o What: Jack Johnson, in concert.
o When: 7 p.m. Oct. 3.
o Where: Sleep Country Amphitheater, 17200 N.E. Delfel Road, Ridgefield.
o Cost: $45.45-$66.75 through Ticketmaster, 800-745-3000 or ticketmaster.com.
o Information: http://sleepcountryamphitheater.com or 360-816-7000.
Jack Johnson’s new CD, “To the Sea,” may change a few perceptions about the kind of music he makes.
Up to now, Johnson’s been known as a former professional surfer who turned to music and charmed legions of fans with his laid-back folk-flavored acoustic songs.
But on “To the Sea,” Johnson frequently plugs in and, along with his touring band, puts some juice into his music.
On “You and Your Heart,” Johnson works up a frisky jangle, kicking into a soulful groove in a chorus that also boasts a simple but irresistible melody. “From the Clouds” has a bit of the hip-hop/soul/blues one might expect from G. Love & Special Sauce, a group signed to Johnson’s Brushfire Records label. And on “At or With Me,” Johnson and his band positively rock out.
o What: Jack Johnson, in concert.
o When: 7 p.m. Oct. 3.
o Where: Sleep Country Amphitheater, 17200 N.E. Delfel Road, Ridgefield.
o Cost: $45.45-$66.75 through Ticketmaster, 800-745-3000 or ticketmaster.com.
o Information: http://sleepcountryamphitheater.com or 360-816-7000.
Johnson still works in his familiar acoustic territory on a few ballads (“Turn Your Love” and “Anything but the Truth”), but more than half of “To the Sea’s” songs feature, at least to a good extent, electric instrumentation.
That might seem like a shocking departure, especially since “To the Sea” comes on the heels of 2008’s “Sleep Through the Static,” arguably Johnson’s most understated acoustic-based album. But rocking out is familiar territory to Johnson.
When he was in high school, he was in a punk rock band. While he was also discovering the more acoustic-centered music of Paul Simon and Cat Stevens around that time, it was circumstance, as much as musical tastes, that shifted Johnson’s music in an acoustic direction.
“We would play Minor Threat and stuff like that,” Johnson said, recalling his punk days. “So I was always playing electric. Then I went off to college and I took (only) an acoustic guitar with me and I started playing more of that (acoustic folk) stuff. Then I started playing these surf clubs and eventually I started traveling around only with an acoustic because there was never an amplifier to plug into.”
Once Johnson began recording albums and touring, he started dabbling with the electric guitar again, plugging in for the occasional song during live shows. When he began recording “To the Sea,” he was ready to put electric sounds to greater use
“I just had been playing around more and more with the electric,” he said. “It’s been fun to pull it back out.”
The acoustic sound, though, has served Johnson well since his late arrival as a musician. As a teenager, he pursued pro surfing until he was injured in a surfing accident.
Then he went to college to study filmmaking, and for a time scratched out a living making surf films. By that time, he was already writing songs, including “Rodeo Clowns,” a tune G. Love covered on his first album, “Philadelphonic,” in 1999. Johnson also composed the soundtrack to one of his early surf films, “Thicker Than Water.”
But a four-song demo that found its way to J.P. Plunier (producer on Ben Harper’s early albums) gave Johnson his big break.
Plunier produced Johnson’s first album, “Brushfire Fairytales.” That caught on, and Johnson has released one platinum album after another ever since, with his last three studio CDs — “In Between Dreams” (2005), “Sleep Through the Static” and now “To the Sea” — all debuting at No. 1 on Billboard magazine’s charts.
Some find it hard to explain how Johnson has become so popular. He doesn’t court attention from the media or do flashy videos. He doesn’t push to place his songs in movies, television shows or commercials. Yet his albums have topped 10 million in sales and his 28-date 2008 tour pulled in $22.1 million in touring revenue, tops for that summer. (That money, by the way, didn’t go to Johnson’s bank account. He donated his tour profits to his foundation, the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation, a practice that continues with his current tour.)
Johnson himself won’t offer many theories to explain his success.
“It baffles me, I swear, more than anybody,” he said. “I’m always afraid that if I start to figure out what made it all work, it just might go away. … The closest thing I’ve figured out is these songs I write are really personal, and at the same time really broad.”
Johnson credits his wife, Kimm, as well as his family, with helping to keep him grounded despite his success.
“Music didn’t start catching on until I was maybe 25 or so,” said Johnson, who is now 35. “We had been together for seven years already. We were living together and I was living off of her teacher’s salary and I was just a traveling surf filmmaker. … To have that same person be with me through that whole process and be able to be so secure with it all, to be able — to enjoy the whole process with me and always keep me down to earth with it all, I think it’s been really helpful.”
