Not That Tough
Johnny Johnson's Auto Biography
Chapter One: Rock I believe that music is something special, and when it’s done right it can have an effect on people and change their lives. That is what I always wanted to do with my music, and I hope that I have done that, at least in the eyes of the fans. My music was influenced by guys like Thunder wolf, and even further back; people like Journey and Ac/Dc had an effect on me. But really, with The Rockers I wanted to fuse these types of music and make a new genre of sound and make something that no body’s ever done before.
The music lasts forever, long after the creators are gone and that is the ultimate goal for any musician; to be remembered.
When we first started and didn’t have any songs of our own, we would cover songs from the big name rock bands at the time and we did okay but most the time we felt uneasy because it wasn’t the type of music we knew we should have been playing. So in 1989, we decided that it was time to begin writing our first album, “Rock”
“Too Tough” was the first song we worked on, I wrote the lyrics while Joey and George wrote the music. Robert Kain who was the original guitarist in the band, and one of my best friends didn’t write at the time because he felt that he wasn’t good enough but as some of the fans will note, he ended up writing some of our biggest hits later on. But back to the song, it was a hard song about a bad marriage and trying to keep your life together with some basic lyrics and some easy listening riffs and luckily for us it went on to be a big hit and is still a main stay in our live shows even after twenty years.
We wrote another ten songs for the album, such as “Get on Home” which is one of my favorite songs that doesn’t get played much anymore. It had a booming riff that blew you out of your seat and left you wanting more and more. But the rest of the songs were mostly forgettable and I am not afraid to admit that. However the then subsidiary of Midnight/Mythic Records signed us and we went into the studio. I will never forget the smell of that first studio. The recording equipment looked like it had been thrown in a pile and left to rot in a dank little basement like building.
At the time we were just kids and didn’t know better, and we felt that we were at the top of our lives and that nothing could ever be better. We finished the album, handed it in and it was released with some good publicity and we felt that we would fly to the top of the charts and be hits right off the bat.
We were wrong though, mostly. The album did sell well, but the reviews were dire and fellow artists used us as their comedy routines, making fun of our name and the way we presented ourselves. It was a pretty depressing time period but it had its moments such as when I went face to face in an argument with Raven from Thunder Wolf…it stayed like that for a long time and it seemed like it would never end. Just as a side note, it did get better, and all has been forgiven but it took at least fifteen years.
Again, the album sold well which helped the labels decision to keep us signed and they even encouraged us to write for the follow up album. We felt that we wanted to tour though, and chose that instead thinking it would be a fun experience playing our own songs in front of people for once. Overall, it was but there were some badly booked gigs and missed planes.
We supported some big name bands back then too, which is always fun because you get to go out and play, have fun, and entertain without all of the stress and pressure to be at the top of your game. It also helped us get a little respect from the fellow artists and gain a few friends along the way.
Joey and I have always been close and I would go as far to say that we are better friends because of the band, but that doesn’t go for those first couple of years. We were really depressed at the time, and with the pressure to play better, we were always on each other’s case and trying to make the other play better and harder. Each of us was never happy with what the other did, on and off the stage. I do blame myself though because of the extent I let it get to before jumping in and saying anything.
A lot of the fans don’t know that we were very close to calling it quits throughout the first five years. We were always going at it, at one point I even hit Joey with a shovel while we were digging a mailbox hole. I have never told anyone this, other than the band…but I was on drugs a lot of the time and was not a fun person to be around. I would just yell and curse at everyone and then go off in my room and pass out on the floor. I will never forgive myself for that and it will haunt me until the day that I die.
I still remember how the high felt. It was the best feeling, because you didn’t feel anything. But you soon realized what it can make you feel. I lost my friends, what few I had, all of them. Every single person I had ever know left me in the dark to die except the band members and they only stayed because we had a contract to live up to and they needed the paycheck. It wasn’t about being a band anymore; they were being paid to put up with me. No matter how much I say thank you, and sorry, I will never feel that I have made up for what they did for me, even if it wasn’t always directed toward me, because of me.
