Photos, review: ‘Poet Laureate of the New South’ Jason Isbell rocks Rupp Arena

As an unannounced guest Friday evening at Rupp Arena, Silas House decreed during a stage introduction at least part of the title he currently carries in the Commonwealth, that of Poet Laureate of Kentucky, to the evening’s concert headliner, Jason Isbell. As such, the Kentucky author dubbed the Georgia songsmith “Poet Laureate of the New South.”

Two masterful saga swappers from two states on the same stage. Still, Isbell had the edge — namely, a tireless and resourceful rock ’n’ roll band at the ready to illuminate the extraordinary human detail in his songs. Never underestimate the power of guitars and amps.

For just under two hours, Isbell and his 400 Unit offered an exhilarating but unashamedly no-frills performance of storytelling emboldened with the kind of everyman imagery that country music today should be honoring if it was doing its job.

Compositions like “Something More Than Free,” “Traveling Alone” or any of the nine tunes summoned from his most recent album, “Weathervanes,” detailed — and, quite often, decoded — a kind of restlessness that may be rooted in the South, one where devotion to family regularly triggers varying degrees of distance. But the sensibility within Isbell’s tunes possessed considerable reach, just as the musical accents that amplified them rocked to more universal grooves.

The first catalyst to this mix of literary reflection and rock combustibility erupted during “King of Oklahoma,” the second of three “Weathervanes” works that opened the concert. The downward spiral scenario told of a blue-collar protagonist recalling how his sense of domestic bliss withered into the wrecked life of a pain-pill popping, copper-stealing, soon-to-be ex-husband. “Nothing makes me feel like much of nothing anymore.”

Cheery stuff, right? But what gave the song, along with so many other Isbell compositions that made up the Friday performance, such gravity was the galvanizing electric drive the 400 Unit triggered. It made such misery sound positively anthemic. As Isbell and guitarist Sadler Vaden engaged in some friendly instrumental sparring as “King of Oklahoma” wound down, the show’s sense of pace and purpose were simultaneously cemented.

The flow of the performance weaved tunes with semi-acoustic, folk-friendly accents around the more robust electric fare with each extreme illuminating the musical dynamics between them. For instance, the twilight-tinged love story “If We Were Vampires” (the only tune offered from 2017’s “The Nashville Sound” album) breezed along with the slightest tinge of a pop reverie. That led right into “Miles,” the eight-minute electric “Weathervanes” manifesto that shoved a piledriving song reflecting the witless exorcism of aggression (“In the name of desire, we burn everything; in the name of redemption, buy it back”) into a Neil Young-ish tale of a father’s growing displacement from his daughter.

And, yes, Southern inspirations were more than keenly felt in the program, despite the largely inclusive feel much of the music possessed. Another Isbell/Vaden guitar exchange, one lighter and more country-esque in design, distinguished the show-closing “This Ain’t It,” recalling the vintage years of the Allman Brothers Band in the process. Similarly, the colors Derry deBorja added on organ and accordion against the airtight rhythm section of Aussie-born bassist Anna Butterss and drummer Chad Gamble during songs like “Overseas” and “Traveling Alone” summoned the spirit of Tom Petty.

It was with two cover tunes from the 1980s that Isbell and the 400 Unit embraced their Southern heritage before abandoning it completely. The first was fellow Georgia rockers Drivin’ N’ Cryin’s 1989 radio hit “Honeysuckle Blue” that placed DNC alumnus Vaden on lead vocals as well as in the director’s chair to lead one of the greatest two-man guitar riffs from that decade. Later, as an encore, deBorja lit up the synths for an unexpected take on The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven” — a five-minute deviation from the rock ‘n’ roll reality checks that made this performance so arresting.

The evening began with a sharp power trio set from Texas songwriter Alejandro Escovedo, a favorite of Lexington audiences thanks to nearly three decades of club and theatre performances. Hearing him in the massive confines of Rupp was initially curious, but with keyboardist Scott Danbom, drummer Mark Henne and his own caustic guitarwork, Escovedo created a massively textured sound to fill the space.

The focus was on the reinvention of past songs with layers of distorted vocals, synth-savvy ambiance and a guitar attack that, in its more bracing electric moments, recalled the scorched Detroit rock excursions of the MC5. That gave new life to Escovedo tunes old (“Sacramento and Polk,” “Bury Me”) and comparatively new (“Luna De Miel.”)

The longtime concert favorite “Castanets” neatly juggled the years, though. It began with the slower, dub-style groove that permeates the reconstituted version from Escovedo’s new “Echo Dancing” album before reverting back to the giddy, elemental guitar jolt of the original arrangement on 2001’s “A Man Under the Influence.”

Sobering stories from Georgia with reimagined grooves from Texas. All in all, a fine — and, yes, poetic — Rupp showing from the New South.

He’s played Lexington for 30 years. Now he’s opening for Jason Isbell at Rupp.

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