Jayhawks frontman and mainstay Gary Louris often turns to classic literature as an antidote to the flimsy, frivolous nature of modern-day life. The title of the group’s new album, Paging Mr. Proust, references this by name-checking French author Marcel Proust, whose introspective novel In Search of Lost Time extends over 4,000 pages in seven volumes.

That’s not to say that Louris is a Luddite. The Jayhawks enlisted their fans to support Paging Mr. Proust, in part, through a PledgeMusic campaign. “I was initially reluctant because I don’t like asking for money,” he reveals. “Then it was explained to me that it was really more like a presale—a way to get us to fund the record— along with money that we got from the label. There were no big donations. It was more of Bernie Sanders’ method— people giving what they could. It wasn’t just charity, they were getting things for it. We had a very good experience.”

Louris produced Paging Mr. Proust alongside R.E.M.’s Peter Buck and Tucker Martine (The Decemberists, My Morning Jacket) at Martine’s Flora Recording & Playback in Portland, Ore. “Peter was all about the feel and the vibe,” Louris reflects. “Tucker was like that as well, but he also said, ‘Maybe we could do that better—let’s revisit the sound and see if there is a better amp.’ He’s more detail-oriented, though he can be big picture, too. Peter said, ‘We could do this record in five days,’ while Tucker was more like, ‘Let’s take our time.’ Peter also helped with pre-production. He helped pick out what songs he thought were best—the sequencing and all those sorts of things. I’m kind of in between both of those guys. I like the idea of: ‘There’s nothing wrong with a first take. The vocal isn’t perfect, but it’s what happened. It was a snapshot in time.’ But I can also go, ‘Oh, I could’ve sang that better. It’s not good enough.’ So I think we found a sweet spot between the two of them.”

Paging Mr. Proust is the group’s first album since 2011’s Mockingbird Time—on which co-founder Mark Olson rejoined the fold for his first Jayhawks record since 1995, before departing again shortly afterward. Proust finds Louris working with the band’s current steady lineup, featuring fellow founding member Marc Perlman (bass) along with Tim O’Reagan (drums, vocals) and Karen Grotberg (keyboards, vocals). While the album hearkens back to the Americana sound long associated with the group, songs such as “Ace” and “Comeback Kids” also reflect Louris’ longtime interest in the German sounds of the 1970s. “You can never tell what people listen to by what they play,” he suggests. “I love a lot of music that I just can’t do very well. I don’t listen to alternative country music. I listen to a lot of non-song-oriented music. It’s like, if you’re a chef, it’s hard for you to go into a restaurant and enjoy a meal. You’re thinking about what’s going on in the kitchen, why they prepared it this way, why they used this ingredient. I can’t listen to it like other people listen to it. It becomes work. Unless it’s somebody really great, I’m very critical. I tend to listen to music that’s not anything like what I seem to do.”

QUIET CORNERS & EMPTY SPACES

“Quiet Corners & Empty Spaces” started with the idea that I wanted to write a big, soaring, old-school pop song. With lyrics, I either tend to do a stream-of-consciousness or a cut-and-paste kind of thing. This one was something out of a newspaper that I cut out. I just have piles of stuff.

For me, it’s a spark to kind of throw some things together, along with other methods, like mumbling. A lot of times, when I’m writing, I sing and play and whatever comes out comes out, and these words are inferred by sounds and half-words. Then I come around and get the meaning out of that, and it’s usually coming from some place inside that is kind of revelatory in a way. It’s almost like therapy.

So, from there, I wrote a song about running away from certain things. Again, in a Proust kind of way, finding a spot where you can be introspective, away from the noise, and get your head together.

LOST THE SUMMER

“Lost the Summer” came out of jamming in the studio. I had some basic chords. It’s a reaction to those shootings in Charleston and the American love affair with guns. It’s kind of a swampy anti-gun song.

LOVERS OF THE SUN

This is one of my favorites on the album. It’s about somebody that was looking for something new—the next thrill, the next thing. It’s about a person who uses somebody and moves on to the next one. I’ve been used and I’ve used—I’ve been guilty of it. It’s another movement song.

PRETTY ROSES IN YOUR HAIR

“Pretty Roses” is a song about when I went to visit an old friend of mine. Our moment of romance had come and gone. But I went to visit her and remembered something that we almost had, standing there, waiting for her to open the door with some flowers in my hand—realizing that we were just meant to be friends.

It’s got some cool things I brought in from field recordings—home recordings— of things out my window, down the street or on a road trip. I live on the third floor of an apartment that’s in an old house up on a hill. I’m surrounded by a basilica and two cathedrals. The bells are going every hour. I recorded The bells on “Pretty Roses” on my phone out the window. It also has some drummachine stuff that I played with, kind of mixing it up.

