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Louise, Louise, Louise, Louise

by Chris Robley

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about

One morning after my father passed away I was going through old photographs with my mom in their apartment. At some point a lamplight beside their reading chair turned on thanks to an automatic timer.

My mom had probably programmed it that way, but I like to imagine it was my dad turning on the lamp. Not in some ghostly fashion (despite the adorable ghost who ended up in the music video above); more that a process he’d set in motion before his death, adjusting a dial on a timer, could keep lighting the way for us in small, surprising moments.

He’d spent the last few years of his life preparing us in big ways for when he’d be gone. The lamp switching on was just a convenient, minor metaphor — for the way the things we do can outlast us.

So that became the beginnings of this song. Definitely NOT a song about my parents, but one in which loss is a kind of waiting. Waiting for meaning.

A JOKE’S MOSTLY HEARTACHE + TIME

The song’s other main through-line is that almost anything can be funny from a distance — that a joke’s mostly heartache + time.

Comedians get to joke about all kinds of tragedies once enough time’s gone by. Personal tragedies, national tragedies, cosmic tragedies. There’s a point where “too soon” is finally allowed to turn to laughter.

Comical alchemy. At least that was Mark Twain’s theory.

I hope you enjoy the new tune. It has harmonica, and who can’t get enough harmonica, right?

Don’t worry though; no banjos or accordions.

lyrics

The morning after, I was in the living room
sifting through the life you’ve left behind ya,
when right at dawn the lamplight came on
you’d always set to fire on a timer.

If a joke’s mostly heartache plus time
then this broken heart has to be mine,
but I ain’t sure what it’s breaking for;
I guess I’m waiting for the punchline.

Chorus:

Oh Louise, Louise, Louise, Louise,
losing you has put me ill at ease,
but maybe years from now my tears…
maybe they will give way by degrees
‘cause every hurt has to — (don’t it?) —
lose out to laughter.

For miles around they came to hear him speak —
so many some were sitting in the rafters.
And Mark Twain, he explained
why some things ain’t funny till long after.

‘Cause a joke’s mostly heartache plus time
and your pain might be part of the design,
and it makes a kind of sense to leave us in suspense
while we’re waiting for the punchline.

Chorus:

Oh Louise, Louise, Louise, Louise,
losing you has put me ill at ease,
but maybe years from now my tears…
maybe they will give way by degrees
‘cause every hurt has to — (don’t it?) —
lose out to laughter.

Now I’ve packed the house up into boxes.
Now I have to figure what it meant.
Now I have to find what little laughs are left behind.
I’m pretty sure they’re all at my expense.

‘Cause a joke’s mostly heartache plus time,
waiting like a field full of mines
hidden in the grass, till someone stumbles past,
and you just have to hear the punchline.

Chorus:

Oh Louise, Louise, Louise, Louise,
losing you has put me ill at ease,
but maybe years from now my tears…
maybe they will give way by degrees
‘cause every hurt has to — (don’t it?) —
lose out to laughter.

credits

released August 3, 2018
I recorded the song in Lewiston, Maine using:

* my trusty Tascam 388 reel-to-reel tape machine
* an AKG c414 microphone
* an Alvarez parlor guitar
* a Lee Oskar harmonica

It was then mixed by Peter Rodocker at Yellow Room in Portland, Oregon.

In between is a whole continent. Imagine that!

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Chris Robley Lewiston, Maine

"Chris Robley is at the top of his game with his new work." - KCRW

Maine-based singer/songwriter and award-winning poet Chris Robley (formerly from Portland, Oregon) performs orchestral indie-pop and fractured folk reminiscent of John Lennon, John Vanderslice, Harry Nilsson, and Joe Henry.

His poetry has appeared in POETRY Magazine, Prairie Schooner, and many other journals. ... more

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