The album passed the Five Hundred Thousand Point, which gave us a little boost of confidence and convinced me to lie of the pills for a while so start writing our second album. We all got into a room with the executers of the label and had a very long talk on what everyone felt this band meant and what we should do and change from the first album. Joey told them outright, “We want to do the exact same thing, that’s who we are and that’s what we like.” And I still remember the face that guy gave him. But in the end he agreed and decided that if that’s what we feel we should do, then so be it. With that, we prepared for our second album.
Chapter Two:
The Worst of No LifeThe writing process was a quick one with our second album, we wrote songs like it was going out of style. We sat in a room cooped up with nothing but pads of paper and pens for over three months. But in the end it was a smart decision because it enabled us to write better music than what we had on “Rock”.
It was a hard rock album compared to what we normally have done too; it had some really strong riffs and really wacky licks that were something that Robert specializes in, though he doesn’t show it much. The title track, “Best of Real Life” was an arena rock anthem even with the almost elementary lyrics and repeated chorus. What it had going for it was pro-life and anti-suicide tones it really got a boost in airplay, and as my fellow artists will attest, that always helps.
We had another song on “Real Life” called “Digital Hell” which was an interesting song as it really had an electronic feel to it musically, but had lyrics that fit better in a heavy metal song, but somehow it fit nicely and became one of the big radio songs. There were eleven songs written for the album, but the label decided that ten was the best option and kicked out a song called “Morning Due” which I still have locked in my safe. We were ordered to go into the studio on January fifteenth, 1990.
This studio was different, it had some decent space to move around and some really nice equipment compared to what most bands who are working on their second album had at the time. We recorded the album in about a month’s time, and it was one bad month. I was still gone most of the time and was only around long enough to lay down my track and to puke on someone’s jacket every now and then. What was worse was that 1990 was the year that Joey decided that alcohol was the solution he thought he needed.
Of course with two drug addicts in the band, tensions arose to new heights and things just went from bad to much, much worse. Joey and I were fighting nearly all the time now, and there really wasn’t much civilized conversation between the two of us. But somehow we did manage to get along for just enough time to record our songs and move on to whatever we felt like we should do. One thing I will say is that I never got into a lot of sex or anything, unless I was really dating someone, and only then did I do anything, and I never cheated on any of them either. That’s the difference between me and Joey, but I’ll let him tell you about that in his part of the book.
Anyway, the album was finally finished recording and was ready to be released, and the label seemed to be happy with it, developing some nice artwork for it, for free and setting up a tour to help promote it. They got some nice radio spots and set up some decent promotion in the stores and stuff like that. For the first time since “Rock” was released, we felt that things were looking up and we just might get somewhere again. The album was released to the world on August Second, 1990 to a high level of anticipation from the fans.
But the anticipation was only from the fans. As with our previous, “Best of Real Life” was met with pretty bad reviews and was mocked by our fellow bands and artists. We were still being made fun of for our simplistic name and awkward presentation, but that was just how we felt about ourselves. We were just a bunch of Rockers together to put some music together and to try and make our mark on the world but at that point of time, things were looking like are mark would be one of disgrace and shame, and it would have been if a few key changes had never happened. Luck shined on us again.
I am of course talking about the Winter Festival of 1990 that invited us personally to attend and to perform on its second stage. It was an honor that we at the time, took for granted, but gladly accepted. We had never played at a truly huge show yet and when they told us that nearly one hundred thousand people would be in attendance, I specifically remember George’s cigarette dropping from his mouth and burning Joey’s foot and leaving a scar that he still has to this very day.
Come December we were getting ever anxious but we were still getting high or drunk and doing whatever we felt like, and being people that deep down inside…I know we aren’t and weren’t then either. We spent the early part of the month deciding what instruments we wanted to take onstage and what kind of sound equipment preferences we needed to tell the show runner about. In the end we just chose some raw amps and the same stuff we used in the studio, after all, if it sounded like us on the records, then it would sound right live as well, right?
