Mark Olson was the founder of The Jayhawks, the most important band to emerge out of the 90's alt-country scene. Olson left after their most successful album, 'Tomorrow the Green Grass,' to pursue a simpler life in the California desert. A decade later, everything fell apart: Mark's marriage to singer/songwriter Victoria Williams ended, his group The Creekdippers disbanded, and he lost the home he had built by hand. These songs were written in the wake of that profound loss, during the two years he spent homeless - staying with friends in places as far-flung as Norway, Poland, and Wales. Produced by Ben Vaughn, 'The Salvation Blues' is Olson's first true solo album, made with some of LA's best session musicians. This album also features Mark's long-awaited reunion with Jayhawk Gary Louris, who provides harmonies on three songs.

Here starts the third stage of Mark Olson's recording career. He first came to prominence as the primary singer-songwriter for the Jayhawks, before leaving that seminal alt-country band to make music with his wife, Victoria Williams, in the more acoustic, organic Creekdrippers. With his reedy voice and elemental imagery, Olson details the painful dissolution of that marriage on this solo album, clinging to music as a lifeline when everything else is lost. In the album-opening "My Carol," he compares his love to "an animal bleeding in the snow," while "National Express" asks "Where's my home? How could I lose this in a day?" Yet musically, "Clifton Bridge" and "Winter Song" rank with the best of his Jayhawks work, and both the title track and "Look into the Night" find redemption in the midst of despair. Gary Louris joins his former Jayhawks bandmate for harmonies on three cuts. --Don McLeese