Gary Louris/Photo: Gary Louris
Gary Louris is best known as the principal singer and songwriter of The Jayhawks, who created a musical niche playing alternative rock with a folk country flair. A true songwriter/troubadour, he has collaborated with Jeff Tweedy, Jakob Dylan, The Dixie Chicks, the Tedeschi Trucks Band and members of The Replacements, Soul Asylum and many others. Louris’ talent has also fostered a twenty-year solo career. In his latest album, “Dark Country,” Louris has taken that same Jayhawks blend but added a much more personal touch. Lyrically, the album is dedicated to his wife Stephanie and their ongoing relationship. Musically, it features Louris’ guitar, voice, harmonica and bits of piano. This type of simple roots music is Louris’ calling card.
“I grew up listening to British everything—all things British rock, Black Sabbath, The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, The Kinks, and then got into prog rock, Yes, Genesis,” Louris says from his home in Ontario, Canada. “I loved synthesizers and punk rock. It was only later in my life, late teens and early twenties, that I discovered roots music, American traditional music forms, blues, bluegrass, country, folk, all those music forms. So what I really did was apply that aesthetic. In that way The Jayhawks are not a true country band but more Americana.”
In a decade noted for its pop synth sound, the Minneapolis-based Jayhawks found a niche with fans who wanted a combination of a more-stripped-down production with a greater emphasis on lyrics. Formed in the late 1980s, The Jayhawks hit their stride with the 1992 release, “Hollywood Town Hall,” and especially the single, “Waiting for the Sun.” Their 1995 recording, “Tomorrow the Green Grass,” further fueled their popularity, as about this time The Jayhawks and Uncle Tupelo were considered to be driving forces behind the alt-country sound of the late 1990s. This in turn further inspired the artistic formation of bands like Wilco and the Drive-By Truckers. The band started out with Louris and Mark Olsen writing most of the material, but in 1997 Olsen left the band, and Louris took over most of the songwriting duties, adding a bit more of the pop and British-invasion sounds that so influenced Louris’ youth.
Throughout his career, Louris has branched out in various collaborative projects, the most notable of which may have been the formation of Golden Smog, a type of “supergroup” formed in 1992. The band featured a rotating cast of musicians that included Louris, Mark Murphy of Soul Asylum, Jeff Tweedy and Jody Stephens of Big Star, and recorded five albums between 1992 and 2007.
“I think Golden Smog was more of a rock band,” Louris says. “Our songs were more pop songs, especially when Tweedy was there or I was there. We still kind of kept to the roots music, but I think there was a little more of a rock sound, a pop sound.”
Louris has also written material recorded by and with other artists, including The Dixie Chicks, The Tedeschi Trucks band, Jacob Dylan, Carrie Rodriguez, Johnny Cash and many others.
While still appearing with The Jayhawks and Golden Smog, Louris began a solo career in 2008. His first album, “Vagabonds,” was produced by Chris Robinson of The Black Crowes and recorded in Laurel Canyon. Famous as the wellspring of the California singer-songwriter movement of the 1970s, it brought back much of the creative freedom that this time and place have since come to represent. Songs like “She Only Calls Me On Sundays” and “Vagabonds” combined country guitar, harmonica and steel pedal guitar, and took a turn from alt-country to straight country, while “Baby Let Me Take Care of You” had a Dylanesque feel, complete with winding-word lyrics spinning a tale of life’s lessons. His second solo album, “Jump for Joy,” released in 2021, suffered from the pre- and post-COVID issues that affected entertainment and, obviously, the rest of the world.
So Louris has put extra heart, soul and especially love into his latest album, “Dark Country.” The title of the album is a bit misleading, as the recording, released on February 14, is a Valentine’s Day tribute and musical love letter to his wife Stephanie.
“It is an album of love, love ballads; a lot of the songs are about finding our love later in life and how it has made me appreciate love more,” Louris says. “In this case I wanted to express my love to my wife. I recorded the whole album sitting here in my home studio in Quebec, just getting up every morning, making myself a cup of coffee and professing my love, as corny as it sounds. I think I am older, and maybe we do have to pack more love into less time, and so I wrote and recorded these songs because I wanted the world to know.”
Gary Louris will perform on Friday, March 28, 8pm, at the Old Town School of Folk Music’s Gary and Laura Maurer Concert Hall, 4544 North Lincoln. Tickets are $35, available at oldtownschool.org.