Wrong, we walked out onto the stage in front of more people than anyone of us had ever seen before, and sounded like utter shit. We played are songs note for note just like they were supposed to be played, but it all came out sounding like we were beating them up against a wall. When we walked of the stage, the crowd didn’t “boo” at us. They were too confused at what had just transpired to have any opinion on it. We got back stage and the host was glaring at us. He said something along the lines of, “What the hell was that?” and we just said, “That was us, rocking the joint!” like the bunch of punk kids that we were. Anyway, he told us that we weren’t getting paid and told us to leave and to never come back.
We went home and did more drugs than anyone person should do in year much less a night. Joey was so drunk that he fell over and fell over and knocked his head on the table corner, knocking himself out. It also left blood everywhere so I got up to help him out but as I did I felt the weirdest feeling I have ever felt in my life. I was seeing Joey, bloody and laying limp and then it all went black and I didn’t see a thing anymore. I didn’t know how it happened exactly but I woke up in the hospital and the doctors were running around yelling words I didn’t understand, and then I saw Robert Kain, my savior standing over me asking me “Are you alive?” and then he disappeared as I went through a door, and passed out again.
I woke up to the news that I had OD’d and that I was within inches of dying and that if not for Robert being clean and able minded enough to drive through heavy LA traffic, I would not have lived. I owe him everything that I have and everything that I never will. He saved my life and I have no words to express how I want to thank him for it, but I think he knows. I hope he does, I will never understand why he did it for me, not after what I put him through those two years and George too, but George wasn’t around as much. Robert stuck by my side the entire time, and never even thought of walking away. That is true friendship and I can’t say that I have any friend that is as important to me as Robert.
It took a while for me to recover and even after I was out of the hospital I was told to rest for as long as possible. I told the band that I wanted a break and wanted to work on songs while I was away. They agreed kindly and I went off to Gatlinburg Tennessee for rest. I was there for an entire year and three months before I came out. But I did manage to write some great stuff while I was sulking over myself. I wrote of how I was going nowhere, and how my life was wasting away into nothingness. I wrote of severe depression and lost friends and how I needed to get back on the right track. I wrote of how I was doing nothing but heading down a “Bridge to Nowhere”
Chapter Three:
Bridge to Somewhere
The guys had been off doing their own thing while I was resting and I came back to find them somewhat unwilling to return to a dying horse, and I can’t say that I blame them in the slightest. They were completely right to be weary. But after some shrewd negotiation on my behalf, I was able to persuade them to give The Rockers just one more chance. We walked into the labels head office, and sat down to negotiate our deal. They were happy to be talking with us again and we were somewhat thrown off by their willingness to work with us, and I still can’t believe how kind they were to us, where ever they are, I just want to say thanks, you know who you are.
I showed the band my songs and they were pretty happy with them, naturally they wanted to cheer them up a little bit and I happily obliged and we ended up with ten songs that really speak loads of how the band felt about itself at that time and how we looked at each other. The title track “Bridge to Nowhere” is one of the most powerful ballads we have ever wrote and is a true emotional roller coaster that really brings out the feelings in everyone who hears it. We wanted to be sad, and it’s not often we want to be deep and meaningful or anything, but at that point in time, it was exactly what the band needed as a little boost to our friendship and it proved that we really were together for a reason and that this band had to make it, because after all the crap that we had gone through, it would be a travesty not to continue onward.
The studio was pretty good third time around. It had the usual recording equipment but the best part was that we got the choice of just about any instruments we wanted to use due to some deals the label made with the big companies. We had top of the line all the way, except for our producer, he was a nut job and I won’t mention his name as we had a pretty bad law suit, but he was the screwiest guy I have ever met and the money we paid him is still marked as one of the biggest wastes we have ever made.
But as always we toughed it out and did the music our way and when he wasn’t around we even snuck into the studio to lay down our own tracks without any instructions from him. That is when we really rocked, and things started to go right. I remember thinking that “finally, we are getting somewhere and doing something right.” And it’s true, we really were at the top of our game and we had some of the best songs we had done yet, put together it turned out to be one of the best albums we have had.
