Modern Classics: Gary Louris' Vagabonds

Gary Louris – Vagabonds
(Rykodisk)

In conventional rock & roll wisdom (if there can be such a thing), most prominent members of prominent rock bands find that they have a hard time finding their voice as solo artists. Even in the case of iconoclasts such as Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney, solo albums have alternately befuddled and alienated fans that came to love a certain artist as a principal contributor of a popular band. So it came as somewhat of a shock to learn that former Jayhawks frontman Gary Louris was cutting a solo album. Even more shocking was the news that the album would be produced by Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson, who himself had problems winning over his band’s audience to his own solo work.

In retrospect, though, it all makes perfect sense. Who better than Robinson, no doubt tempered by his own experiences as a solo artist, to help Louris wade through all of the expectations and baggage that come with being a band leader and cut to the essence of what the artist has to say? That is exactly what happened on Louris’ excellent Vagabonds, the type of singer/songwriter album that unfortunately seems only to get made a few times each decade, at least since the era of MTV.

Not that Vagabonds ignores the aspects of Gary Louris’ songwriting that made the Jayhawks one of the most influential bands of the 90s (Uncle Tupelo and Wilco didn’t just appear out of thin air). If anything, it outright embraces them. But gone are most of the fuzzy guitars and affected vocals that were so prominent in his work with the Jayhawks, and in their place are a more earthy assortment of instruments like pedal steel, Hammond organ, and harmonica, helping to reveal that Louris is still one of the most honest and imaginative songwriters in all of rock music.

But perhaps the most prominent instrument of all is the “Laurel Canyon Family Choir”, a collection of top-notch sit-ins assembled by producer Robinson via connections made from his infamous regular jam sessions said canyon with guitarist/songwriter Jonathan Wilson (who plays bass on the album). The chorus includes not only Robinson and Wilson, but also Jonathan Rice, Rilo Kiley singer Jenny Lewis and former Bangles frontwoman Susannah Hoffs.

It’s not that the Choir makes the songs that they appear on better. It’s that they make them beautiful in such a way that they will haunt your every waking moment – a brilliant juxtaposition of the oft-frail and vulnerable voice that is Louris’ trademark and the thick, angelic texture of the choir. When Louris sings on the title track “carry on, you vagabonds”, and the Choir joins him in delivering the line “everyone’s gone away”, the result hits you like a ton of the marijuana that Louris sings about being grown underneath the bridge during the song’s second verse.

The brilliance is that with the Choir present, Louris is under no pressure to oversing his way through the album’s bigger choruses. With Louris alone delivering the punch line, songs like “We’ll Get By” and “She Only Calls Me On Sundays” would either be simple-yet-charming life lessons about love and loss, or he might be tempted to oversing. With the Choir behind him – as well as stunning Hammond lines delivered by Adam McDougall (it’s really no wonder that he was later hired by the Black Crowes) – they carry the weight of sermons delivered by the Almighty him/her/itself. Even if you don’t believe in that sort of thing, after the Choir is done with you, you may be apt to reconsider.

This is not to say that the Choir dominates the album – far from it. The star of the show remains Louris’ ability to relate an earnest story without it feeling like he’s just making shit up to fill the space between choruses. The songs such as “To Die A Happy Man”, “D.C. Blues” and the aptly-titled “Meandering”, which feature the Choir either minimally or not at all, penetrate the deepest into the listener’s psyche, even though they might take the a few more listens to truly absorb.

So “conventional rock and roll wisdom”, be damned. After years of relative obscurity – contributing new material only to the alt-country “supergroup” Golden Smog – Gary Louris has emerged with what might well prove to be the best album released in 2008.