Singled Out: Danny Johnson's Blood Of The Blues

12-02-2018

Danny Johnson tells us about his track "Blood Of The Blues" from his new 2 disc album "Americana Kitchen". Here is the story:

Hi everyone! My name is Danny Johnson and I'm a musician, songwriter, studio owner, and recording engineer and I recently released a Studio Band Project CD by Americana Kitchen called "Come And Get It"!

This CD showcases (2) very important things:

1)American Roots Music

2) And the tremendous musicians talent pool from San Gabriel Valley *and greater Los Angeles areas).

The very 1st song I ever wrote for this CD was called "Blood of the Blues" and is a story told from the perspective of a real modern day Vampire. The idea came to me out of nowhere and I had the chorus written in about 2 minutes while on a bike ride. I also knew it was going to be a strong enough hook and guitar riff to carry the song so I only needed and storyline for the verses and perhaps a bridge or pre-chorus to set up the main chorus. Well that was easier said than done. I threw away more pieces of paper with writing attempts on them over the next 2 months trying to figure out how the story should be told. However, I everything I tried sounded contrived, over simplified, and just plain terrible. I finally stopped working on the entire song because I was ruining it! I worked on many other things for the next 3 years but still had no ideas that worked whether tried written or sung. Finally, I was on another bike ride when I got the idea of telling the story from the Vampires perspective as if he/she was in pain living forever with this curse. BANG....the words came to me like a streak and within a mile I had verse #1. By the time I arrived home, 32 miles later, I had the story line figured out and all I needed to do was to use the right amount of words in combination so the story sounded simple, yet believable. It took 30 minutes and the song was done finally after 3 years....and well worth the wait. It was good enough that for the next year, Blood of the Blues was going to be the name of the CD. Well, that later changed when the collection of songs for the CD went well past Blues alone and was a eventually a collection of American Roots songs. The CD Project Band was now changed to Americana Kitchen and the CD would be called "Come and Get It". The 1940's Pinup Girl on the cover is a real paining by the great Gil Elvegren (called "Come And Get It") and I licensed the image for $500 for the CD cover because it was perfect! Elvegren and Vargas (Playboy fame) were the 2 most famous Pin Up Artists of American Pop Culture since the 40's. Blood of the Blues is recorded on the CD 3 times with 3 different bands, singers, and arrangements:
Ver 1. Rock Ballad Style - featuring Benny Cortez on vocals / Sammy Avila (Walter Trout Band) on Hammond Organ, Danny Johnson on guitars & Guitar Solo.

Ver 2. Unplugged / Country Style - featuring Francesca Capasso on Vocals / Johnny Main (The 44's) on guitar solo.

Ver 3. Modern Jazz Style - featuring Francesca Capasso on Vocals / John Avila (Oingo Boingo) on a fretless bass solo.

I hope you visit our web site to audition the 3 versions and maybe even like it enough to buy the 20 song dbl CD download or perhaps the hard copy CD if you like to read the liner notes and song credits.

Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself and learn more about the album right here!