The label didn’t like it too much; they felt that it was too depressing and that the audience wouldn’t respond well when we are known for our hard rocking songs and our easy living type of lyrical feel. Again, Robert did exactly what he needed to do to make things right. He told the executive some of the most amazing words I have heard, he told them, “If you don’t realize how good this is, then you can take this guitar and shove it up your ass!” and amazingly the exec smiled and decided that he would take this chance and see how the people responded.
It was released in the summer of 1992 to the best reaction we have ever had. The fans bought it up as if it were candy and the reviews came in wonderfully, with high praise for the lyrics and the true feeling in the way the songs were played. We even gained some praise from our fellow artists and rivals. I was told by a member of Moronic Changeling that we were going to be the next big thing. Not much is higher than being told by the best, that you will be the best in the future. We were on a natural high and felt no need for any sort of drug or narcotic. It was a feeling like no other and it was around that time that I met Lilly Mason, in a bar in Chicago. She was a curly blond with a personality that makes a man melt. I fell in love with her at first sight. She came up to me after the gig and asked me if I wanted a drink! I told her know, but asked if she did, to which she accepted.
We spent the entire night together, just hanging out, getting to know each other. She was great; she felt that music should be felt from the heart and that most people don’t understand that anymore, just as I do. We were seemingly meant for each other. Before she left I asked her where I could see her again, and she said, “Las Vegas” which was where our next show was meant to be, and being a bit slow I asked if she knew that and of course she did. She came along on the bus with us from Chicago all the way to Vegas.
She became my main focus, possible even above the band. I was in love; I felt that there was a good chance that she was my soul mate. I had never felt that way about anyone before. We made love in Vegas, and I really felt that the chance meeting had been set up by God for us to move on and get married. I was ready for a family even at twenty one; I felt that she was the mother of my children to be.
The guys grew angry at me for spending most of my time with her, and I even skipped out on a few dates which Joey was left to attempt singing, which by the way; he can’t. I see my faults now, but when you’re in that sort of mood and you are truly set in your mind on what you want and what you think is meant to be…you don’t see the faults that you are spewing out among the ground. I made some bad decisions those years, whether it is business mistakes, life mistakes, but once again I screwed up and I will never understand my tendency to do that. I still feel to this day that I have made more mistakes than anyone in the music industry. We had been at the top, making a million dollars a week, and I pissed it all away again! I spent more money on that whore than I ever dreamt I could ever spend in a life time much less a few years.
We went four years just touring and spending money, I spent it on Lilly, and the band spent it all on houses and cars from Italy and who knows where. Except Robert…The world is danged if it wasn’t Robert Kain who came to my rescue and breathed new breath into the band when it was all but lost. That is the magic that is Rob. He put every bit of money he made away other than what he needed to live a normal life. Food and Shelter, that’s all he ever spent a dime on.
I married Lilly in a private wedding on July thirteenth, 1997. I had been with her for five years and knew that it was time to get married. It was all right. So I thought. Within three months she had filed the divorce papers and was walking out the door before I even knew that there was something was wrong. She took everything I had, my house…actually I should say houses. I lost five million dollars out of the five and a half million that I had. That was just the beginning.
Joey lost his house and car because of a DUI charge that rendered him disgraced and unhappy. He went back to drinking hard and squandered everything in a sing game of poker, black jack. George lost his houses over a dispute with the state of California over how much he owned and they counter claimed that they owned it all and that there was a technicality in the paperwork. After five years of being what we dreamed of being, we managed to get rid of it all over again. I was anything but happy but for some reason, drugs never even came to my mind, in fact the only thing I wanted to think about was the band. I decided that we were going to tour and tour until we had made every penny back.
That resulted in the ultimate bankruptcy. We spent money we didn’t have on our stage equipment thinking that we could have it like we did when we were millionaires not realizing we couldn’t afford half of what we were using. I thought I was going to die of regret. There is no pain of understanding that you were the reason that you went from living in multiple houses to living in a dark street under a sheet of newspaper. No one outside of the band knows that, until now. We were latterly sleeping under newspaper in allies. Until Robert decided we had learned our lesson.
