Music that only used to be accessible to frequenters of the Earl is now accessible to all who enjoy soft melodies and lilting tones. One also hears strains of James Taylor.īest cuts: 'There Is a Breeze', 'Rooty Toot Toot For the Moon', 'Happier Days'.Ī first album by a veteran folkie (who started his professional career in 1964 singing in coffeehouses in Chicago).

Shades of Don McLean.here is a singer similar in vocal style and shading. Michael Johnson's first album is fully half as good as Michael live, and that's enough to make it welcome in my home. Villa-Lobos provides the guitar spectacular, and all ends on a properly bizarre note with Rogers and Hammerstein's 'You've Got To Be Carefully Taught'. 'On the Road' is given an afternoon treatment (as opposed to Bonnie Koloc's midnight reading). 'I Got You Covered' is a dazzler-a strong Biff Rose tune with a solid acoustic chugging skeleton. 'Rooty Toot Toot for the Moon' could make one of those maddening 'American Pie' type things if it were done a touch crasser. There are slow points-the album starts off with a funereal 'Pilot Me' and ambles into 'In Your Eyes'. There Is A Breeze is Michael Johnson's first album. His repertoire covers some pretty broad ground-Jacques Brel followed by 'Bluesette' and a Jesse Winchester tune. His voice is convincing but never in competition with his guitar. That hardcore music freaks of every persuasion find themselves in the Earl of Old Town listening attentively to this too-perfectly handsome blondie wearing a psychedelic folk uniform is fascinating enough.įrankly, he seems at first glance very much like the organic outgrowth of the Mitchell Trio (with whom he did indeed once gig).īut when those fingers fly, my oh my! The strongest chords sound coaxed from his guitar, and those chords are slipped into the songs with powerful effect. Michael Johnson is, as his many friends in Chicago will readily attest, a most interesting fellow.

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