The Jayhawks’ Gary Louris on New Album and Embracing ‘Outsider’ Status

Long before Americana music had a name, it had the Jayhawks.

Formed during the heyday of Eighties hair metal, the band offered something different: a sound rooted in American country, British folk, harmony singing and the group’s own version of roots-rock. Today, 30 years after the Jayhawks’ debut, an entire industry has sprung up around the type of music Gary Louris and company began pioneering in a town more accustomed to Prince’s funk and the Replacements’ noisy sweep. The Jayhawks still feel like an island unto themselves, though, with a new album, Paging Mr. Proust, that downplays their twang in favor of Sixties-inspired folk and electrified krautrock.

Gary Louris, once again the band’s lone captain after briefly reuniting with Mark Olson for 2011’s Mockingbird Time, spoke with Rolling Stone Country about his post-rehab musical rebirth, trading the Everly Brothers for Fleetwood Mac and going independent.

You co-wrote every song on the last Jayhawks album with Mark Olson. When you began writing for Paging Mr. Proust, was it difficult to write alone again?
I spent a lot of time working on this record before I even knew it was going to be a Jayhawks record. I came out of rehab and was wondering what that hell I was going to do with my life. I didn’t know if I was even going to do the Jayhawks anymore. I thought I might need to pursue some new avenues outside of music. I started recording more, playing with electronics and getting more experimental — as overused as that word is — and I found I had three or four different kinds of songs I was writing and recording. Then I realized the Jayhawks were never holding me back, I was holding myself back. I realized I needed the Jayhawks and had a whole new appreciation for them. I always knew the Jayhawks were good, but I didn’t realize how great the band was until we started working on this record.

Paging Mr. Proust feels like a showcase for the whole group, particularly those who sing with you.
I had a mission to feature the fact that we have three good vocalists in the band. There’s just a certain timbre to those voices. We might not be the most trained or perfect singers, but we have very distinct vocals. Karen’s voice has a character to it that I just love. It almost has a Fleetwood Mac feel, and I love having a female voice in the band. It makes it less of an Everly Brothers thing, with two guys in front, and more of a communal sound. We can do pads. We can do calls and responses. We can just do more.

On “Lovers of the Sun,” the back-and-forth between you and the other singers feels like a tribute to classic vocal groups from the Sixties. There’s maybe even a bit of the Cowsills in that chorus.
[Laughs] It has more of a Velvet Underground thing to me, but I’m just a Sixities and Seventies pop guy at heart. I feel like it’s so out-of-fashion that maybe it’s in fashion now. The structure, the scale, the chord progressions I write — they all feel like they’re out of time with what’s “now,” but that’s not gonna keep me from doing music like this. I want to craft those uplifting, melancholic, triumphant chord progressions. I can’t get away from a good, soaring chorus.

You channel some different influences here. “Pretty Roses in Your Hair” is another song that reaches far beyond anything resembling country.
Yeah, it’s more like the Association or something. You know, you get known for something, and sometimes you get put into a box. But I was hoping this record would show people I’m not a one-trick pony.