It was a cold and windy night, when like an angel in hell I saw him walking through the fog towards me. I will never forget the words he spoke, “Come on John, time to go home.” And with that he grabbed my hand and we started off for his car. It was the strangest and longest car ride that I have ever taken part in. We drove for at least an hour looking for George and Joey who we found sitting together under a hotel balcony to keep dry. Even after we found them, things didn’t get much better. We rode silently not knowing where he was taking us. Joey asked a couple times but Robert just sat there silently and stone faced. Finally we turned off on a dirt road that Joey and I remember all too well…he had brought us “home”.
Chapter Four:
My Childhood I decided to not put the early years of my life at the beginning of the book because I felt that if you knew how my life ended up that it would show just how unusual my childhood was compared to what my adult life has become. I was born to John and Mary Johnson in 1972, by which time; Joey was already three years old. My family was always very Christian and as such, rock music was not allowed in our house. That was fine when I was young and was perfectly happy going to Bible Camp and what not, but it created problems when I grew older and discovered the magic that is rock music and culture.
Joey was already sixteen years old and was already a bit of a rebel; drinking and smoking but I was always proud to be the strong willed Christian that I was, and still am. But when I came into possession of Elvis Presley’s album, “Burning Love” I changed my opinions. I would listen to it in my room with the door shut and the volume down low. My parents had grown used to the idea that I was the good child and that I would never end up like Joey, and I didn’t. I didn’t do drugs, or have sex with everyone who walked by, all I did was listen to the music. But still in my parent’s eyes, that was blasphemy.
They finally found out on the day of my fourteenth birthday when my best friend Robbie bought me Ac/Dc’s “High Voltage” and gave it to me right in front of them! They blew up like I knew they would and sent Robbie home immediately, followed by a huge search of my room. When they did that they found about ten rock albums and I was given the longest lecture ever heard with human ears. After at least an hour or more, they finished with, “If you promise to work for the church and never listen to this again, then we won’t punish you…agree?” and I felt the anger rise within me. I told them, “No…I like the music.” And my mother literally passed out. My father on the other hand walked into my room and when he came back out he was carrying a bag of my stuff and told me, “If this is how you want to live, fine…go live with Joey.”
I certainly didn’t want to do that. Joey had become worse than ever, he was never at his apartment and more often than not, he would come home drunk and usually brought home a girl…and they did more than just “visit.” But at least I was able to be my own person; listen to my own music and do what I wanted which was what I had been wanting since I was thirteen.
It was one year later, when I turned fifteen that I decided that I wanted to learn how to play an instrument, I didn’t know which but I did want to learn something, after all Joey had just bought a set of drums and could play a bit. It took me a while but finally I saved enough money to go look at the music store. I looked at everything, from guitar to piano, to drums and bass but just couldn’t decide. I began to hum passionately and the owner of the store came up to me and asked me if I had ever sang before, I said, “No, only in church.” And he smiled. “You should take some lessons and learn to sing boy, you got a real nice voice. Sing me something.” I was nervous but then I decided to sing an old hymn that I remembered. “Yes sir, I tell you what, I will tell my vocal instructor to give you lessons half off, what do you say?” and I thought about it for a while and finally decided that it couldn’t hurt.
My first couple lessons went pretty badly. I was too nervous over singing and my instructor was a very intimidating man with a deep growl of a voice, and could sing wonderfully. My voice was weak and cracked and he kept telling me to give it up and that I didn’t have a voice. I finally decided that if I wanted to get anywhere that I needed to just let myself go and to sing my best and then worry about his opinion. I walked in the building on my seventh lesson and sang my heart out and did the best I could vocalize and using some interesting changes in tone. My instructor stood up and said these words, “You shouldn’t be here anymore.” To which I got angry and demanded that he tell me why and he smiled, “Because you can already sing better than me…and most of the singers I know.”
On my sixteenth birthday Robert Kain, George Francis and I all went to Joey and asked him if he would like to join the band we were putting together. Rob had been playing guitar since he was six and George had been playing drums since he was eleven so anything we didn’t know, I said they could teach us. He was blatantly reluctant to join up with us kids but I seemed to have had my powers of persuasion back then as well and he finally caved and decided to join. We didn’t know how or where to start but we were going to do something.
