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| Mark Olson's 'The Salvation Blues' Mark Olson spent the past two years doing one thing — traveling the world.During this time, the singer and songwriter and Jayhawks co-founder came to grips with some of the most painful moments of his life, including a divorce that resulted in the loss of the home he'd built in the California desert. Such life-altering events inspired him to dig somehow deeper, writing the kind of album that makes adjectives like introspective seem tired and utterly useless: the aptly titled 'The Salvation Blues, ' set for a June 15 release on HackTone Records. Written in the far corners of the world, 'The Salvation Blues' is a collection that saw Olson doing something for the first time in his 20-plus-year career: recording demos before cutting the final versions. The result: Each track evokes the place where its demo was recorded — an abandoned Communist music school in Krakow, Poland; the hills and mountains of Olso, Norway; and Olson's hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota — building gradually, beautifully, into a set of story-songs that, like the best poetry, leaves a singular impression of the author's deepest feelings while still being open to imaginative interpretation. In the end, 'The Salvation Blues' is a deeply personal album, documenting as it does two profound years in the life of an equally profound artist. Produced by Ben Vaughn (Los Straitjackets, Ween), it lays bare Olson's painful break-up with wife/musical partner Victoria Williams, the loss of his home, and the eventual reclamation of his very spirit. It's a collection whose overriding sentiment Olson sums up (every bit as eloquently as you'd expect) in the first verse of the title track: "There's such joy and sweet moments to be found in this world/We know they'll come to an end/Just how makes our hearts hurt/Salvation blues/And these blues will help us all." Jayhawks fans take note: this album marks the reunion of Mark Olson with former bandmate Gary Louris, who joins Mark on vocals for three songs,including "Poor Michael's Boat", which they wrote together but had never recorded until now. Olson will play several shows in NYC this spring at Mo Pitkins - April 17, 19, 24 and 26. write your comments about the article :: © 2007 Jazz News :: home page |