Louka
Testing Your Patience
In his third album, Testing Your Patience, Louka proposes a provocative listening approach. He calls his genre Roots Crossover because the songs are connected to American acoustic music and often crossed with other genres. We hear the conventions of country music but the harmonic language of much darker world music that results in a new hybrid sound.
Louka displays variations in a lyrical style that is poetic in nature. We find transposing patterns within the same song, taking us to a different place from one moment to the next. His lyrics are simple but multifaceted, some slightly otherworldly or dreamy, others strikingly and unexpectedly direct. Poetic or colloquial. Rich or unadorned.
As a musical story, Testing Your Patience alludes to an introspective beginning, marked by minimal instrumentation rooted in the guitar and voice. A well-balanced, vintage style guitar reverberates in a room captured by a classic microphone. At times we can hear the reflections of mandolins or ukeleles on a hardwood floor or an old staircase. Gradually, drama develops with harmonic tonalities that span from bright to dark, often going to the far ends of the spectrum. Often unexpected shifts result in songs with ethereal or cathartic qualities.
In Testing Your Patience, Louka celebrates acoustic sound. Without the use of effects we can hear things as they are, real.
Louka calls his genre Roots Crossover because the songs are connected to American acoustic music and often crossed with other genres. We hear the conventions of country music but the harmonic language of much darker world music that results in a new hybrid sound.
In Testing Your Patience, Louka celebrates acoustic sound. Without the use of effects we can hear things as they are, real.
The New Americana has arrived.
Louka’s “Testing Your Patience” paints a midwestern gothic landscape: unmade beds, tombstones, lost lovers gone mad, needles in the wind, and a delightfully dark Bob Dylan cover.
Virtuosic guitar playing and originality abound. Louka’s voice is deceptively calming while it cuts through right at chest level with lyrics full of intoxicating melancholia. Suddenly you’re sitting next to him in some dark dive bar in middle America, flipping beer tops into a baseball cap.
Joyful riffing sets up “Inside Out, Upside Down” a gritty blues/rock tune featuring “the drunk of 1,000 beers” and a hard living lover whose “good ideas begin & end in bed”. A slow build is punctuated by a guitar solo that would make Frank Zappa proud, as the tune patiently waits to open up until near the 3 minute mark (bar time?) where things really cut loose.
Rich textures and world music elements surface all over the album but are perhaps most beautiful & prominent on “In My Tea” where one can actually feel the water boiling. A Brazilian Udu plays alongside rhythmic clapping which slowly and unexpectedly crescendo into an intense postlude marked by a sinister trio of mandolins, psychedelic strings, and a satisfying descent into madness.
On “Moonrock”, auxiliary birds singing and a deep sigh introduce a metaphoric gem-filled oscillation between negative and positive thinking, as Louka considers how to delicately handle a difficult counterpart— “it takes an ocean to dissolve an island but you can do it, just keep on crying”. A protective nature toward unruly adversaries permeates many of the album’s themes. The track is a pulsing Americana-tinged beauty with soaring acoustic bass and a welcome ukulele solo.
The apex is “Long Walk Home” (a cousin to “Red Ferns”) —where Crosby Stills & Nash-style harmonies deliver a dark, sexy & destructive message . Soulful & charred, even as everything around him is falling apart, he fights back with a youthful optimism “I can’t stand when people say it is what it is and you can’t change it”. The ultimate crank it up and drive-around in-the-dark song.
The final song “You Got it All” is a fever dream that puts Louka’s disarming, soothing vocals on display. Perhaps a meditation on letting go, that rugged optimism surfaces one last time as he irresistibly assures “you’ve got it all the way down to the final end”.
Somehow I believe him.
-Joy Dragland
PERSON WITH EARS
Fake Candle Chandelier
Did you dive into a pit of hurt?
Heart first into a pit of hurt
Was it on fire in your hand?
When you surrendered to your man?
Did you think he’d break the dam
release the river, cool the sand?
Did you think he’d break the dam, break the dam?
Was there fish jumping in your boat?
Was there not fish jumping in your boat? Well you’d throw most back out to sea
And some would jump back in immediately a ship like that might sink
but the reef below aint deep
A ship like that might sink, might sink
Was that you cutting cactus down? Was that you cutting cactus down?
I saw needles in the wind
As someone practiced on their swing
It only stood up to catch your eye
Offering water when all was dry
Only stood to catch your eye, catch your eye
Was there light in your chandelier? Bright light in your chandelier? Was there light in your chandelier? Igniting halos on your love
Like make believing was enough
Was the image negative underneath your closed eyelids? Was the image negative, negative, negative
Was the image negative underneath your closed eyelids? Was the image negative, negative, negative?
Inside Out, Upside Down
Those nails were already pounded
In the wall that’s how I found it
Like the drunk of a thousand beers That’s how you came to me, crying tears That your laugh was gone
wondering what took so long
It’s funny how close you get
when all your love is dead
And mine is in your head
All your good ideas begin and end in bed
Old flames fly out of your room Hysterical just like you
Talking ‘bout this and that
but it just ain’t true
Sleepwalker staring in the men’s room mirror Big delusions getting clearer
Seeing doubles in a bathroom stall
Watching the bubbles moving on the wall
Focused on the surface of a crystal ball What you see is true after all Everything is inside out
and upside down
Fast fire climbing up the hallway wall Quick smoke crawling down the hall Laugh track cracking up to the ceiling you know when you get that feeling
You’re writing the movie and playing the role Like trying to drive a spike through a tiny hole but those nails were already pounded
In the wall that’s how I found it.