My parents heard the news and called us within a week, telling us how we were playing Satan’s music and how we were ruining our lives but we just told them that if they weren’t going to support us…well, we honestly didn’t care. They told Joey and me that they disowned us and that they never wanted to see us again, and with that we decided that we were fighting a hopeless battle and left. We began teaching each other different aspects on what we felt was the right way to play and made few weird noises and felt good about how it sounded.
That’s when I met Andy Keys, a seemingly good guy who wanted to be in the band. We asked him to show us what he had as a piano player and instead he showed me some pills. I being a stupid little kid decided, “What the heck” and swallowed them. I won’t go back into detail but, that’s how it all started. It was downhill as far as that went, from there.
Anyway, we got ourselves signed on to a few small gigs around town and played some crappy covers of songs that we liked. We were booed a couple times, and I wasn’t singing songs that suited my voice and by 1988, I was just about sick of playing other peoples songs and pretending that we were doing a good job at them. So I got the guys together and talked about starting work on our own album. They all seemed to like the idea and I showed them a song I had wrote over the course of a year and told them what I would like to sound like and they all agreed, except for Andy, so we kicked him out on the curb. It may have been a rash decision but we didn’t want anyone holding us down anymore.
All of this culminated to be what I call my childhood. It may not be the worst, but I think you will agree that it wasn’t the greatest way to grow up and didn’t turn out how it should have according to the way I was raided but either way, it all added up to bring me to the man I am today, and it also bridges the time when I was born to where my book started.
Chapter Five: Making Amends We told him to stop the car and let us out, but he refused, telling us that it was time that this get sorted out. We tried to jump out but he locked the doors and windows. When we finally came to a halt we were sitting in front of my old house. It looked the exact same way that it had nearly ten years before. A light shimmered from the old living room window. I wasn’t a boy anymore, I was going twenty seven years old and knew that this was going to happen sooner or later but this is not how or when I expected it to happen.
My mother answered the door. She looked at Joey and me and she started to cry. I don’t think I have ever realized how much she really did care for me. We walked in and found my father sitting on the couch watching the T.V. and he looked angry at first, but then he too showed that he had been upset about the way things turned out. We hugged and told them our story of what had happened while Robert stood in the corner and George stayed in the car. They shook their heads and occasionally told us how they felt sorry for us and then dad did something I never expected.
He walked to my old room and when he returned he was carrying a very large box, and when he opened it my mouth dropped open. Inside sat copies off all our albums and about ten rolled up posters and some other merchandise. I asked, “Why do you have this?” and he told me an interesting story of how he had a change of heart after I left and that he saw the light and that he had been wrong about some of the music and that my lyrics that contained illusions to God had showed him that it’s not all Satan’s music.
I told them that I never was trying to upset them and that I was only listening to the music that I felt had meaning and feelings in it. They said they understood and it was a very emotional night after that. We all tried to make up for what we had done in the past when we felt we had done nothing, and in fact we had done everything…I still wish I could go back and change it earlier than I did, and again I thank Robert for taking me there. I probably never would have gone if it wasn’t for him.
When we left a week later, I felt like I had come full circle in my life. But then I realized that I was still broke and had no house to live in. But damn it all if Robert didn’t come in and give me and Joey both three hundred thousand dollars! I bought a small house, and so did Joey and we began rebuilding our lives from the ground up again. We slowly began to regroup the band into what we once were as friends and we made amends with each other and vowed to never let our own foolishness be more important than the band again.
I didn’t know how I wanted to go about continuing with the music, weather I wanted to just tour a while or if I wanted to begin working on a new album and writing again. The guys said that we needed to converse with the label before we did anything and so we did. On the first day of January, 2000 I went to the execs and asked them about what they thought we should do.
They told us that they were done with us, that they were sick of waiting on us and that after eleven years; they didn’t want us anymore. They told us that if we wanted to continue our careers than we needed to do it elsewhere. It was a huge argument from there that involves some broken chairs and a messy office when we were done. We walked out onto the parking lot with the feeling of rejection and a bitter taste in our mouth. After all the struggle and pain, there was only more to be had but I knew...
