Tom Lynch

When Calvin Johnson toured with The Microphones a few years ago and stopped in Chicago, he taped notes under the seats in the audience for fans to find during the show. One said, "Call Calvin an asshole in the middle of a song." Another, "throw something at Calvin." If this seems like odd behavior for a record-label owner and Pacific Northwest indie god, that's because it is.

The K Records owner and member of trend-setting, lo-fi Washington acts Beat Happening and Dub Narcotic Sound System, the man who helped shape the Olympia music scene and influenced countless West Coast upstarts, the "other guy" on Beck's "One Foot in the Grave" album cover, finally released a solo record in 2002. And it's strange. And sad.

Different than anything Johnson has been a part of in his past, including his stellar work with Built to Spill's Doug Martsch on their Halo Benders records, "What Was Me" challenges the listener to forget everything taught about singer-songwriter garbage in music school. Johnson's ten-song cannonball includes multiple a cappella tracks (sometimes treacherous with his patented spine-tingling bass), and a noticeable absence of drums. All acoustic, all "the voice."

"I assumed it was just another record where a guy's playing guitar," says Johnson, preparing for another solo tour. "I pretty much knew I wanted these songs on a record, and I just went in for one weekend and recorded them. They were written over a long period of time. Some songs were ten years old. They were just songs that didn't seem right at the moment I wrote them, but all of a sudden, they made sense."

"What Was Me" swims elegantly through the major theme of love and loss, but what remains noticeable about the record is Johnson's lingering in the past, his unwillingness to let go, his fear (or invitation) of repeat. "The Past Comes Back to Haunt Me," the record's opening track, a four-plus-minute a cappella journey that reminds the listener of Johnny Cash in an alarming way, works as a letter its narrator writes to a past love that may return. Can the head honcho of K honestly doubt his past accomplishments? What the hell really was Calvin Johnson?

"I never said I was this guy on the record," Johnson insists. "These are songs that are just complete songs. While most of the other records I've done have been collaborations, and this just being me, I didn't really set out for it to be one way or another. I had some songs and they all kind of came together. This is just where they fell."

The musician, record producer and label owner has a lot to juggle in the day, since the three are basically full-time gigs. "I'm just doing what I can," says Johnson. "I'm taking it one step at a time. I just do what I can, and what I can't do, I just put off until later." Does he prefer one job to another? "It all seems the same to me, playing and then working with other artists."

Given Johnson's history in the Northwest's music scene, it's a major change to turn into a solo act. He's been supported by accomplished and intelligent musicians in the past, and now, as he says, he's "all by his lonesome." He's toured solo for nearly three years now. "You hear yourself differently," he says. "When you perform on a stage with people, you are very aware of what they're doing. Suddenly, that's not there anymore. Now, it's more communication with the audience, rather than communicating with band mates. I've always thought about doing a solo record, I just didn't get around to it until it made sense. But I do enjoy performing live. I'm more a live performer than a recorded (one). It's more of what I do."

Johnson ends his record with this lyric: "When I die there will be a song/And everyone will sing along/And that will be me/That will be me." Not that it's inconsistent with the rest of the album, per se, but "What Was Me"'s title track offers a new sense of optimism absent from the previous nine songs. A lullaby of sorts, the song delivers a happy ending, a light at the end of the tunnel, and a way to escape the grasp of a haunted past. "I like to think of myself as a fairly optimistic person," Johnson says. "I think, basically, where I don't have a strong belief in a higher deity, or life beyond the grave in any form, I'm presenting a concept that there is life in the work we do beyond the immediate moment."

Calvin Johnson plays May 22 at Open End Gallery, 2000 West Fulton, Suite 310, at 9pm.

(2004-05-18)

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