Jason Isbell Writes a Song in 2 Minutes!

Grammy-award winning artist Jason Isbell shows Rainn and Reza how to write a song.
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[@michaellitton4380]

That song should never be cancelled. It’s a masterpiece

[@FurciferousBand]

Holy shit I learned more from this 3 minute video than I've ever learned about songwriting.

[@rhettdiessner]

No wonder he's won 4 Grammys.

[@vcsuwar6126]

Love this, but The Night They Drove Ole Dixie Down wasn't celebrating the South. It was a song about being a spectator to complete defeat and taking stock in what remains and what is lost.

[@randalleasley31]

Every morning when I wake up. I have a new melody and I play drums all night with my teeth.

[@davevannoy664]

The Last Waltz changed my life, and it changed Jason's life!!! R.I.P Richard, Rick, and Levon! Rock on Garth!!

[@brin57]

This man's right up there in the list of Great American songwriters !!

[@SirinxDumplings]

He never ceases to impress...

[@DoctorMine]

I could listen to this dude for hours.

[@garynorman424]

Super helpful insights for me as a hobby writer! Thanks

[@dustintalley5908]

I like how I let this man writes songs with the rules of songwriting like I fix air conditioners to the rules of air conditioning. Lets stay in out lanes! Love Jason Isbell!

[@hotlov72]

Sounds like Southern Man by Neil Young

[@danielleteixeiramatt]

Amazing

[@webbwilder3021]

He is a game changer

[@connorswegle1338]

Did Reza jump in and tell him about his band in the 90s?

[@hiddenhillinstruments]

Canceled? I didn't get the memo

[@smashaddamsofficial]

Ask him what he thinks of George Jones...

[@helethead]

More like Neil to me

[@ronaldjaybelin520]

although i only wrote the storyline

[@Pete-kr8gm]

Does anyone understand what he means by long word short word? Why is that cheating exactly?

[@JadAWESOME210]

I took it as wanting to have the syllables of the lyrics line up with the rhythm of the melody, bc if you did a long word first then you'd be sustaining the first syllable longer than the second

[@JackJensenTrader]

I think it's to do with iambic pentameter, if you've ever studied it/Shakespeare. How we naturally tend to speak. And that (I think) sentences normally start with a subject - I, We, He - as opposed to a long word. The cheating merely being that it would stand out as not being natural; cheating by only writing it that way for the song, even though it's unnatural in terms of not being how the song's character would actually speak. But a follow-up question on that would have been good.

[@anthonyfrijia5643]

@@JadAWESOME210 he's talking about singability, and believability. The notes in his melody went daa-da-daaaaa da-da, so he wants to sing something like "lost-the waaaa-aaaaar". That long word would be a stressed syllable and would get the spotlight because its the subject of the phrase. When writers mistress syllables to fit a melody or to get a rhyme, it doesnt sound "believable", because they aren't singing the way a person would speak. For some reason Jason does this on "Songs That She Sang In The Shower" when he sings the line "I repEAT the mantras that might keep me clean for the day" - but aside from that I dont think I've ever heard him do it. Zach Bryan is a chronic mistresser which drives me nuts but he gets away with it because people love his voice.

[@ronaldjaybelin520]

and... he hears music i dont when similar

[@VokeyDawg1]

Was "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" really celebrating the confederacy?

[@chrissawyer4060]

Kinda yeah.

[@joelstice2673]

"Celebrating" it isn't accurate. It's a story song simply telling of the hardships Southerners faced at the end of the Civil War, even if those hardships resulted from their own wrongdoings. It's asinine for Jason to write this song off as being justifiably canceled. He does do a great job of explaining his songwriting process though.

[@chrissawyer4060]

The reason I say kinda is because songs are subjective. As a Appalachian with deep roots to WNC to me it is an anti war song. To many of the meatheads i grew up with in Asheville it was a little more. Again like the Skynyrd thing fans amd critics alike seem to have a different understanding of "what it all means." No I have personally seen drunk whites in Winston Salem sing together when it gets to the part where they say "Take what you need and you leave the rest but they should never have taken the very best!" To them it was as if it is a reference to the white southern male being "The VERY best." I on the other hand always tripped on a Canadian writing a song of the south. Kinda like Young and Southern Man (another great southern song written by a Canadian.) I think for some people it was much longer ago than it was for others. Like more generations removed from the civil war. My Grandfather was born in 1889. His father was Eastern Band Cherokee and he left NC and went to Tennessee to join the Union Army because he had seen a NC slave owner beat his slaves mercilessly the same way he saw his family treated during Jackson's Indian Removal Act and The Trail of Tears. He never mentioned States Rights either. It was about slavery being the only thing that made the agrarian south viable financially. Pretty sad for sure. Granted racism and slavery has been around for thousands of years. It's just easier to play it with a southern accent...

[@budgibson185]

@@chrissawyer4060 did Robbie write all of these alone without help from Levon? It seems like w Levon being the only southern boy he had to input something here ?

[@andrewbowen6875]

So yeah Levon being the Southern Guy was the absolute key to the rests education to the roots of America and the whole mishmash of music that came from there. Robbie should of given due credit to Levon for that

[@ronaldjaybelin520]

not how i do it

[@Ironworthstriking]

Jason Isbell: Song Police

[@sethdonahue3441]

The idea of rewriting songs because of its content is like rewriting history.

[@ronaldjaybelin520]

not how i wrote cover me up

[@ronaldjaybelin520]

it sounds like several

[@anthonyclegg1511]

I bet Paul McCartney,s bricking it.

[@danielstephens9748]

Love Jason and his music. First heard of him via John Prine... Jason is a great song writer....but...cancelled my ass! I play it on my radio show as well as others that the 'woke' wankers are trying to erase.