Eric Johnson: Our Complete 1982 Interview

A 7000-word Conversation Four Years Before the Release of “Tones"

Four years before the release of his debut solo album Tones, Eric Johnson and I did this wide-ranging 1982 interview. At the time it was unusual for me to interview a guitarist who didn’t have national recognition or even an album to promote, but all it took was a pair of ears to hear that Eric Johnson already was an extraordinary musician.

As a staff editor for Guitar Player magazine, I was continually hearing about superb guitarists who, for various reasons, were largely unknown. What instantly set Eric apart was who was talking about him. In 1980, I asked Jeff Baxter, studio legend and lead guitarist for Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers, if he knew of any guitarists deserving of more fame. “Eric Johnson is just amazing!” Jeff responded. “When I heard a tape of him, I went ape. This might sound silly, but if Jimi Hendrix had gone on to study with Howard Roberts for about eight years, you’d have what this kid strikes me as.”

The next voice to sing his praises to me was Steve Morse of the Dixie Dregs, in June 1982: “Eric Johnson is one of the best electric guitarists anywhere. He’s so good it’s ridiculous. I’m not kidding – he’s better than Jeff Beck. Eric destroys people when he plays. We’ve played gigs with him, and it put a lot of pressure on me when it came our turn to play. All I can say is that if he had an album out, he’d be the first one on my list of required listening.”

Eric had recorded a 1975 album with the Electromagnets, but by 1982 that regional release was long out of print. But, I learned, he did have an unreleased cassette called Seven Worlds. I called Eric at his home in Austin, Texas, and asked for a copy. When I played it, my reaction was similar to Baxter’s: I was floored. The tape began with the original versions of “Zap” and “Emerald Eyes,” followed by eight other stellar tracks. Eric’s playing certainly held up to the hype, but it would be another 16 years before Seven Worlds would be issued on CD. Another GP editor, Tom Wheeler, loved the tape as much as I did, and we agreed that Eric was worth covering. The interview took place on September 27, 1982. Portions of Eric’s answers were used for a feature article in the December 1982 Guitar Player. Here, with Eric’s kind permission, is a transcription of the complete Q/A of our first major interview.

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So many famous players have talked about you – Jeff Baxter, Billy Gibbons, Steve Morse, Johnny Winter. Why is it that you’re still fairly unknown to the general public?

Well, I think it might be just a case of the method of getting known. I’ve submitted quite a few tapes, and there’s always been some facet of them that’s been kind of rough, I guess. Sometimes I feel they were in the right direction that should have been accepted. But I think the main thing that I’m doing that maybe I shouldn’t be doing is I’m trying to do what I want to do at this point, rather than trying to get some credentials playing with other people. I haven’t gone the route of playing with well-known bands, which is probably a more assured way of being recognized. I’m trying to develop a certain style of my own, and that necessitates me following my own career at this point.

Have you had offers to join bands?

Yeah, I have. Let’s see. I had an offer to play with Stan Clarke, which I really wanted to do. But at the time there was some business things going down, and I’d just recorded the Seven Worlds tape that I sent you. I was told at the time that the album was coming out and all this, and everybody was saying, “You’ve got to do this and that – it wouldn’t be a good time to go on the road.” And so I didn’t do it. I always kind of regretted that because I thought that would have been fun.

Since not much has been published about you, let’s start at the beginning. When were you born?

August 17, 1954.

When did you start playing music?

I started playing piano when I was five. I took private lessons studying the classical canon until I was 13. When I was 11, I started playing guitar.

So you have a fairly good background in formal music education?

Pretty well, yeah. I always tended toward learning from ear rather than from sight-reading, although I can sight-read a little. I always liked picking up stuff off of records. Even when I was young, playing piano, I’d like to sit down and kind of jam around on it.

How did you become interested in guitar?

I had a friend named Jimmy Schade – he was quite a fine player around this area in the mid ’60s. He was a friend of my brother’s when I was just about 11, and he would come over and play all this great stuff. I started hearing the Ventures real early – that was a real big influence when I was about ten. And then the Stones and the Kinks. I just got real enamored by rock at that particular time. It slighted my piano playing somewhat – I felt like, “This is where it’s at, to be rocking out on the guitar.” And sometimes I wish I’d kept up the classical piano training, but it was just all those initial influences that really got me into it. This friend of mine, Jimmy, he taught me the first things I ever learned on guitar. We’d sit around and jam.

Did you start out on electric?

Uh-huh, I did.

So you were learning more toward innovation than imitation.

When I first started playing guitar? No, I was more of an imitator. I would be a little innovative, but not really. I was so in love with the way a guitar sounded. I remember when I was like three or four years old, the very first time I ever heard an electric guitar, and it was just like that was it!

What was the occasion?

Well, it was this friend of the family that was doing some construction work around the house. After he finished work, he had this guitar. There was this AC outlet on the wall outside of the house, and he just plugged it in. We had like this little party outside, and he played some just really great blues. He was playing Elmore James and stuff, and I thought it was great. I just went, “God! What is this?!”