Eric Johnson: Our Complete 2012 Interview, Part 2

On Song Origins, Spirituality, Favorite Musicians, and the Journey Inward

Eric Johnson in his studio, 2012. Photograph by Max Crace. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

In Part 1 of our day-long 2012 interview in Eric’s studio in Austin, Texas, we spoke extensively about the Fender Eric Johnson Signature Stratocaster and other guitars. In this second part, we discuss favorite players, the origins of several of Eric’s best-loved songs, how to enhance inspiration, the roles of spirituality and sacrifices in creativity, and other subjects.

When you think of the guitarists you admire, who would you put in the category of people who have the million-dollar vibrato?

Definitely Clapton and B.B. King. Mick Taylor, like from the Mayall days. You know, in certain ways Peter Green. And then the slide stuff that Robert Johnson did, the way he would do that. And then Django Reinhardt for his own style. Oh, Albert King – definitely Albert King! Of course, that’s more like he’s just stretching big stretches. Yeah, I’d say definitely Albert King. That’s where, I guess, Clapton honed his own style. I mean, Clapton’s vibrato on early Cream stuff is pretty ridiculous. It’s pretty great.

B.B. talks about how he developed his vibrato because he couldn’t figure out how to play slide. He couldn’t play slide well, so he decided to imitate a slide with his fingers.

Oh, wow.

He also told me that when he was a kid, strings were so hard to get that if you broke one of the Black Diamond strings, you would just tie a knot in it, restring your guitar, put a pencil above the knot, and tie string around the pencil and tighten it so it became a capo. And then he would play above the pencil, whether it was at the 3^rd fret, the 5^th fret, the 7^th fret or whatever, until he was able to buy a new pack of strings.

Oh, my God. That’s great. I thought you were gonna say just take it and just rewrap it to the ball and tie it – we used to do that as kids. But that’s one step more. That’s even more old-school. That’s living the blues right there!

During one of our interviews, I asked John Lee Hooker, “What’s the difference between playing the blues and saying your prayers?” He said that there really wasn’t much difference, that spirituality is in both. He said that blues is a gift from God – “This is what he gave me, this is what I do. There’s nothing wrong with it.” Could you describe, if it’s possible, your thoughts on the spirituality of playing music? To play at your very best, is it important to keep yourself pure on some level and unmotivated by greed?

You know, that’s a great question. I’ve thought about that before. The reason I think about it so much, I think that for me to play my best, I need to have myself not modulating but more in sync and focused with that aspiration. Because somehow that, for me, is the gateway to feeling at peace with myself. If you’re at peace, you can kind of travel beyond yourself. At that point, you’re available for any nuances of magic that are bombarding us 24 hours a day anyhow – we’re just too busy talking or distracted to hear it or feel it or see it. But it’s always there if you can get into that focus where you’re just at peace with yourself. Being like that allows me to then go pick up on something that’s maybe sublime. I’m always kind of searching, looking for something that’s sublime, that makes me feel better or makes somebody else feel better. It’s not like, “Oh, that’s the only way you can make art” – I don’t think it is. I think there’s a real validity for art that sometimes causes angst or dissention or uncomfortable provocation of thought. But for me, my little niche is to try to make people feel good or to at least try to go, like, “Oh, wow!” Because I think life is hard anyhow, so why not use that opportunity?

The question is really interesting to me because I’d love to say that that’s necessary, but I guess it’s not. Somehow I think what’s necessary to make a really good artist is being able to turn off the switch of your self, which is just gonna just throw a bunch of paraphernalia in your path for you to trip over. Some people do that by trying to get into a really good place or a big place. Have you ever met people that are artists that you just meet them as a person and go, “Jeez. This person is not very nice, or really just hung up on themselves.” Or you meet a famous actor or whatever, and they’re just like, “Wow! This is a high-maintenance person.” But they’ll walk on the set and [snaps fingers] bam, and they’ll just be in touch with this God energy, and they do this amazing performance or this amazing piece of music.

So you can’t hardly say that you’ve got to go home and – you know what I mean? I used to grapple with that. Because I’d see some great acting performance, and I’d think, “This person is unbelievable!” And then I’d meet him and think, “Jeez.” You know what I mean? So I thought, “Well, that blew my theory of you’ve got to do all this homework.” I didn’t want to have to reconcile with that, really. I thought, “That’s weird. How does that explain everything?” But I think it’s still ideal and much better, because I don’t care what you do – it’s a lot more important to work on that spiritual aspect.

The other stuff, really, if we think it matters at the end of the day, we’re totally just kidding ourselves. I don’t think it does. I don’t think it matters any more than anybody that does anything. And if we think there’s any self-importance, we’ll be really surprised that it’s not. I mean, I don’t think there’s any currency that gives that more currency than something else, no matter what it is. I think it’s really more important, regardless. Obviously, it’s a switch. And some people – regardless of how they live their life or what they like or appreciate or how they conduct themselves or relate to other people – they have an ability to just [snaps fingers] do a switch to where they can go beyond themselves, regardless of what their self is comprised of. So I guess it’s an enigma and just depends on the individual.