Author: Jernej Vene
Artist: Johnson, Eric
Label: EMI Records
Release: 2010
Running time: 51:12
Rating: 4.5/5
Some experts rank him among the most eminent names in guitar music, period. The Texan guitarist Eric Johnson is a master and a one-of-a-kind painter of sound. We always await his albums with wide eyes and open ears, partly because they come out so rarely. Even though he became known with the record Tones in 1986, he’s been on the scene since the mid-seventies, and in all that time he’s piled up just six studio albums, which says a lot about his extreme drive for perfection. On Up Close he’s helped out by a few regular collaborators, and there are some well-known guest appearances too.
Eric Johnson was born in Austin, Texas, on August 17, 1954. He was the youngest of five children, and his parents encouraged their kids hard when it came to music. Young Eric was already showing interest in music at three, was learning piano at five, and by eight was writing simple compositions of his own. When his older brother brought home an electric guitar in 1964 and started a band, Eric made up his mind for good: he was going to be a guitarist too. At fifteen, Johnson was crazy about all the masters of sixties rock guitar. They included Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck, but his greatest love was the blues and the jazz giant Wes Montgomery. Eric Johnson has more than once scolded himself for not going to music school seriously for any length of time. Even though he can’t read notation fluently, he has absolute pitch, which comes in very handy. As a member of all sorts of local bands, he honed his craft through the seventies and the first half of the eighties.
With every record he wins over the guitar crowd, both with the expressiveness of his music and with the enthusiasm he plays it with. That’s exactly why Eric Johnson wins over plenty of young guitarists, who adopt him as their own instantly. We had to wait five long years for the follow-up to the album Bloom, but the wait paid off, with an even more refined treatment of musical ideas and of bringing them to life.
More than ever before, the wait paid off. Up Close is the work of a mature, deeply expressive and dependable artist. With songwriting principles put to very skillful use, a superb musical and tonal performance, and meticulously thought-out attention to detail, Eric Johnson has shown something extra here. He steers attentive listeners away from the guitar pyrotechnics and acrobatics, which are certainly not in short supply, and points them instead toward the structure of the songs as a whole, which is the one goal and meaning of music as such. The invisible touch of his messages leaves positive, liberating marks on devoted listeners, and ever-wider circles of people hungry for quality music soon fall for them. Eric Johnson is an attentive listener to the sonic worlds around him, he knows how to tune in to them and pour their stories into his own expression. Technically speaking, he’s even so driven that he leaves nothing to chance in recording technique and gear either. When it’s time for music, everything has to be at the highest level. That’s why he delivers such polished records. Whether it’s the melodies and solo spots across the whole length of the fretboard, the legato lines he lays one on top of another, or the open, bright chords.
The long break came mostly because Johnson had already recorded the album almost to the end twice, but both times he changed his mind and started recording again. As a distinct and demanding perfectionist, he could undoubtedly afford moves like that without having to answer to anyone. The result is audible on Up Close, which surely lives up to its reputation as one of the most anticipated guitar records of recent years. Among the collaborators I have to mention Johnson’s regular rhythm section, bassist Roscoe Beck and drummer Tommy Taylor. As a multi-instrumentalist, a guitar virtuoso and a decent tenor, Eric Johnson has undoubtedly already shown enough to earn a place in music history from a proper chronicle, and not just from the specialist guitar magazines where he was already collecting nothing but first places in the eighties. Not only has he once again revealed his extraordinary talent and his ability to turn ideas into notes and fingerwork, he’s also great at dosing out taste. Knowing you’re one of the best at what you do surely brings heavy pressure with every new proving ground. With a thoughtful approach to every aspect of making music, Eric Johnson paints contented smiles on the faces of listeners, collaborators and, last but not least, himself. The record is stylistically varied, and Johnson shines on the instrumentals Vortexan, Fat Daddy and the dreamy Gem. The song Texas, by Mike Bloomfield and Buddy Miles, dates from 1968, when they played together in Electric Flag. This time Eric Johnson is helped out by the legendary Steve Miller and by the brother of the late Stevie: Jimmie Vaughan.
On Brilliant Room, fellow Texan Malford Milligan sings, a singer in demand on tours with several well-known musicians. There’s also a tribute to his hometown, where he’s helped by the blues guitarist and singer Jonny Lang. It’s called Austin.
Even the most hardened opponent of cosmic guitar technique, violin-like tone and the spirit of all the masters who left us long ago has to bow down to the music on the new album Up Close.
Lineup
Eric Johnson – guitar, vocals
Roscoe Beck – bass guitar
Sonny Landreth – guitar
Jimmie Vaughan – guitar
Jonny Lang – guitar, vocals
Malford Milligan – vocals
Steve Miller – vocals
Barry “Frosty” Smith – drums
Tommy Taylor – drums
Production
Eric Johnson, Richard Mullen
Tracklist
1. Awaken 1:05
2. Fatdaddy 2:44
3. Brilliant Room 3:53
4. Texas 6:02
5. Gem 4:09
6. Traverse 1:18
7. Austin 4:01
8. Soul Surprise 6:11
9. On the Way 3:09
10. Arithmetic 4:32
11. The Sea and the Mountain 1:50
12. Vortexan 3:04
13. A Change Has Come to Me 5:19
14. Change – Revisited 1:39
15. Your Book 1:50
