Jason Isbell cleans up nicely for sold-out Northrop concert

Although the Turf Club is just a few miles away on University Avenue, longtime fans of Jason Isbell saw a much bigger leap when the acclaimed singer/songwriter landed at Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis Monday night.

Five years earlier, Isbell played a rough and unintentionally rocky show at the Turf that forecast what would come next in his career. The Alabama native — who got his start in the early-'00s with the cult-revered twang-rock band Drive-By Truckers — entered rehab not long after that 2011 gig and fought his way back to sobriety. His personal turnaround became the inspiration for his breakthrough 2013 album "Southeastern."

Monday's concert felt like the payoff to that rebound. It followed the release of another highly acclaimed record, "Something More Than Free," which just won two Grammy Awards last week. And it found Isbell moving up to what is now one of the poshest and most acoustically refined venues in town, with all 2,700 seats sold out far in advance.

"I always liked playing the Turf Club, and First Avenue — it doesn't get any better than that," he remarked midway through the show, one of several times he got all aw-shucks about playing the fancy theater.

"This room just looks like it sounds good, all curvy. It has feminine curves. I don't like all those big, old manly looking rooms."

Another sign of how things have looked up for Isbell of late was the woman standing next to him on stage: Fiddler/co-vocalist Amanda Shires, his wife, was back in the band following a maternity leave for their first child and a recording stint working on another album of her own.

Isbell, 37, repeatedly looked to Shires on Monday as he sang, "I'm tired of traveling alone / Won't you ride with me?" The couple shared another intimate moment later when he talked about his fear the first time he played her a song she inspired before they were married.

With a seated crowd in front of them instead of the packed clubs they're used to, Isbell and his longtime band, the 400 Unit, took awhile finding the right pacing Monday. Some of the rockier tunes, including the Truckers classic "Decoration Day" and the sordid bruiser "Super 8," felt stifled.

That was a fair trade, though, for the pristine sound and hushed attentiveness during "Cover Me Up" and other quieter, more moving tunes. Other standouts like it included two from the new album, "Children of Children" and "Flagship," plus the night's two most emotionally wrought tunes, "Elephant" and "Dress Blues," about cancer and a fallen soldier, respectively. The latter one always used to turn the Turf Club pin-drop-quiet, too.

Isbell brought along an opening act following a similar club trajectory on Monday: rowdy, gospel-spiked South Carolina duo Shovels & Rope. Even in just a short 45-minute set, the musical couple of Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent were able to show off their musical dexterity, swapping out drums, guitar, keyboards and lead vocal duties (sometimes with one of them filling three of those roles at once).

All the more impressive, the duo covered a wide gamut of musical versatility, trading the hard-plunking Southern boogie of "The Devil Is All Around" for the elegant mountain harmonies of "Birmingham." Hearst joked about them being out of place in such a nice theater, offering a funny explanation why they wore matching black and white suits.

"We have a bartending gig right after this," she claimed.

Here is Jason Isbell's set list from Monday night:

Chris Riemenschneider • 612-673-4658