Album Review: Josh Abbott Band’s ‘Front Row Seat’

Grab the tissues for Josh Abbott Band's new album Front Row Seat. The 16-track release follows the span of a relationship, which includes the excitement of new love, watching it slowly bloom and the often heartbreaking and complicated end.

Written by Annie Reuter
Album Review: Josh Abbott Band’s ‘Front Row Seat’
Josh Abbot Band; Artist publicity photo

Grab the tissues for Josh Abbott Band’s new album Front Row Seat. The 16-track release follows the span of a relationship, which includes the excitement of new love, watching it slowly bloom and the often heartbreaking and complicated end.

Frontman Josh Abbott opens up to Entertainment Weekly about the band’s fourth studio album which stems from his divorce last year. He explains that while the stories are his, things didn’t happen exactly how they materialize within the songs between Abbott and his first wife.

“The stories are mine but they’re not necessarily hers and mine,” Josh Abbott tells EW. “I haven’t made a record that pities me. That was a time in my life that I’m not proud of and have moved on from.”

Abbott goes on to explain that he wants people to hear the honesty in his songs and be able to relate to each track.
“I know there’s going to be a natural reflection on me and how the album mirrors my life,” Abbott says in a press release. “But I’d like to think that this is really a story that is so common that everyone relates to it and that it’s not just about me. Hopefully people can listen to it and feel like it’s about them.”

The album takes place like a film with five acts in the storyline of Abbott’s relationship. Front Row Seat begins with “While I’m Young,” a song that paints the picture of Abbott’s college life as he lived in the moment. The song embodies the fast-paced, fun live show fans have come to know and love from Josh Abbott Band with plenty of hand-clapped rhythms and foot-stomping banjo accompaniment.

While “Wasn’t That Drunk” features beautiful vocals from Carly Pearce and continues the lightheartedness of the album with memorable banjo and fiddle accompaniment, “If It Makes You Feel Good” and its soaring melodies are easy to envision in a live setting as is most of the songs within Act 2 and Act 3. It is in Act 4, however, which leads with the devastating “Born to Break Your Heart,” where the tissues are needed. Detailing the difficult end of a relationship, when Abbott sings “Hotels and highways just ain’t workin,’” you can hear the devastation.

“Ghosts” follows and is the first song Abbott wrote after his wife left him. With slowed, ethereal music and vocals, Abbott says he cried while recording the last chorus. Words like “Goodbye is the hardest part / I was supposed to hold your heart / Like the grains of sand through my hands, it fell apart,” adequately get the emotion across.

Nearing the final act Abbott finds some relief. “This Isn’t Easy (Her Song),” written from the perspective of his wife, remains gut-wrenching but at the same time acknowledges that healing has to happen by not speaking to each other. Where the spoken word of “A Loss of Memory” remains suspenseful, “Amnesia” continues to darken the mood as Abbott laments of the unfortunate circumstances of seeing his ex every night in his head as he turns off the lights. On final song, “Anonymity,” he still feels alone but there is solace on the acoustic track. A catharsis of sorts, Abbott has come out the other end of his divorce a stronger man.

“When you’re moving on from somebody, even once you’ve accepted it, you just feel alone,” Abbott says. “That’s the reason the acoustic track ends the album.”