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Hear Two Unreleased Jason Isbell Songs For The First Time

Jason Isbell in 2007.
Matthew Williams
/
Courtesy of the artist
Jason Isbell in 2007.

When Jason Isbell left Drive-By Truckers in 2007, his future was by no means secure: His time in the band had been marred by substance-abuse issues, and he wasn't a known quantity as a solo artist after years spent sharing the spotlight with other songwriters. But when Isbell released Sirens of the Ditch that same year, it was clear that he'd been working from an almost bottomless well of talent and star potential.

Today, Isbell is not only sober and happily married to bandmate Amanda Shires, but he's also one of Americana music's biggest and most enduring stars: a four-time Grammy winner with an unbroken string of enormously well-loved albums. So as a sort of victory lap, he's revisiting some of his early solo material with a "deluxe edition" of Sirens of the Ditch, out July 13.

Co-produced by Isbell and Drive-By Truckers' Patterson Hood, the album provides an excellent showcase for the singer's then-burgeoning mix of insightful roots music and swaggering old-time soul. With cameos by veteran session players at FAME studio in Isbell's hometown of Muscle Shoals, Ala., Sirens of the Ditch crackles with life and heart, setting the stage for the remarkable material to follow.

Sirens' forthcoming reissue features four previously unreleased studio tracks: "Racetrack Romeo," "Crystal Clear" and two songs you can hear for the first time on this page. "The Assassin" is a Hood composition Isbell still plays in concert, while the churning original roots-rock ballad "Whisper" burns slowly and wearily. Notably, both fit seamlessly alongside the singer's later songs about stumbling hard and finding saviors on the road to peace and redemption.

Sirens of the Ditch (Deluxe Edition) comes out July 13 via New West.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Stephen Thompson is a writer, editor and reviewer for NPR Music, where he speaks into any microphone that will have him and appears as a frequent panelist on All Songs Considered. Since 2010, Thompson has been a fixture on the NPR roundtable podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, which he created and developed with NPR correspondent Linda Holmes. In 2008, he and Bob Boilen created the NPR Music video series Tiny Desk Concerts, in which musicians perform at Boilen's desk. (To be more specific, Thompson had the idea, which took seconds, while Boilen created the series, which took years. Thompson will insist upon equal billing until the day he dies.)