Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit Brought Brawny Vulnerability to a Sold-Out Majestic Theatre

Fourteen months have passed since Jason Isbell last stood on a Dallas stage.

In the interim, the Alabama native lived through all manner of personal and professional turmoil — not least of which was his divorce from fellow musician Amanda Shires in December 2023, a split impacting his life both on and off the stage.

Elsewhere, he took a role in Martin Scorsese’s sweeping Killers of the Flower Moon; found himself the target of bitter words from Justin Townes Earle’s widow, Jenn, over "When We Were Close," Isbell’s poignant, raw tribute to the late musician; and released his ninth album, the lean, visceral Weathervanes, which bagged him a Grammy for best Americana album.

If any of the turbulence of the prior year and change wore on the 45-year-old singer-songwriter, it was not immediately evident Wednesday as Isbell and his backing band, the 400 Unit, tore through a gritty, glorious 100-minute set before a sold-out Majestic Theatre. (In an amusing nod to Isbell’s longevity on area stages, he alluded to a long-ago Deep Ellum gig: “I’m just gonna tell you now we’re not gonna play ‘Outfit,’” Isbell joked. “You should’ve come to Sons of Hermann Hall when you had the chance.”) The setlist heavily favored last year’s Weathervanes — seven of its 13 tracks were showcased — but even the left-field choices (an encore opener of the Cure’s “Just Like Heaven,” because, hey, why not) were of a piece. The head-down, one-foot-in-front-of-the-other attitude often yielded moments of hard-fought transcendence — like the thrill that comes from watching a line of football players make a game-winning defensive stand as the clock ticks down to zero.

Isbell cycled through what seemed like a Guitar Center’s worth of electric and acoustic models throughout the night, flanked by his formidable bandmates: Derry DeBorja on keys and occasional accordion; Chad Gamble on drums; bassist Anna Butterss; long-time guitarist Sadler Vaden; and Will Johnson, the pride of Denton, a recently added multi-instrumentalist who handled guitar, backing vocals, drums and gong duties Wednesday.

The collective force of Isbell and the band was something to behold, a mighty, muscular roar that felt brawny even during the more delicate moments. Absent Shires’ fiddle, the country strains of Isbell’s catalog fell away, leaving the triple-guitar attack to be leavened with a tasteful flourish of accordion or keys.

“King of Oklahoma,” an early highlight, brought the capacity crowd to its feet for the first of several ovations, as Isbell and Vaden dueled apart and together from across the sparely dressed stage, rigged with lights above and behind that swirled and flashed and glowed. Later, Isbell, whose typically gregarious asides were kept to a minimum Wednesday, arranged a late triptych of songs — “If We Were Vampires,” “Death Wish” and the blistering “Miles” — as a kind of call-and-response which built to an extraordinary climax.

The bruised lovers bound together in “Vampires,” curdled into the suffocation of “Death Wish” (“Did you ever love a woman with a death wish?/Something in her eyes, like flipping off a light switch/Everybody dies, but you gotta find a reason to carry on,” Isbell sang) and reached its brutal, beautiful apex in “Miles,” which closes out Weathervanes. On Wednesday, “Miles” was the penultimate moment in the main set — a seething, anguished scrape of a song, brought to brawling life by Isbell and his bandmates: “In the name of survival, we get used to this/In the name of forgiveness, we get bored.”

As with any songwriter of Isbell’s caliber, the temptation is great to read between the lines and assume he’s alluding to his own life, but the ferocity with which it was performed seemed to make the lyrics as much an act of atonement as aggression. That said, there was a moment where Isbell’s ruefulness was in full view, as he spoke of his two-decade-plus friendship with Johnson: “If I make friends with someone from Texas, I stay friends with them a long time,” Isbell said, before taking a beat. “Not always, but usually.”

Isbell’s solo career has been a going concern for nearly two decades, and in that time, he has evolved into one of America’s most consequential musicians, a writer of uncommon frankness and raw-nerved vulnerability. The confidence born out of doing is evident in every note Isbell and the 400 Unit played Wednesday; the punchy, rangy swagger driving home the moods and melodies of a man holding tight to what he knows to be true, even as everything around him shifts.