High Horse

Dean Johnson’s debut album is a triumph of modest mastery and restraint.

To say Nothing For Me, Please is an intimate record would be an understatement. To say it is a cathartic listening experience would not quite be the justice it deserves. It is a sublime record that deals with the depths of human folly, complicated and unrequited love, time- too much or not enough of it. It is one for the books and to add to the canon if there is someone keeping track of that sort of thing.

There is a sense or feeling like you are not supposed to be listening to this record and the backstory confirms this. The record feels revealing and also revelatory. It’s a slow and simmering batch of songs- songs that sound like they were only meant to be heard by the sole singer- singing in front of an open fire when all the other campers have gone off to sleep.

It is full of subtleties that make the songs appear simple on their surface but then you pick up your guitar and try to play them. The record is dense in its musicality and lyrical content- as comforting as it is complex. It is a batch of songs that tug at your chest in the best conceivable ways. The lyrics are devastating and triumphant.

I was struck by the barebones of the compositions and the subtle accompaniment. Sonically, it is tastefully spare and acute. It sounds like it was recorded in a cathedral the size of a football stadium and the band are huddled together playing on the smallest altar in the corner. The air in the room is almost as loud as the brush of the snare drum and the guitar’s jangle. It gives it an atmosphere, and hangs behind and in between the notes of the songs.

The opening number “Far Away Skies” recalls the old cowboy crooners like Eddie Arnold and the songs of the old west. The “cattle calls and canyon walls, the jangle of spurs” and the wide expanse of sound travelling for miles until you can hear the past utterances seconds later across the plains. He tells us a story about a man on the streets (or of the streets), down on his luck, imagining a time before our current dystopian technocratic world:

You wouldn't know by looking at me, 
I am a cowboy my friend
I'm forever out riding upon the range of my mind 
dreaming away all of my time

He is recalling and missing a place he may have never been, but he’s seen the movies plenty of times. The song is an interesting portrait of a man romanticizing the lore of the west.

This version of the song, recorded before the album's release, has Dean Johnson performing with The Deslondes:

Time is an important motif in Johnson’s songs; Time that should be held dear and cherished. In the opening track, the protagonist is aware of his excess leisurely pursuits.

But then Johnson asks us, could there be too much time(?)- The album’s title and closer, “Nothing for Me, Please”, tells the story of a group of people all waiting in line to “Let the vampire bite them” but Dean laments his conversion: “Eternity, I guess it’s not for me.”… “This heaven’s just a dirty trick, old boy, and I was dumb enough to fall for it.” This song hits especially hard and I think it shows Johnson at the peak of his powers.

Unrequited love is another theme in many of the songs. Another stunner, “Old Tv”, tells the story of a past love affair- the singer remembers and laments when the times were good in love and that was all that mattered.

Similarly, with “Your Shadow”:

I let my memories come in
they lock the door and start to spin
round and round
filled with the sound
of the voice that I know so well
darlin I can hear it ring
your laughter and the way that you sing
sweet melody 
drifting over me
it gets me to wondering when.

Johnson is able to achieve a lightness in his lyrics that still cut deep. He has both a keen folk sensibility and an ear for early popular music fundamentals in these songs. "Shouldn't Say Mine" is a great example of this:

She was my girl, but I shouldn't say mine
now that she's gone, I play and rewind
all of the ways I was naïve and blind
She was my girl, but I shouldn't say mine.

"Acting School" is another one that just sticks. It'll hop on your back and it won't let go. It's about having to see your old lover all over town, all of the time after things have gone south. This song shows Dean's gift of writing a song that seems harmless and playful on the surface. But by the time you get to the chorus, it's too late. All who have dealt with lost love and having to act like you aren't devastated will be able to relate. 

Dean Johnson calls Seattle home. He’s been on the scene for a long time and has gathered a following both as a bartender at Al’s Tavern and as a bard. Those who are paying attention or have had the good luck of a spontaneous Johnson set know that he is the real deal.

His record label, Mama Bird Recording Co, has made the comparison, calling Johnson “a back porch Roy Orbison” due in part to his vocal range and technical eclecticism (key changes, surprising modal shifts) but he does it gently as if not to disturb the neighbors. Gentle but fiercely effective, his songs can surely rip your heart up if you listen under the wrong (or right) circumstances.

Dean Johnson is a card-carrying member of The Sons of Rainier, a band that is hard to define. I’m tempted to use the word pastoral. Their album, Down in Pancake Valley, feels like an old friend to me. Devin Champlin writes songs that are playful and well-crafted in a voice reminiscent of Michael Hurley and the author Richard Brautigan. These records are more dense in concept and in brevity. Like Johnson’s record, there is no filler, no nonsense or noodling. Their new album veers more into The Band / Richard Emanuel territory. It deserves a write up of its own and more investigation (coming soon).

Some SOR content to get you started:

Three of the four Sons are at work on Johnson’s album: Dean respectively, Sam Gelband (percussion) and Charlie Meyer (string bass). Add in Steph Green on the lap steel and Sam Doores tickling the keys and playing a tambourine and lighter(Dean and Duff have both since told me that Sam was instrumental in the recording, producing and engineering of this record).With a line up like that, its hard to go wrong- it still achieves something magnificent. It really doesn’t need anything more and it lets each song breathe and moan and groan in the sizzling air.

It was recorded in New Orleans by Duff Thompson (Mashed Potato Records), who also plays some guitar, a little over five years ago(2018). Learning about the scene in New Orleans and the Seattle connection by way of the Sons and Chris Acker, Dean Johnson’s record was one that me and my friends were anticipating. I was playing drums in Shawn Hess‘s band, The Country Skillet, when I heard about Johnson and the others. Many of the friends we’d see and those we would meet on the road have been whispering about Johnson for a long time.

I remember listening to this album for the first time in a van with my band, driving across the badlands of South Dakota. I think I only heard the first four tracks that first time, but my mouth was watering for more. We were all stammering and wall-eyed, in awe of the craftsmanship. We were hooked.

I’m a believer. And even though I have played the hell out of this record, I keep coming back for more. These songs will creep into your subconscious and make themselves at home. They will be the songs you will carry with you and sing to yourself as you drive home from work or take out the trash. They’ll become a part of your day to day.

Dean Johnson’s record is one that will stand the test of time, at least in my record collection. It feels like the best records do: like a special collection of moments captured. It is an album that can purge you of your melancholia and offer you solace if you let it. Give yourself a present today and let it.

by Evan O’Neal