Mark Olson

In 1995 Mark Olson parted ways with the Jayhawks after ten turbulent years that had brought growing acclaim, choosing instead to follow his own path in search of straightforward, roots-driven Americana. The remaining members carried forward under Gary Louris’s songwriting leadership and shifted the group toward a more mainstream pop direction. Olson bypassed conventional label deals altogether, electing to work independently so he could create and distribute recordings on his own terms. Enlisting his wife Victoria Williams, already established as a singer-songwriter, along with longtime fiddler Mike “Razz” Russell, he assembled a makeshift studio inside their Joshua Tree, California home and captured The Original Harmony Ridge Creek Dippers in 1997. The release earned favorable notice among alt-country listeners and drew substantial coverage in No Depression.

Enjoying the experience, Olson, Williams, and Russell tracked Pacific Coast Rambler in early 1999 and Zola & the Tulip Tree later that same year. Hightone Records, known for supporting roots-rock artists, issued the partly autobiographical My Own Jo Ellen in late 2000, followed by December’s Child in 2002. Olson also continued releasing material with the Creekdippers, including Political Manifest in 2004. The year 2005 brought the close of both his marriage and creative partnership with Williams after Olson suffered a short-lived emotional crisis. His 2007 solo album The Salvation Blues, issued in an elaborate package, reflected on that divorce and its aftermath while also featuring three tracks that reunited him with former Jayhawks colleague Gary Louris. The collaboration proved fruitful, leading the pair to issue Ready for the Flood as a duo in 2009.

Olson next delivered the fully solo Many Colored Kite in 2010, after which the Jayhawks reconvened for the 2011 album Mockingbird Time and an extensive tour. During a 2013 interview, however, Olson stated that the band had disbanded and that he had started working with his second wife, Norwegian musician and songwriter Ingunn Ringvold. When visa complications—later cleared—prevented the couple from residing together in either Norway or the United States, they joined a music school in Armenia and composed the songs that became Olson’s 2014 solo album Goodbye Lizelle. He and Ringvold collaborated once more on the 2017 release Spokeswoman of the Bright Sun.