Sharing His Voice

Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit will headline the new Palomino Festival alongside Kacey Musgraves, Willie Nelson & Family, and others.

Jason Isbell to headline 1st Palomino Festival with Kacey Musgraves

By Jordan Houston

Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Jason Isbell says he’s excited for his upcoming performance at Goldenvoice’s first Palomino Festival on Saturday, July 9. Isbell and the 400 Unit are promoting their 2021 album “Georgia Blue,” which honors artists from Georgia. Isbell during the 2020 presidential campaign pledged that if Joe Biden

Isbell, who has won Grammys for Best Americana Album and Best American Roots Song, and the 400 Unit will headline the new alt-country festival at Brookside at the Rose Bowl, 1001 Rose Bowl Drive, alongside Kacey Musgraves and Willie Nelson & Family.

“I’m feeling good. I think it’s a great lineup, and I’m looking forward to it,” the Alabama native says.

“We haven’t played in Pasadena a whole lot, and this gives us a good opportunity to get out there and play with other artists that are really good.”

The Palomino Festival, backed by the team behind Stagecoach, adds to Southern California’s already eclectic music festival scene. It seeks to appeal to longtime country fans, brand-new Americana lovers, and everyone in between.

Fused with sounds of country, folk, pop and bluegrass, the lineup features industry talents like Orville Peck, Turnpike Troubadours, Old Crow Medicine Show and Charley Crockett.

Isbell, having built a reputation for his introspective and nuanced songwriting, says he prefers to refrain from pigeonholing his band’s musical style.

“I get distracted when I start trying to (define) the type of music I make,” he says. “I’m a singer-songwriter, and the most important thing to me is writing songs. I think that is something I have in common with Kacey and Willie, and most of the other people on the bill. We focus on the songs first, and everything else sort of follows.”

Longtime fans of Isbell, named Artist of the Year in 2015 by the Americana Music Association, might be pleasantly surprised by the band’s Pasadena gig, the singer and guitarist says.

“I think the audience might be surprised. It’s much more of a rock ’n’ roll feel we put on,” Isbell says. “Our albums are a lot of writing. Somebody who hasn’t listened to my whole catalog — it’s soft, quiet music.” triumphed the Peach State’s election, he would record an album of songs by his favorite artists from there. A share of the proceeds would also be donated to nonprofit progressive organizations. The star-studded covers album is a 13-song set comprised of Southern rock jams, R&B classics, folk sounds and college rock hits. It includes tunes made famous by R.E.M., Otis Redding, the Black Crowes, James Brown, Cat Power, the Allman Brothers Band and others. Artists Brandi Carlile, Béla Fleck, John Paul White of the Civil Wars, and Adia Victoria are also featured guests on the LP. But “Georgia Blue” isn’t the only album Isbell and the 400 Unit are celebrating. “Reunions,” produced by Dave Cobb and including contributions from David Crosby and Rival Sons singer Jay Buchanan, was first released in independent record stores in May 2020. The album aimed at helping small businesses amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Isbell says. “I put ‘Reunions’ out right in the middle of lockdown, so we couldn’t tour behind that,” he adds. “Now, I feel like the touring we are doing is really the initial tour for the album because we spent so much time in the house, either playing to screens or doing those kinds of shows like Zoom and a few socially distanced shows.” A “more production-savvy set that mixed introspective personal numbers with songs addressing larger political and social concerns,” “Reunions” is the fourth album Isbell has written and recorded since getting sober. At least one theme is prevalent throughout the album, according to Isbell. “A lot of the songs, I didn’t really set out with a goal other than just to write a set of good songs. Once I got started, I started to see some themes

continued from page 10 reemerge,” Isbell says. “One of the things that made itself pretty obvious to me was the presence of ghosts, and not in a mystical way, but in a way of people I used to be in contact with reemerging in my mind after some years.”

“A lot of situations I used to be in where I wasn’t working as a musician, and I normally was just hanging around rooms with my friends and playing songs — we would play each other what we were working on. A lot of those people who were sitting in these rooms with me are ghosts now — some of them have passed on, some aren’t in my life anymore. This is a way to reconnect.”

In the early 2000s, Isbell made a name for himself as a member of the Southern rock outfit the Drive-By Truckers. He left the band in 2007 to pursue a solo career, marked by Southern grit and raw and rootsy sounds.

He released his first solo album, “Sirens of the Ditch,” in 2007, a “bluesy, punk-infused lesson in guitar tones and Southern swagger.”

But Isbell’s knack for songwriting quickly dominated the stage after he publicly came to terms with his journey and dependence on alcohol and drugs. His first album after getting sober, 2013’s “Southeastern,” has been described as a major “critical and commercial” breakthrough in his career.

“The thing that makes me the happiest is when I write a song or just a line or lyric that says exactly how I feel,” Isbell says. “I think that the longer I go on writing songs the better I get at communicating. I don’t necessarily get better at writing hit songs or popular songs; I get better at communicating how I feel more accurately. That is what makes me feel the proudest.

“Sometimes it can make me feel worse because some of the things I’m writing about aren’t necessarily happy things. I think the catharsis comes from when I realize there are people out there who are similar to you, and that’s the magic of it. It’s not necessarily in the writing of the songs, but when you see it resonates with people that have the same emotions and concerns.”

For his upcoming Pasadena performance, Isbell says he is most eager to perform once again in the presence of longtime country music legend Willie Nelson.

“I love Willie, and any opportunity I get to be around him and see him play is very special to me,” Isbell says. “I’ve done quite a few shows with him in the past, and I think he’s one of probably the top 10 greatest songwriters that has ever lived. To even live in the world at the same time as somebody like Willie is a special thing.”

Isbell will also join Nelson’s rotating lineup for the 2022 Outlaw Music Festival Tour. The bill includes the ranks of ZZ Top, Larkin Poe, Steve Earle & the Dukes, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, the Avett Brothers and Gov’t Mule.

Palomino Festival WHEN: Noon to 11 p.m. Saturday, July 9. WHERE: Brookside at the Rose Bowl, 1001 Rose Bowl Drive, Pasadena COST: Tickets start at $179 INFO: palominopasadena.com

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