Hear the Steve Johnson interview and some great songs from his CD’s Bluestoons and Bluesville.

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Like many of us, Steve grew up in the sixties listening to rock n’ roll and playing guitar. First he played in garage bands then later, bar bands. Steve however, took it a little farther by recording his bands and doing studio work. At this point Steve is not quite sure how many records he has made of his band. Checks come in the mail from time to time for studio work he has done. Rarely does he remember the band’s name he was playing for. To Steve it is about getting to play and create music. Who the band was is of little interest to him.

The names he remembers are the artists he has gotten to jam with like Little Jimmy King, Popa Chubby, Jon Paris, and Johnny Copeland. Then there was the time he got to play a set with Albert Collins, or the late night jams with Paul Butterfield. You can hear it in his voice how he feet so honored to play with these guys. He told me how Albert Collins was a friendly, happy person in a good mood. Steve said Albert Collins was a good example of how blues is not always about sad things. The songs are not always like an Albert King song that has the knife in the back kind of story. Many blues songs are up beat, fun, party type of music. That seems to be what Steve came away remembering the most about Albert Collins was his good nature enjoyable personality.

Steve Johnson’s Bluestoons is a nice mix of originals and covers with some nice surprises thrown in. Steve has a really neat blues voice, it sounds like it’s coming from deep inside of him. A somewhat rough, deep, dark, mournful voice, maybe even a little like Howlin’ Wolf but deeper and fuller. Hey, I know the best way for you to know Steve Johnson’s singing voice, play the podcast so you can hear him sing. The First song “I Won’t Be There” is a great blues rocker to start off the CD. It is a really good guitar solo I would like to use in Guitar Solo of the Week but this song is already tagged for the main part of the show. “Badside” is another blues rocker about someone he knew that had everything going for them but a cocaine problem. I said there are some nice surprises on Bluestoons well, here is the first one. “Sex Meachine” is an old Sly & the Family Stone’s song. A good funky instrumental that Little Jimmy King heard Steve play one time and liked it so much he asked to play it with Steve Johnson and his band. Side note: when Little Jimmy King would come to New York City he’d have Steve Johnson and his band be his back up band. This song is great because it gives Steve a lot of room to play around on guitar. The next surprise is the old Savoy Brown song “Tell Mama”. Steve’s deeper voice works really good on this. The whole song has a fuller, slightly stronger sound to it, very well done. Steve said “Blue Lincoln” started out as a faster song but he kept slowing it down to the point that he could play all the complicated slide guitar lines while still singing. There is a very nice slide guitar solo in this too. A real surprise for me was finding out that not Steve Johnson but Eric Johnson wrote the very beautiful instrumental “East West”. This is followed by “Bad Day”, a nice blues rocker, followed by another instrumental “Endless Blues”. A real change of pace comes in with country blues song “Flathead Blues” on which Steve demonstrates his guitar picking and slide work. Flathead is a motorcycle, you know like the one Lee Marvin used in The Wild One.
“Rockin Robin” is a fast blues rocker with great harp playing by Harry Fritz. Harry really shows you why some people call it a Mississippi saxophone. The CD ends with another fast rocker called “Hardluck Blues”. The last two songs really put the icing on the cake. As you will hear in the podcast Bluestoons has good guitar and slid guitar work with refreshingly unique vocals. This would be a fine addition to any music collection.

Bluesville is another CD of Steve Johnson’s that I’ve been enjoying lately. Some quick highlights are “Call Me Baby”, Roofman both written by Steve. Tom Waits “Walking Spanish”, Willie Dixon’s “I Just Want To Make Love To You” and “Loan Me A Dime” made famous by Boz Scaggs. This CD could have just as easily been the spotlighted CD, it’s also very good.

Bluestoons – Bluesville – Blues From the Roadhouse – Leaving New York

They have been together for about 14 years:
Steve Johnson – guitars, lead vocals
Mark Pavlica – bass guitar, vocals
Cliff McComas – drums, vocals

Songs in the podcast:
1. Badside
2. Out the Door
3. Flathead Blues
4. Call Me Baby
5. I Won’t Be There

Guitar solo of the week was the song “Endless Blues”
All songs are from the Bluestoons CD, Except “Call Me Baby” from Bluesville

Steve Johnson Website
You Tube video
Steve Johnson MySpace
Buy Bluestoons or Blues From the Roadhouse (Live) from Dixiefrog Regords
Download CD Leaving New York

Thanks to Steve Johnson for all his help with this.

Blues Music and Interviews
A1Blues.Com
formerly A1 Artist Spotlight. Com
by A1 Mark