Big Cypress Records: EVAN JOHNS

ARTIST:
Evan Johns

SAMPLES:
Yes

Evan Johns

The best indication of Evan Johns' singular approach to life and music has to be its power to elicit fanciful similes. "Hot as the peppers on the far end of the bar" said TIME. The San Antonio Light likened his guitar sound to a "'57 Ford pickup ripping through a barbed wire fence at 100 mph," while City Link in Ft. Lauderdale recently described his voice as being "as surly as a Jack Russell terrier in a shoebox and almost as funny." Bob Magazine summed it up thusly: "Before someone gives a knockout punch in a cartoon, he sticks his thumb in his mouth and inflates his fist until it is ten times its original size. Evan Johns is that fist."

The object of such poetry came up in the late 70's music scene of Washington DC playing with "the world's greatest unknown guitarist" Danny Gatton (who hired Johns to be his front man, using Evan's song "Redneck Jazz" for his first album). Migrating to Austin, Texas in the early 80's, Evan quickly earned a rep for hot picking in a town that does not bestow such honors lightly. There he joined the LeRoi Brothers, and along with others became one of the "Big Guitars From Texas," whose Trash, Twang and Thunder LP was nominated for a Grammy in 1985. By the time his band The H-Bombs joined him in Austin, Evan had embarked on a career of uncompromising rock and roll with the attitude to match.

Barnstorming the planet and cutting a series of incendiary albums (including one produced by E Street Band keyboardist Gary Tallent), Evan Johns & The H-Bombs gained a permanent place in the history books (The Hartford Press Encyclopedia of Rock and the Trouser Press Record Guide, to be exact). Johns' preternatural gift for mixing roots genres ("as if he'd invented them all himself" said The Austin Chronicle) was grounded in past forms, but his off-the-rails aggression was something the punks could relate to. Evan Johns may be the true originator of all things "psychobilly," but he is more than that, an effortless songwriter and earnest singer, a beloved anachronism to be cherished as much now as when he blazed across the "new wave" era into the 90's.

Evan Johns has since appeared on over 50 albums, recording with everyone from Timbuk 3 to cult figure Eugene Chadbourne to neo-country chantuese Neko Case. The songs he has donated about sports and holidays to the Hungry For Music charity albums are gems. Sidelined briefly by cataracts in the late 90's, Evan Johns continued to write and record, releasing a live album in 1995 and eventually meeting up with LA instrumental band Hillbilly Soul Surfers. Together they waxed Moontan, a 12 song tour-de-force that is the premier release of Big Cypress Records.

Moontan reveals to old fans that the master's gifts remain undiminished, while introducing new listeners to an American legend ripe for veneration. Writers, prepare your similes - Evan Johns is back!

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