It’s hard to believe that it’s been 30 years since The Jayhawks formed back in the twin cities. The mark they have left on the Americana music scene is undeniable, but also quite puzzling. Why in the hell is this band not a household name? What kind of music industry can let a gem of a band like this seemingly go unnoticed to the greater masses, especially after delivering a string of brilliant and critically acclaimed records?
I first heard The Jayhawks when I worked at a record store in college back in St. Louis. The label rep/ promo guy (you know, Artie Fufkin) brought in a promo copy of Tomorrow the Green Grass the week of its release and was saying great things about these guys. The label even had a display contest in which the store with the biggest and best Jayhawks display won a prize. I love that fucking record and the band so much that I made the entire back of the store one enormous Jayhawks display. (I swear I still have the photo somewhere, tweet me later and I’ll track it down) Oh, and I won by the way.
One of the other benefits of working in a record store back in the day, besides all the free promo CDs, was the free tickets that came along with them. I got to see The Jayhawks at the legendary Mississippi Nights. The show was EPIC. Fast forward to last week at another legendary venue, the Fillmore here in San Francisco, I witnessed The Jayhawks sounding better than ever.
How is that possible you ask? Well in my opinion the BEST records these guys have in their catalog are the ones that founding member Gary Louris led. The Jayhawks purists will tell you that Mark Olson was the genius of the band. Those folks are delusional. When Mark left the band the pressure was all on Gary, and he delivered big time. Sound of Lies is one of the greatest records I have ever heard in my life. What followed was even better. The New York Times wrote one of my favorite reviews of all time for the follow-up to Sound of Lies and second post-Olson release, the modern masterpiece they would simply call Smile. I couldn’t have said it any better so I will just share an excerpt by Karen Schoemer (she gets it) called What If You Made a Classic, and No One Cared?
Smile aspires to be nothing less than a classic, the kind of album teenagers stumble upon and hold dear for the rest of their lives. It wants to join a club with Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds, Big Star’s Sister Lovers, and other rock ‘n’ roll benchmarks of loneliness and disillusion from the ’60s and early ’70s. Smile is so retro in tone and scope it even feels like it should be on vinyl—you can imagine a thick gatefold sleeve, the dusty white outline of a circle impressed into the cover.
It doesn’t get any better than that folks. Now back to my show review from the Fillmore last week. The set list that night was stellar and weighed heavily on the second wave of Jayhawks reissues—Sound of Lies, Smile, and Rainy Day Music which all received a much overdo repackaging and remastering into deluxe versions on vinyl. Gary Louris led his original ’97 lineup (well, most of it) through such classics as “Big Star,” “The Man Who Loved Life,” “I’m Gonna Make You Love Me,” “Smile,” and more. He even threw in a few Golden Smog songs, although I would have loved to hear one or two from the first record as it’s the masterpiece.
Now The Jayhawks could never truly play a show without revisiting their “breakthrough” record. “Blue,” “I’d Run Away,” and very surprising—one of my favorite songs, “Real Light”—sounded spectacular and the packed Fillmore could not have been happier with the 27 song set.
Opening the show that night was an artist that I heard for the first time named Trapper Schoepp. This guy and his band were fantastic as well. Falling somewhere in between the Old 97’s and the early days of Wilco, Trapper Schoepp and the Shades are carrying the torch and keeping Americana alive and well for the next generation. Let’s just hope they get a fair shot in this dying industry.
TRAPPER SCHOEPP
Bottom line: The Jayhawks are an American treasure and we should be celebrating their entire catalog. Especially The Sound of Lies and Smile which are now available on beautiful 180 gram vinyl as they should be heard. Check out high res photos of The Jayhawks and Trapper Schoepp.
