Never mind the tariffs, here’s Gary Louris of the Jayhawks, newly solo and Canadian

Gary Louris has heard a lot of opinions and met a lot of upset people over the past couple of months. And no, not because he went and made another solo album. Fans of his band, the Jayhawks, are usually quite appreciative of his work outside the group.

It’s because the folks he’s been running into know he’s American.

“People here are really pissed off,” Louris said. “They love the States, but what’s going on down there is hurting everyone here.”

“Here” in Louris’ case is rural Quebec. Minnesota’s best-loved Americana songwriter besides Bob Dylan is now living in Canada.

The Jayhawks frontman married a Canadian woman in a small ceremony with friends in Minneapolis in October 2020. They have since resettled in a ski hamlet in the Laurentian Mountains an hour outside of Montreal.

Louris’ change in nationalities might seem well-timed to many Americans. As he returns stateside to promote his new album, though, the 70-year-old singer/guitarist is feeling the unexpected unease on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border.

“Most of my business is still there in America, so hopefully it doesn’t get too ugly,” Louris said last week by phone from his new home. He returns to Minneapolis for a solo gig at the Parkway Theater on Saturday.

Louris’ third solo LP, “Dark Country,” is all about his uprooted existence of late. The title is both a play off the political turmoil in the country he left behind and the geographical variations in his new country (where daylight is more fleeting in winter).

In truth, though, “Dark Country” is not very dark, nor is it country-ish in sound. The songs are light, acoustic and folky, and the lyrics are as romantic as anything he’s written this side of the Jayhawks’ “I’m Gonna Make You Love Me.”

Louris easily summed up the album this way: “It’s all about the strength of unabashed love.

“It’s pretty blatantly a love letter to my wife,” he said. “It’s not in my DNA to be real literal or autobiographical, but in this case I guess I just want the world to know what real love sounds like.”

Living in upstate New York at the time — he left Minneapolis after his son, Henry, headed east for college — Louris met his future wife, Stephanie, through the owner of the Horseshoe Tavern in Toronto when the Jayhawks played there on tour in 2019. “It was kind of love at first sight,” he said.

When they moved to Quebec, he set up a home studio and co-opted his new stepson’s piano to begin writing the songs that would make up “Dark Country,” inspired by his new marriage as well as the seclusion and scenery there.

“I walked a fine line between the dark and the light,” Louris sings in “By Your Side,” a nakedly overt piano ballad. “But then I met you, and my forever home fell within my sights / A little bungalow and you my darling wife.”

Other new songs are just as openly romantic, including the fingerpicked, intimate ditty “Couldn’t Live a Day Without You” and the more windswept-sounding kiss-off “Blow ’Em Away.” The album’s opening track and first single, “Getting Older,” is a more nuanced ode to shedding old patterns to find new romance.

Louris said “Getting Older” is “more about seizing the day than the aches and pains of getting older.

“I noticed that a lot of my songs over the years have been about the passage of time and life being too short, and that’s definitely one of them,” he said.

Originally from Toledo, Ohio — another new song, “Listening to Bobby Charles,” pays homage to his late mother’s musical influence — Louris came to the Twin Cities in the late 1970s to study architecture at the University of Minnesota. He wound up playing guitar in the rockabilly-spiked band Safety Last before the Jayhawks formed in 1984, setting in motion what has become a four-decade career in music.

Louris has made many other diversions from the Jayhawks over the years. He still sporadically co-helms the cult-loved all-star band Golden Smog with members of Soul Asylum and Wilco. He also has written songs with or for other artists, including the Chicks, the Tedeschi Trucks Band, the Wallflowers and Nickel Creek.

Even with another solo album to tout and now an international barrier between them, Louris remains closely tied and fully committed to the Jayhawks, the rest of whom still call the Twin Cities home (drummer Tim O’Reagan, keyboardist Karen Grotberg and co-founding bassist Marc Perlman).

Louris and the group are working on their first new album since 2020’s “XOXO,” songs from which earned a warm reception when they previewed them at their Fitzgerald Theater shows in December. They plan to drop the record next year alongside a major tour, all tied to the 40th anniversary of the band releasing its first album (“The Jayhawks,” aka “The Bunkhouse Album”).

In the meantime, the Jayhawks also have a smattering of gigs on the calendar this year, including another hometown outdoor show Aug. 7 at Utepils Brewing, where they played a sold-out set last summer. Louris said, “It was such a fun gig, we thought we’d do it again.

“We’re gearing up for a big year next year, and I think we’re as strong as we’ve ever been,” he added.

Still, Louris admitted he will relish at least one aspect of performing without his usual bandmates when he’s back in town Saturday.

“I can talk more when I’m playing by myself,” he said with a laugh. “Believe me, the band is not interested in hearing me talk anymore. They’ve heard all my stories.”

When: 7:30 p.m. Sat.

Where: Parkway Theater, 4814 Chicago Av. S., Mpls.

Tickets: $35-$50, theparkwaympls.com.

When: Aug. 7.

Where: Utepils Brewing, 225 Thomas Av. N., Mpls.

Tickets: $51-$136, etix.com.