Isbell originally released the emotional tune as part of his 2013 album Southeastern
Hayley Williams enlisted Jason Isbell for a performance of his 2013 song “Cover Me Up” at New York’s Hammerstein Ballroom on Sunday night.
Isbell joined Williams on stage to showcase the emotive, bluesy track, off his album Southeastern. Isbell played acoustic while Williams took on the vocals, with Isbell later joining her on the chorus. “This is a dream come true,” Williams told Isbell. “Thanks for doing it.”
Isbell originally wrote “Cover Me Up” about getting sober and his love for ex-wife Amanda Shires. “That was a hard one for me to even get through without breaking down the first time, because that one is really personal,” Isbell told NPR in 2013.. “It’s not easy to sit down and open yourself up and say, ‘This is how much I love you,’ you know? It’s scary to do that.”
The song was notably covered by Morgan Wallen as part of his 2020 LP, Dangerous: The Double Album. Following Wallen’s industry-wide rebuke for using a racial slur in 2021, Isbell announced that he would be donating the money he earned from Wallen’s recording to the NAACP.
“A portion of this money goes to me, since I wrote ‘Cover Me Up,’” Isbell tweeted. “I’ve decided to donate everything I’ve made so far from [Wallen’s] album to the Nashville chapter of the NAACP. Thanks for helping out a good cause, folks.”
Williams is currently out on her first solo tour in support of her album Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party. She played three nights at Hammerstein Ballroom and will head to Baltimore on Tuesday. The tour continues through mid-May, when it concludes with three shows at the Wiltern in Los Angeles. She will continue the trek in Europe and the U.K. in June.
