“A lot of people that I grew up with, went to school with in Alabama, and a lot of people in my family who told me growing up that cities were terrible places and anything outside of our little circle was scary and dangerous and frightening. And I thought about the effect that had on people, when you start to believe that, and you let yourself be so afraid of other people and the outside world, that you never feel tethered, you never feel a connection with the rest of humanity. So, I wrote that song based on that kind of fear.”Jason Isbell (1079)

“‘Last Of My Kind’ is a character study for me that’s built upon partially who I was when I first started touring, when I came from Alabama and started traveling around the country for the first time. I’ve never been the character in that song entirely, not 100%. But there was half of me that was terrier – when I first came to New York I didn’t have a good time, too many people, they were driving me crazy; it was cold, I couldn’t enjoy myself. I didn’t know how to go with the flow of traffic, I didn’t like somebody touching me all the time. I grew up in the middle of nowhere. So I would go into a bar, I would hide in the bar until my New York trip was over. I would play the shows and stay in the bar. I realized after a few trips, I could have been doing this anywhere.”Jason Isbell (1080)

“It’s important for me to just continue to notice that there are doors that are open for me that wouldn’t be if I wasn’t white or if I wasn’t male. I’m not guilty about it, and I’m not ashamed of it. I have no control over it. And I need to consider those things because, if I don’t, then I’m just running wild and never really considering what privilege that I have and how to make the world a better place for people who don’t get what they deserve.”Jason Isbell (1079)

“That song deals with how to come to terms with things you have no control over, ‘cos obviously I was born a white man. It’s being empathetic and sympathizing, more exactly, with women and other ethnicities, with other social groups, other cultural groups without feeling ashamed of something that I can’t control. It’s a fine line, a difficult thing. Because I learned when I quit drinking, I was going through a lot of different processes to get recovered, that you can’t allow yourself to feel shame over things that you can’t control, because that’s just a rabbit hole, that’s a downward spiral. So tried to find, “how do I help, how do I help make us all more equal if that’s at all possible”? That’s what I’m trying to do with that song.”Jason Isbell (1288)

“I think it’s a very strong love song because it deals with love after that initial spark, love as it ages and changes. It also deals with how we might not be inspired to love each other in the same way if we were going to live forever. It deals with death in the way that, if there wasn’t any death I certainly wouldn’t feel the need to tell somebody that I love them before it was too late because it never would be too late so we would atrophy emotionally.”Jason Isbell (1080)

“That was written for my daughter. Playing music has always been, first of all, very therapeutic for me and a whole lot of fun – good way for me to meet people and make friends, sort of set myself apart a little bit from the din. As I got older it turned into a career and now I go to work every day really excited. If I’m home and off for a couple of months, I get really irritable – I feel like I need to go to work. It occurred to me that that’s not the case for most people in the world. Most people are happy to have a job but sure do wish it was a little more fun. I was just hoping for my daughter that she would find something early on – doesn’t have to be music or writing songs, but something she can really put her back into and be proud of and that she would enjoy.”Jason Isbell (1080)