Run Carabao is a Philadelphia-area project led by singer and multi-instrumentalist Isaac Jabola-Carolus. The single “High on My Low” is the first release off the self-titled debut album Run Carabao, out in Fall 2023. A springtime ballad and an homage to West Coast folk-rock, the single fuses a laid-back groove, subtle hooks, and a twinge of melancholy to announce Run Carabao’s vibrant sound. 

“High on My Low” pairs Isaac’s textured vocals and lilting guitar with breezy licks on piano, bass, and electric guitar from producer Samuel Nobles. The song follows the rhythm of spring, with a simple start that blossoms into a lush soundscape. Vibraphone and organ envelope the chorus with a warmth you feel in your belly.

Isaac was born in Glendale, California and is biracial Filipinx American. When he was young, his heart beat to a mix of his parents’ 1970s favorites and the church hymns of his Filipino grandparents. His mother, who immigrated from Manila to the U.S. as a child, blasted Bonnie Raitt and Stevie Wonder in the car, while his Minneapolis-born father rocked to The Who and Jethro Tull.

“By the time I started writing my own songs, though,” Isaac says, “I was hooked on the surf rock and skate folk of Donovan Frankenreiter, Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, Tristan Prettyman, and G. Love. ‘High on My Low’ is partly a tribute to them.”

Yet the song transcends those influences and reflects a longer personal journey. In his teens, Isaac wrote and performed with the folk-rock band Dick Nixon & the Scandals, including a record produced and engineered by multi-Grammy winner Jim Scott. 

Music started to take a back seat after Isaac left California for college. “I was hardly playing, and my bandmates all lived in different time zones. Then I went on to pursue a PhD, which really forced my music into hibernation.” But he stuck with it, training to be a sociologist during the week and chipping away at songs on weekends. 

He returned to songwriting fully in 2019: “I decided music couldn’t really wait any longer,” he explains. Living in Boston at the time, Isaac found community at Club Passim, the historic folk venue and music school. That experience, followed by the pandemic, sparked a new creative flame. 

“The heaviness just piled up, and then a flip switched. I’d been struggling to write lyrics for a while, then suddenly I had six verses for a song called ‘Shit’s all Fucked!’ It was a mess, but it cracked something open for me.” 

“High on My Low” emerged a few weeks later. “I wrote that song to capture a fleeting sense of calm, a quiet moment I chanced upon that spring. I knew I wanted to preserve that feeling, so I could come back to it, even after the pandemic. I also wrote the song to mark a new beginning for me musically, which is why it felt right to hark back to artists who inspired me when I was young.” 

On the upcoming album, the lightness of “High on My Low” will sit alongside poignant lamentations and tracks that channel Isaac’s experiences studying and participating in labor organizing. What binds the works together are evocative lyrics, deceptively simple arrangements, and a looseness that leaves room for improvisation, whether on fiddle, guitar, or piano. Each time you listen, you hear something new that pulls you in deeper.

Isaac’s long-time friend and writer Timothy E. Nolan says, “Isaac’s versatility lets him dig into pockets of mixed feelings that often elude other artists. There’s a sadness in the upbeat tempo, an energy to the mellow chords. His songs delve into those complex emotional spaces where we live most of our lives.” 

But Isaac doesn’t do it alone, nor does he want to. “I perform as Run Carabao to honor my multicultural heritage and as a nod to labor—but also because the music is never just mine, and I adore working with other artists.” It was Timothy, in fact, who came up with the line “high on my low.” Isaac recalls, “I had everything except the chorus, which I couldn’t figure it out for the life of me. That’s always when I turn to Tim, who’s the best writer I know.” 

Run Carabao’s upcoming album is the most ambitious collaboration yet, with producer Samuel Nobles, who grew up in Wilmington and lives in Philadelphia. Nobles has also produced for local artist Sug Daniels and plays in bands like Pillow Princess and The Lunar Year. Nobles recruited Lunar Year drummer Adam Shumski to record the infectious rhythms of “High on My Low.” Gabriel Perez Ouhirra also contributed to percussion and production.

Isaac says of recording with Nobles, “I love collaboration because you take your constellation of skills and influences and collide it into someone else’s, and then you get a new world of sound that didn’t quite exist before. Sam does everything from jazz solos to film scoring, so he's a special person to work with.” Both Sam and his partner—musician, music writer, and photographer Paige Walter—also contributed backing vocals that elevate the chorus in “High on My Low.”

Listeners of the upcoming album can expect to hear at least one more collaborator on the record. As Isaac explains, “This sounds a bit odd, but the album also feels like a collaboration with my younger self. Each song contains a lyric, a melody, or some seed of a song from years ago that I’ve finally realized. It’s been a long time coming.”