How Was The Show - Gary Louris, Mark Olson at The Varsity Theater

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Mark Olson and Gary Louris at The Varsity Theater on 2/22/09

(Photos by Alexa Jones)

Halfway through Mark Olson and Gary Louris’s 90-minute set Sunday night at the Varsity it finally sank in what a big deal this really was. Sure I’d seen Gary and Mark perform together at least a dozen times or more in the original Jayhawks lineup prior to Olson’s departure from the band in 1995. Sure I’d seen Mark play solo and with the Creekdippers (even at a memorable show in London at The Borderline). And sure I’d seen Gary play many more gigs with the Jayhawks in the post-Olson lineup until the band itself went on hiatus indefinitely a few years ago. And Gary has continued to appear with some regularity on Minneapolis stages solo and with other groups, including variations on a theme of Golden Smog.

But Olson and Louris together? Live? For me, it had probably been 15 years.

It wasn’t the first time Mark and Gary had appeared together in town. HowWasTheShow recapped their special show together at the 400 Bar on New Year’s Eve 2004. The two then toured together in Spring 2005. Then about a month ago the duo kicked-off the first leg of this year’s tour with an in-store at Treehouse Records and a performance at MPR. (Check out this video of “Saturday Morning on Sunday Street” from that MPR session here.)

Sunday evening in the second of two sold out shows at the Varsity they opened with “Rose Society,” the opening track from their new album together Ready for the Flood, then dug into the magical Jayhawks back-catalog right away with “Nothing Left to Borrow” from 1995’s Tomorrow the Green Grass.

And this is how it would go over the next hour and a half, a song or two from their individual catalogs and their new work together mixed in with the Jayhawks songs everyone in the audience loved but that some in the audience had never seen them do together live. (I’d guess by the age of the crowd, however, that I had plenty of company as a fan that had been around since Jayhawks 1.0.)

Mark and Gary seemed like old friends up there, and consummate professionals, with just their two guitars and a table between them with various beverages. They were definitely chatty, and I think they made it clear that they loved this town and this crowd at least as much as the crowd loved them. Many of the long time music fans I know are acquaintances or even friends of one or more members of this long time Minneapolis songwriting team.

Read for the Flood was released on vinyl and CD by New West at the end of January. On Mark and Gary’s MySpace for the album, Tony Glover alludes to what others call “The Voice” that results when Mark and Gary sing together. Glover puts it this way: “They’ve got that intuitive ear for blending and weaving that exists on some genetic level.” Olson and Louris have always been two musicians who when added together are greater than the sum of their parts. Still, this is not a Jayhawks album. The Jayhawks could not have made this record.

Louris remarked more than once that it was a bittersweet moment for them tonight, this being the final show of the tour. (Though they go back out again in April.) Louris also took the time to wish First Avenue Stage Manager Conrad Sverkerson (who was in attendance) a happy 50^th Birthday. Mark took time out to say hi to his family who were attending from Le Sueur, MN.

Those who attended Saturday’s show as well as Sunday’s let on that Sunday’s was pretty much the same with basically the same set list followed for the entire tour (with some minor change ups in the encore.) Again they ended with “Blue,” a song former HowWasTheShow editor Bob Longmore remarked during Saturday's show should have made them international superstars back in the day. In many people’s minds, it did. In a perfect world, that was the tipping point.

Sunday’s Set List (unlabeled songs are from the new album, Ready for the Flood)

1. The Rose Society

2. Nothing Left To Borrow (Jayhawks – Tomorrow the Green Grass)

3. Bicycle

4. Bloody Hands

5. Turn Your Pretty Name Around

6. Two Angels (Jayhawks – Blue Earth)

7. Say You’ll Be Mine (Mark Olson – December’s Child)

8. Saturday Morning on Sunday Street

9. Chamberlain SD

10. Two Hearts (Jayhawks – Tomorrow the Green Grass)

11. Clouds (Jayhawks – Hollywood Town Hall)