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Johnny J Blair "Singer at Large" - Pictures of You (blue guitar version)

from HALFWAY TO DAKOTA (limited edition EP) by Johnny J Blair w/Davy Jones, Mike Garson, Prairie Prince, Chris von Sneidern

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Taylor Matthew Jordan wrote this deeply heartfelt love song as a segue from "Halfway to Dakota," as it mentions South Dakota and travel. While I was recording it I had to choke back tears--Jordan obviously wrote this from a deep place. It's straight country-folk, a stylistically departure from the rest of this EP, but I felt it flowed with the title cut and included it so people could hear more of the TMJ tunes.

The "tenor guitar" is a digitized transfer from an old reel-to-reel of Jordan playing. The rest is new guitar and vocals by me, recorded at Hyde Street Studios in San Francisco 9/12, produced by Chris von Sneidern. We may re-cut the song as a full band track later.

Jordan is a Mystery Cowboy who left me boxes of songs to do. Everyone has a Mystery Cowboy story. Maybe it’s not always called that, but reach into your misty memories and you’ll recall that intriguing person who affected you, captured your attention, and moved in the shadows of your life at key and unexpected points, then disappeared into an unreachable place.

The wind was blowing hard around the 23 Club (www.facebook.com/23CLUBBRISBANE?ref=hl) the night I met this particular Mystery Cowboy. It was like a scene from the movie “The Petrified Forest,” the building clattering as if Duke Mantee would come busting in. Instead, in walked a weathered but sturdy looking elder I would come to know as Taylor Matthew Jordan. For weeks he’d been slipping in and out of my shows at the 23, listening quietly in a dark corner, making me think of Strider if he groomed himself like Waylon Jennings.

Bourbon and blood spilled on the stage of the 23 Club in the wild, old days when Johnny Cash, Wanda Jackson, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Hank Williams were in their prime and took the stage there. It all folded into the canyon village of Brisbane, where people lived hard, worked hard, and played hard, just a mile below the San Francisco city line.

The rough wood structure of the 23 Club still echoes the melodies of a time before the Telecaster was a 'vintage' guitar, but the clientele today is slightly more genteel than in the 1950s heyday--when the slogan was “music at 9, fights at 10.” Meanwhile, the 23 atmosphere stays Americana (emphasizing alt-country and rockabilly). This was the perfect place for me to meet Mr. Jordan.

I was just wrapping up my last set when I heard big boots strolling up to the stage. I turned and looked into eyes that seemed both haunted and at peace. He introduced himself, complimented me on my singing and playing, then handed me a notebook and a small box of old reel-to-reel tapes. He spoke in an accent that could’ve come from anywhere between Deadwood to Tupelo, “It would be my great pleasure if you could go through my songs and record them. Take the publishing and everything. All I want is for them to be done proper, and you’re the man.”

Taking a seat on the edge of the stage, I opened the box, letting loose the musk of sunbaked California sage and that familiar dust of recording tapes. Then I flipped through the notebook with dozens of songs. I had questions, but when I raised my head to talk to Mr. Jordan, he was gone. No one saw him leave.

The few who know about him say he lived self-sufficiently before dying in one of the shrouded canyons where banditos hid in the 19th century. Others told me he’s a mentally disturbed “prospector” rambling around the mountain looking for a lost gold mine. Gleaning from his own notes, he was a rising rockabilly star from the late 1950s who, right when he was breaking into the big time, inexplicably walked away from it all and vanished.

Meanwhile, I’m sitting here with his notebook of amazing songs: Sweet songs that make you think of heaven, sad songs that absorb your pain, songs to make you dance, cry, pray, reflect, celebrate…too good to sit unsung.

credits

from HALFWAY TO DAKOTA (limited edition EP), released January 29, 2013
JJB: acoustic guitar & vocals
Produced & engineered by Chris von Sneidern, Hyde Street Studios, San Francisco 9/12.

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Johnny J Blair "Singer at Large" San Francisco, California

"Johnny is a virtuoso"--Brian Wilson
"Pop music with a conscience.”--Goldmine
“the Harry Houdini of rock and roll.”-- Spotlight. Listen to Johnny's fast-paced mix of old school soul, psychedelia, punk/new wave, & classic pop/rock. Singer-songwriter in his own right, he was also a sideman for Davy Jones and The Monkees + performed with David Cassidy, Al Stewart, Buddy & Julie Miller, & others. ... more

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