Will Johnson

I live in Austin, yes. It’s growing at a rate faster than I think it was ready for. It’s still a good town for music, food, nature and raising kids, but space is diminishing and population and rent are quickly increasing. There’s still a pretty good music vibe there during non-festival times, but we’re losing some venues due to prices going up, and “development.” In my opinion, that kind of “development” is ripping some of the soul out of the city.

Sheryl’s sister Karen was my main babysitter, but Sheryl filled in for Karen from time to time. We all went to the same church, and their mom taught me piano.

I remember being pretty well behaved around them. I have always had a lot of respect for their family.

It was a collection of songs that made sense together to my ear and my mind. The writing happened in the wake of a difficult time in my life –losing my mother and our band of almost 18 years– and I knew I wanted to commit some things to tape shortly after the final Centro-Matic tour. Whether it was good or not, I just wanted to get it done. There’s some tough subject matter, but some hope within for whatever comes next, and hopefully some gratitude for the experiences themselves.

With the exception of a couple of songs, I wrote most of it during the fall of 2014, in various places: hotel rooms on tour, out running on the trails and at home. It was tracked and mixed in six days, between two sessions – one with John Congleton engineering, and one with Britton Beisenherz engineering. They each played on the record, as well as my friends Ricky Ray Jackson (Phosphorescent) and my former band mate Matt Pence.

I continue to experiment with narratives and characters on the record, something I’ve done a lot of before. There’s some coming to terms with loss and adulthood, too. Life moving on.  I’ve written on those themes before, but they change, as one’s relationship with them does. So in my mind that’s worth writing about, granted it’s compelling enough to my eye and ear.

It wasn’t a decision to focus entirely on doing things solo. The band collectively had come to a point where it just wasn’t sustainable anymore. We didn’t really have enough time for it due to other life and musical commitments, and it was hard to ignore that. I didn’t want it to be a part time, or a hobby band. I also didn’t feel like I had another Centro-Matic record in me writing-wise, and thought that Take Pride…was an appropriate bookend. We were all getting along and playing about as well as we ever had, so we figured we should end things on an as celebrated note as we could, with a final tour. Not a lot of bands get to do that. We had it pretty good.

I’m still regularly searching out, and learning about new songwriters. I feel like the busier and louder and faster the world gets, there’ll still be an audience for quieter music.

In my mind it’s still a needed thing, and I think new generations can identify with it and reinvent it in their ways. There’ll be changes and different fingerprints on it as time goes, but in all, I think quiet music will always have its place.

Maybe not in the mainstream, but it will have its audience.

I do tend to think Europe has more patience and respect for it than the US does. I may be wrong, but I think for the most part it’s taken more seriously here than back home.

I’m traveling solo this time, just with an acoustic guitar. It’s a pretty quiet show.

I’ve never gotten to go to a flamenco show, but I would like to!

I’d be curious to see what similarities exist between that and a more traditional folk music show.

Thank you!