when 0:17:54.359 --> 0:17:59.119 you solve the puzzle, you do feel rewarded, you know, 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:02.160 by something great than yourself. I think there's something when 0:18:02.160 --> 0:18:04.800 you hit it just right. Yeah, you know, and you've 0:18:04.880 --> 0:18:07.000 hit it just right many many times, and you probably 0:18:07.040 --> 0:18:10.760 have that feeling where it's like, whoever to just help 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:13.760 me with that? Thank you? You know, absolutely, because you 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:16.760 feel at that moment like something's happening that you didn't 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:20.280 necessarily do all by yourself. Always, yeah, all of it. 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:24.399 I mean my experience is that we have little to 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:29.120 do with it. Yeah. Yeah, you show up and pay 0:18:29.200 --> 0:18:33.440 close attention and our patient because that's a big part 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.439 of it, is the patients involved. But a lot of 0:18:36.480 --> 0:18:41.600 it feels like to me, feels like it comes from elsewhere. Yeah. Yeah, 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:45.080 I can go with that for sure. But I think 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:48.080 to find it, you know, you have to sometimes you 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:51.359 have to turn every rock over. Absolutely, You've got to 0:18:51.440 --> 0:18:55.760 be the person that's willing to look in most places. 0:18:55.800 --> 0:18:58.520 And that's I guess goes along with the patients. Yeah, 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:04.040 in the in the right process. Do you ever think 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:08.280 of the audience? I try not to. Uh, yeah, I 0:19:08.280 --> 0:19:10.600 think I think I do my best work when I'm 0:19:10.640 --> 0:19:13.960 not doing that, but I'll allow myself to think of 0:19:14.000 --> 0:19:18.000 the audience if it's in the service of challenging them 0:19:18.359 --> 0:19:23.880 or helping in some way. Not I don't. I don't 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:27.600 think about pleasing them or about meeting their you know, 0:19:28.160 --> 0:19:33.480 requirements or expectations. But I do think about pushing them, 0:19:33.600 --> 0:19:35.960 you know, or maybe presenting things to them in a 0:19:36.000 --> 0:19:38.840 way because like on the last album, I had a 0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:43.600 song called white Man's World that was about privilege and 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:49.960 about you know, realizing who I am and what opportunities 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:52.840 I have that some people don't just simply by the 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:57.040 fact that I'm white and male in America and especially 0:19:57.040 --> 0:19:59.440 in the South, which the song talks about that too. 0:19:59.760 --> 0:20:03.480 M So I was thinking about my audience when I 0:20:03.520 --> 0:20:05.439 wrote that song, but I was thinking about it in 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:09.320 a way that like, I want to push your buttons 0:20:09.320 --> 0:20:11.359 a little bit, you know, I want to make you 0:20:11.400 --> 0:20:15.199 consider that you know now that you hold me in 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:18.479 a certain esteem, you're willing to pay fifty or seventy 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:20.320 five bucks to come stand and listen to me do 0:20:20.359 --> 0:20:24.240 this for whatever reason. Now, I would like to use 0:20:24.280 --> 0:20:26.480 that to kind of square up on you a little bit. 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:31.200 Would you play it for me now? Yeah, sure, beautiful, 0:20:31.440 --> 0:20:35.639 thank you beautiful. How did it start that song? I 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:39.520 think with the groove, And then I thought, this, the 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:43.520 groove is a little funky, so I have to be 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:48.359 careful with it, you know, because I really enjoy music 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:51.840 that used to be called black music. But I'm also 0:20:52.000 --> 0:20:54.840 very careful about making it because I'm not I don't 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:59.840 feel qualified to make it, you know, not in that way. 0:20:59.840 --> 0:21:01.720 So I think, if I'm gonna make a song that 0:21:01.800 --> 0:21:04.760 has that kind of groove, there needs to be a 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:07.480 purpose to it, you know, So I need to make 0:21:07.600 --> 0:21:11.960 something that is aware. And it was around the time 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:14.560 of the presidential election when I was writing this song. 0:21:14.600 --> 0:21:17.480 It was right after the presidential election, and I wrote 0:21:17.720 --> 0:21:20.320 a flurry of songs, as as a lot of songwriters 0:21:20.359 --> 0:21:24.560 did in that week or two and still are, but 0:21:24.600 --> 0:21:26.359 that was one of them. And I thought, what, you know, 0:21:26.800 --> 0:21:31.760 what can I say about who I am and what 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:38.080 my responsibility is that might sway people a little bit 0:21:38.160 --> 0:21:43.399 and might also, you know, earn my keep as far 0:21:43.440 --> 0:21:45.600 as playing a song with that kind of groove goes, 0:21:45.720 --> 0:21:49.840 you know, because it's a blues really, so it's like, 0:21:49.840 --> 0:21:51.520 if I'm going to play the blues, I better fucking 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:53.919 sing the blues, and I better do it for the 0:21:54.040 --> 0:21:57.080 right reason, you know, And I think that's that's where 0:21:57.119 --> 0:21:59.479 it came from. So I thought, well, what is one 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:04.080 truth and then let's write another true thing, make them rhyme. 0:22:04.680 --> 0:22:12.280 But I remember writing very easily and comfortably about my 0:22:12.359 --> 0:22:15.359 own admissions in that song about like how I wish 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:18.360 now that I had stood up and said something when 0:22:18.400 --> 0:22:22.960 I was hearing racist jokes, you know, and writing about 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:26.280 that aspect of you know, southern that's not necessarily you know, 0:22:26.359 --> 0:22:32.000 more ruralness, but I definitely there's there's a line from Dixieland, 0:22:32.040 --> 0:22:34.320 you know, so it's like I'm talking about I'm talking 0:22:34.359 --> 0:22:37.200 about the South right there. That part was very easy 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:39.760 as far as working that puzzle that one kind of 0:22:39.760 --> 0:22:43.520 fell out, but getting to the chorus was was difficult 0:22:44.119 --> 0:22:48.200 because you don't want it to be too flippant, you know, 0:22:48.240 --> 0:22:51.760 when you're trying to motivate people to think about, you know, 0:22:51.840 --> 0:22:57.199 something like like a racial division or like privilege, you know, 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:01.320 you have to look at what happened in a way 0:23:01.359 --> 0:23:07.040 that either keeps it from being repeated or suggests that 0:23:07.080 --> 0:23:10.280 it might not have been the most human course of action, 0:23:10.480 --> 0:23:15.000