In My Tea
Dropped you down in the drink,
I could hear you start to crack and shrink
I put you into my tea
I could see you staring back at me
Dropped you down in hot hot water
You make it warm and then I wish it was hotter You melt so I don’t burn
It’s enough to make a stomach turn
Popped you out of a tray
In fact I got my own shape that way She holds you close to her skin She can feel the cold sinking in
Dropped you down in hot hot water
You make it warm and then we wish it was hotter You melt so we don’t burn
They know
They drop you down in hot hot water
You make it warm and then they wish it was hotter They lose their taste and send you away
The servant pours you down the drain
Goes to fetch another tray
You melt so they don’t burn
It’s enough to make a stomach turn
Red Ferns
The red fern’s growin’ on the side of you house I’m sitting here quiet, squeakin’ like a mouse Don’t you leave me in this hole alone
It’s gonna be along walk home
The paint is chipping and the carpets a fade
By the time you get back I wont be the same
And this old house will cave, collapse and degrade And I wont remember your name
One day the Earth will line up
with Pluto and Mars,
if it don’t happen fast I’m gonna sell the farm and the life there is gonna wither and die
Polishing each once of Earth
‘till it sparkles and shines, their appetite for lies keeps on growing
and they can’t get full
The porch is crooked and my bed’s unmade
when the legs give out I’ll slip into my grave and the Sunshine is gonna carry me home
It’s gonna be a long long walk alone
One Big Happy Now
I said more than a mouthful and I got some more to say
I’m on the road to heaven, I aint going back through hell Everybody tells me that I got some dues to pay
Well I’m barefoot on the pavement and I’m singin’ everyday
I was cutting up 9 lines with 9 women on my mind
When you don’t know who you are she’s awfully hard to find Each occupied a room in my mental motel
Thinking 8 Evictions just might benefit my health
People posing like they have their house in order But the truth don’t need no one to believe
You can draw your definitions in the dirt
but it don’t observe your borders
It’s all one thing
Just stop you brain from talking and feel the way you feel!
I toppled over towers and tore apart the sea
All that I could think of was me and victory
I made my people cower and massacred the crowd
But I’m letting it go so the story ends in one big happy NOW!
Dropping history just too heavy to carry
Mental reenactments making everything too scary Separation’s a lie, we’re all going to die
but never you mind ‘cause we’ll just come right back to life
Walking around with questions inappropriate to ask Like seeing realistically you’re banished from the pack Don’t need no cures for symptoms of common disease Just get down to the bottom of how it came to be!
Moonrock
You’re like a moonrock on the dark side
I’m a scuba diver swimming for the light You’re like a tombstone with no date of birth and no sign of life
I’m holding hands with your cousin in the sand You’re out to sea trying to understand
You’re like a candle on the crest of a wave waiting for a flame
Chorus:
It’s in your gaze
I feel the feeling
It’s a long a spiral staircase but it ends up at the ceiling You walk the maze in your little room
I don’t believe you when you sing
but I know you mean to speak the truth
It’s true
Your like a lust lost lover gone mad
I’m a book of old poems sitting on your lap but you don’t read me You’re lying in the dark drifting off to sleep
Well I could see you smiling shining over all Instead of poised like rain about to fall
It takes an ocean to dissolve an island
but you can do it, just keep on crying
It’s in the way
you find a reason
It’s a short and crazy dream
when you say just what you mean
You walk the maze
in your little room
I don’t believe you when you sing
but I know you mean to speak the truth It’s true
Long Walk Home
The red ferns grow on the side of you house I’m sitting here quiet, squeakin’ like a mouse Don’t you leave me in this hole alone
It’s gonna be a long walk home
The paint is chipping and the carpets a fade
By the time you get back I wont be the same
And this old house will cave, collapse and degrade And I wont remember your name
Chorus:
Well I can’t stand when people say
“It is what it is, it’s always been that way” It’s easy to think like yesterday
when you still feel the same
I can’t stand when people say
“It is what it is and you can’t change it” Well if you leave me in this hole alone,
I’m pointing my cannons at the side of their ship
‘Cause even when the wind blows they’re gonna crack the whip But the the hull wont hold
and the sails are ripped
They’ll be rowing till the frame is tipped
Polishing each ounce of Earth
‘till it sparkles and shines, appetites for lies keeps on growing
and they can’t get full
The porch is crooked and my bed’s unmade
if the legs give out I’ll slip into my grave and the Sunshine is gonna carry me home
Chorus:
Well I can’t stand when people say
“It is what it is, it’s always been that way” It’s easy to think like yesterday
You don’t feel the pain
Well if you leave me in this hole alone, It’s gonna be along walk home
One day the Earth will line up
with Pluto and Mars, if it
don’t happen fast I’m gonna sell the farm and the life there is gonna scatter and die
Well I can’t stand when people say
“It is what it is, it’s always been that way”
Well there’s a there’s a graveyard in your mind There’s a graveyard in your mind
There’s a graveyard in your mind
where you buried the love that you found inside!
Chorus:
Well I can’t stand when people say “It is what it is and there aint no way”
It’s easy to think that same old way you don’t feel the pain
I can’t stand when people say
“It is what it is and you can’t change it”
Well if you leave me in this hole alone, It’s gonna be along walk home
You Got It All
Letting all the water past the dam
It’s been sitting there cracking
Leaking for so long
Bust the crumbling rocks and watch it flow down Get clean in the currents I can hear the sound then we’ll see
What’s in this dream
Gonna watch it flow all the way down to the end
I’m getting right out of bed and I’m gonna see you again And when deltas turn to bays
We’re gonna turn around and say
“You’re finally inside me”
You got it all
2xs 2xs 2xs 2xs
3xs You got it all the way down to the final end
I can see you
I can see you all the way down to the final end I can see you
I can see you all the way down to the final end
