Jason Isbell says the desire to be honest and fair is his compass. “One day I decided: ‘This is what I’m going to claim as the purpose for why I’m here,’” he says. “I think it’s to leave the place a little bit better than I found it, and to experience all the things that I can experience.”
This year, Isbell is certainly experiencing plenty. He is releasing two albums, has a role in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, and is the subject of an HBO documentary.
Isbell, 44, changed his career not too long after he changed his life by becoming sober. Since then he has won four Grammys, become known as one of the country’s leading singer-songwriters, and gained a legion of devoted fans, including Bruce Springsteen and the late John Prine.
