Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit - Weathervanes (June 9, 2023) Album • Page 18

I feel like he usually plays 0-1 DBT song and they are well received for sure but not like Cover Me Up

 

I really cannot get over how good "When We Were Close" is. I genuinely can't think of another artist whose tribute to a lost friend is that naked and that warts-and-all. Maybe his most astounding lyric in a career full of them.

 

His solo/400 unit stuff is infinitely better than any of his DBT stuff, IMO. It’s just not even close.

 

wow!!

 

Southeastern is my favorite thing he’s done, but some of his DBT songs are top notch. “Goddamn Lonely Love,” “Decoration Day,” “Danko/Manuel,” and “Outfit” come to mind.

 

This album is so consistent start to finish. Doesn’t drag and feels shorter than an hour long. On each of his other albums, there are at least one or two songs that don’t connect with me as much as the others, but there’s no “duds” on this one. It does make picking a favorite harder…I’d probably go with “King of Oklahoma” currently but it’s a tight race.

 

This is pretty much how I feel. His DBT songs are all really great, and he's always been an incredible songwriter, but to me he kicked it up a notch when he struck out on his own.

It's not a knock on those songs, it just seems more to me that having entire albums to himself and not having to work within the confines of an already established group with more than one strong songwriter already allowed him to flourish more. I certainly don't think he peaked with his DBT songs and never reached those heights again or anything like that though. Aside from the opening song really, "Sirens of the Ditch" was sort of a 'holy shit this kid is really effing good' moment to me where he showed he could take what was great about those songs and do it for an entire album, and he hasn't made an album that isn't at least really great since.

After spending a few weeks with this album, I don't think there's a weak song on here and I certainly wouldn't lose any. My weird nitpick critique would be that I think "Strawberry Woman" is in a strange place in the tracklist for the type of song that it is, but it's not glaring, and I can't really think of a better spot for it, and I'm not gonna say I know more about sequencing albums than Jason Isbell so.

 

its also just a volume thing. he has, what, six drive by truckers songs? maybe less than that? maybe one of them is less than great? not that his albums aren’t all decent but there’s definitely some stuff i don’t really feel the need to come back to again, whereas i listen to those five or six on repeat basically every week lol

 

but also lol


edit: “all time” i’ve only had last.fm for a year lol

 

Yeah it’s not a knock on those songs at all. I love them too! Southeastern just remains my favorite thing he’s done and it was that record that really caught my attention. Everything before was like “yeah this is great.” And then that record came out and I was like “oh wow. This is fucking nuts!”

 

yeah i mean that’s maybe his fourth best record imo, we’re just getting different things from him, which is obviously totally fine. y’all like acoustic stuff more than me, i like the rockers more, it’s gravy.

 

Listening to The Dirty South (and the band) for the first time. Pretty good stuff. I like the guy who sings Puttin People On the Moon and Iwo Jima the best out of the singers

 

Yeah me too

 

I think any other time I tried to get into them I was hearing the first track or another song by the first singer, and it turned me off a bit

 

The big DBT fans alll love Cooley but his voice bugs me. I’m a Hoody guy

 

cooley is the GOAT for sure

carl perkins cadillac, uncle frank, birthday boy... dude has all the hits

 

Godamn Lonely Love was my favorite track on the album (that or Moon) and maybe my favorite Isbell track that I’ve heard. The third guy doesn’t do it for me, but I’ll check out their other stuff and see if he grows on me

 

“Marry Me” on Decoration Day is dope. Like it more than his songs on the other one

 

I struggle with both Hood and Cooley as vocalists. Always been my big stumbling block with a band that I think should otherwise be one of my favorites. Still like them, but I don't reach for Truckers albums all that often as a result.

 

i felt that way about Hood for a bit but he won me over. it’s more a case by case thing. a track like hell no i ain’t happy would be terrible with any of the other singers doing it but i don’t always love his more ballad-y tracks. that being said, flying wallendas, daddy learned to fly, baggage … all pretty perfect patterson songs

mike cooley is perfect and always has been. kinda wild that a band ever had three S-tier songwriters in it at the same time like those two and jason.

the biggest issues with their individual albums are a) the early classics have the terrible rob malone songs and b) brevity isn’t their strong suit

 

DBT are playing near me in September with American Aquarium - gonna attend for certain.

 

American Aquarium are so great!

 

i actually started listening to them because of a @Craig Manning recommendation a while back, they're fantastic.

 

yeah their live show is as good as it gets, i love jason live but there’s something about three guitars on stage being loud as fuck

 

I also became aware of them because of Craig