Jason Isbell's "Southeastern" Quiz

Answer: Americana Music Honors & Awards

At the 2014 Americana Music Honors & Awards, Jason Isbell won all three of these awards. His Song of the Year award was for "Cover Me Up." In 2018, he won a Grammy for Best Americana Album for "The Nashville Sound," which was also nominated for the Country Music Association Awards. He won a Daytime Emmy Award in 2018 for his performance of "Cumberland Gap" and "If We Were Vampires" on "CBS This Morning."

"Americana" is a term used to describe a type of music that draws from a variety of American musical roots, including folk, country, R&B, gospel, blues, and rock and roll, but which is not properly classified as any of those. It is the label most often affixed to Jason Isbell's music, though his songs have also at times been labeled alternative country, southern rock, and folk.

Answer: 23

On the US Independent Albums Billboard it hit number five. The album was released on June 11, 2013, and is Isbell's fourth studio album, after "Here We Rest" and before "Something More Than Free."

Jason Isbell played with the Drive By Truckers and contributed original songs to three of their albums. He split with the band in 2007, and released his first solo album, "Sirens of the Ditch," that same year.

Answer: cancer

"Elephant" is a haunting song that depicts a man dealing with a lover dying of cancer and how they avoid discussing the issue of her impending death. "There's one thing that's real clear to me," the narrator sings, "No one dies with dignity / We just try to ignore the elephant somehow."

Answer: becoming sober

The recording of "Southeastern" followed Jason Isbell's time in rehab. He told NPR, when speaking about this song and becoming sober, "I worried about what parts of me would go along with the bad parts, because it's not cut and dried. It's not like you make the right decision, and everything's great, and you're a better person for it. You are, you know, at least 51 percent better. But there are some things that are lost forever, and that's just a fact of it."

In the song "Live Oak," the narrator is not a recovering alcoholic, but a former murderer. As the song proceeds, he realizes his lover is only attracted to him because of his hard past. Isbell told NPR with regard to his newfound sobriety, "I was thinking, 'Well, what do they like? Do they like that guy? What combination of those two guys are gonna make those folks stay in my life?'"

Answer: He got in a fight at a bar

The narrator starts a fight in a bar by insulting another bar goer. It's apparently not unusual behavior for him, because it's the final straw for his lover: "And in the car / Headed home / She asked if I had considered the prospect of living alone. / With a steak / Held to my eye / I had to summon the confidence needed to hear her goodbye / And another brief chapter without any answers blew by."

It's a custom to hold a cold steak to one's eye to help with swelling when one is hit. The efficacy of this home remedy is a subject for debate.

Answer: Weatherby

"I might not be a man yet, / but that bastard will never be, / so I'm cleaning my Weatherby, / my sight and my scope, / and I hope against hope." Later he says, "I load up my Weatherby." In the end, it's implied the narrator has killed, or is about to kill, his classmate's father: "Saw your father last night; in the window the light made a silhouette. / Saw him hold you that way; he won't hold you that way anymore, Yvette."

Answer: An ashtray

"Are you having a long day / Everyone you meet rubs you the wrong way / Dirty city streets smell like an ashtray / Morning bells are ringing in your ear." The upbeat tempo and soft singing in this song belies its dark, heavy lyrics.

Answer: Klonopin

The song contains these lyrics: "Lost a good friend / Christmas time when folks go off the deep end / His woman took the kids and he took Klonopin / Enough to kill a man of twice his size."

Jason Isbell has a knack for being able to rhyme the specific names of drugs. In another song on the same album, "Different Days," he writes, "You've been stripping Portland since the day you turned 16 / You got one thing to sell: benzodiazepine."

Answer: The magnolias

The lyrics run: "So girl, leave your boots by the bed / We ain't leaving this room / Till someone needs medical help / Or the magnolias bloom. / It's cold in this house and I ain't going out to chop wood / So cover me up and know you're enough / To use me for good."

"Cover Me Up," was named Song of the Year at the 2014 Americana Awards. In 2019, the song peaked at number ten on Billboard.

Answer: Lock me up tight in these shackles I wear / Tie up the keys in the folds of your hair

This song may be using Stockholm Syndrome as a metaphor. Stockholm Syndrome refers to the feelings of affection and trust that hostages and kidnap victims sometimes develop for their captors. The narrator has surrendered to his lover/captor: "Once a wise man to the ways of the world / Now I've traded those lessons for faith in a girl."

Answer: false

"New South Wales" describes a young couple a long way from their families struggling to make a life for themselves without much guidance: "Here we sit / Across the table from each other / A thousand miles from both our mothers, / Barely old enough to rust. / Here we sit / Pretending both our hearts are anchors / Taking candy from these strangers / Amidst the diesel and the dust."

Answer: traveling alone

"Traveling Alone" is the third track on "Southeastern." The chorus indicates the singer has "grown tired of traveling alone" and asks, "Won't you ride with me?"

Answer: Super 8

"Super 8" is track number ten on "Southeastern," and opens with the plea, "Don't wanna die in a Super 8 motel / Just because somebody's evening didn't go so well."

Answer: sin

This line comes from the song "Different Days," which is track six on the album. It's followed by the observation: "My daddy told me, I believe he told me true, / That the right thing's always the hardest thing to do."

Answer: hands and slaves

"Flying Over Water" is the fifth track on "Southeastern." The first stanza reads:

"From the sky we look so organized and brave / Walls that make up barricades and graves / Daddy's little empire built by hands and built by slaves."

On the surface, the song is about a woman afraid to fly (literally) over water in a plane, but on a deeper level, it's likely about the fear that often comes with starting a new relationship and with new beginnings in general.