LEAVING THE MONSTERS BEHIND

“Leaving the Monsters Behind” is a song that is troubled. My songs have multiple meanings, but I knew it had something to do with my demons, addictions, so on and so forth—trying to get away from them. I kind of stay one step ahead of them. Mike Mills sings some backgrounds on it. He happened to be out in Portland, and he also sang on “The Dust of Long-Dead Stars” and on a song called “Useless Creatures,” which is a B-side that will be out at some point.

It has a funny combination of movement and also slowing down, stopping and being in the moment. It’s kind of a push and pull and tug. This is one of those songs where it feels like you’re moving through the entire song, probably because you’re trying to run away.

ISABEL’S DAUGHTER

This is an older song. I don’t usually go back and have older songs on my albums, but I’ve always liked it. I had a really good demo with it from 2007, 2008 or so. It just never went away. I live in Spain part of the time—I have a place there and have these friends, a couple, who adopted a daughter from Africa. She’s just the sweetest thing, and maybe it came from there. It was an attempt to really take advantage of Karen and Tim’s vocals.

ACE

“Ace” began as a demo. I had this old drum machine from the ‘70s called the Rhythm Ace. I push these big buttons in a wood case. I put it through some distortion and other effects, and it came out with a note-y sound that became the basis of it. There are some train loops, train recordings that I put in there. I also added sounds from some of the music apps that I play from my phone on something called a Thereminator and some things off my iPad. I just plugged little things in and built this base.

I really wanted to write a song with one or two chords, which I did. There are two chords, but there’s a tension because the guitar, the basic riff, just stays on one chord the whole time. Sometimes I get carried away with a chord and then a little passing chord—but as a songwriting exercise, I really wanted to write something simple. On my demo, the guitars were acoustic and it was only about two minutes long. I was listening to this band, Relatively Clean Rivers, which is a very obscure band from the early ‘70s that my son and I both love, and there’s a little bit of that going for it. It’s a dreamy song about sex and love and not having a mere companion—that desire to have it all.

When we recorded it, we used the drum loops that I put together in my home studio. Then, Tim played with that. We did it in one take. I was down on the floor playing with all my little pedals and knobs, and Karen was doing crazy stuff with the echo and her piano. Everybody was holding it down.

The full version, which is on a bonus disc that was available to the Pledge people, is 11 minutes or so. We just kept going and going. I’m sure it’ll come out in some other way. It was a lot of fun. We just ran with it and didn’t think too much about it.

THE DEVIL IS IN HER EYES

This was the last song I wrote before we went into the studio. It was one of those songs that just fell together immediately. Some songs are more difficult than others. This song came together when I was just sitting on the couch and everything happened right away. It was a beautiful thing. It’s definitely got more of that old Jayhawks sound to it—mixed in with a little Crazy Horse background vocals. It’s a live track—not all the background vocals but the guitar and stuff was just whatever happened.

COMEBACK KIDS

“Comeback Kids” came out of my demos, again. Some of those sounds are definitely recorded in my home studio. One of the synths was recorded in downtown Minneapolis at a friend of mine’s studio, Eric Olson. It was my homage to krautrock and New York-y, brittle, mercurial, thin guitar sounds. I love bands like Television. I love that band Wire from England. I like things that can be mechanical sounding. I like the precision. This song definitely has its humanity there, but it also has a German sound to it because that’s music I listen to, more than really anything else. The story is about an old girlfriend and rekindling a relationship, flying back and forth between Minneapolis and Raleigh-Durham. It’s a sweet song.

THE DUST OF LONG-DEAD STARS

I think that’s another clipping from a newspaper or magazine. The song is about perspective, again. Who are we? Where are we going? I went to see Laurie Anderson a couple weeks ago, and it was a great show. She had this part in her performance where she was saying what her day is for. I have a lot of time where I’m not busy— reflective time—and then I’m really busy. It’s a severe contrast. Either I’m isolated or I’m out on the road and losing every day. I guess that’s what this record is like— it’s moving or it’s being completely alone. There was a lot of time to think. I think a lot about why are we here, what are we doing, why are all these little things so important? The big questions.

LIES IN BLACK & WHITE

The Jayhawks move around in a lot of different areas. I think we wanted a Dylan-y, complaining folk song. My songs are about a lot of different things in the same song, so while I could go back and tell you what certain songs mean from the past, they’re rarely about one thing. The song is a commentary on “Don’t always believe what you read.”

I’LL BE YOUR KEY

“I’ll Be Your Key” is a really high song. I sang that live. It’s an emotional song for me. I think these songs mean more to me than almost any other songs I’ve ever written. It’s a love song about two people who have been trapped in loveless relationships but seem to find each other. I’ve been guilty of putting too much stock in relationships—some of my songs are a little overly romantic. But this one is just a love song.