Guitarist Evans Johns Sees a Lot of the U.S.A. in His Old Chevrolet : Rock: He’s on the road 300 days a year and has put 240,000 miles on his van. The next stop is tonight, when he performs at Bogart’s in Long Beach.

Whoever coined the ad phrase, “See the U.S.A. in your Chevrolet,” would have had to go on an industrial-grade binge before imagining how guitarist Evan Johns would take that slogan to heart.

Johns, who rolls into Bogart’s in Long Beach tonight fronting Evan Johns and the H-Bombs, has clocked more than 240,000 miles on his blue 1975 Chevy 350 van (with the original engine no less) as he spends about 300 days a year crisscrossing the country. When not behind the wheel, Johns can typically be found on a nightclub stage with drummer Jim Starboard and bassist Steve Riggs howling and hammering out his particularly unfettered version of rock ‘n’ roll.

“I’d like to get a Chevrolet endorsement,” suggests Johns in a voice that, in its softer moments, has been likened to a cross between Popeye and Howlin’ Wolf. “Mr. Blue,” however, might not be a vehicle the folks at Chevy would particularly care to be associated with.

“Have you ever seen this truck?” Johns asked. “It’s a piece of work. All the way around it’s totally scathed. There’s a club owner in Houston who wants to buy it, cut it in half and hang it from the ceiling, the way the Hard Rock Cafe does with classic cars. This would be the ‘anti’ version of that. It’s ragged. It’s all just bumper stickers what holds it together. We keep finding dents we didn’t know were there, and the only way we know they’re new is they’re not rusty yet.”

True to form, Johns was calling from a roadside pay phone while making a pit stop in Santa Barbara for gas and crackers. His favorite road cracker?: “I don’t know, anything that’s yellow or orange.”

Long before his van rolled off the assembly line, Johns was on the move. A persistent runaway from his McLean, Va., home, before he was college-age he had crossed the country 11 times, hitching or riding rails. “Between 13 and 18 I went everywhere. I came out here the first time in 1969. I was 13 and wanted to see San Francisco. But it was all screwed up. It wasn’t no fantasy land. I’ve looked for them, and they don’t exist. That’s one thing I learned.”

During his stints at home, Johns learned some of his guitar craft from bluesmen Mississippi John Hurt and the Rev. Gary Davis, and later from guitarist’s guitarist Danny Gatton. Once he began playing professionally, he became one of the hottest acts on the Washington scene, which, according to Johns, wasn’t saying much.

“It’s just a government town, and no musician makes it out of there. They all have to move: Roberta Flack, Duke Ellington, Roy Clark, Roy Buchanan, all of them had to move to get noticed.”

That was the case with Johns, who relocated to Austin, Tex., to do a stint with the LeRoi Brothers. Shortly after, he persuaded his band to follow him down, and he resumed playing his own music. While Austin is a city with more hot guitarists than parking meters, John’s blend of fret-board technique and recklessness stood out, and he was one of the featured players on the 1985 Grammy-nominated “Big Guitars From Texas” compilation album.

Johns has a fairly succinct statement of purpose: “I like to get up there and make a bunch of . . . (choice expletive) racket is what I like.”

While often classed as a roots rocker, he balks at the notion that he’s playing retro-rock.

“I think this is how music should sound right now, in this day and age. It’s rock ‘n’ roll, the definition of rock and roll. Not rock , we’ve got some roll left, you know what I mean? Nowadays Metallica is called rock ‘n’ roll, and there ain’t no roll; they never swing. You’ve got to swing on occasion. We’ll do waltzes, I don’t care. Rock ‘n’ roll is everything. It’s not just one style. I’d like to hear a heavy metal band do a mambo.”

A representative sampling of Johns’ racket can be heard on his current album, “Bombs Away,” which, oddly enough, is on the audiophile-oriented Rykodisc label. The album was produced by ex-E Street Band bass player Gary Tallent, who became a fan of Johns back in his Washington days. Tallent had been slated to produce Johns’ 1986 “Evan Johns and the H-Bombs” album, but an 18-month hindrance known as the “Born in the U.S.A.” tour got in the way.

On “Done By Me” on the “Bombs Away” album, Johns sings “Well this rockin’ ain’t no way of life / Least that I can say it’s done by me.” He does feel a musician’s life is a mixed blessing.

“I’ve got a dog I can’t even take care of. My buddies have to. So how am I going to look after a wife or children? But I can’t make a living if I don’t travel. But that’s the way it is. It’s kind of like if you’re in the Army and you say ‘Well, I’m a lifer.’ I can’t quit. I play music. So I’ll do it until the day I die, and that’s all there is to it. I don’t know how to do anything else.”

Another of the album’s songs, “Lessons That Burn,” was drawn from his experience with the “Big Guitars From Texas” album. “We were sure ripped off on that one. Everyone else involved has gotten checks from that album, except for the musicians that actually played on it.” Hoping to avoid that experience again, Johns and the other Austin musicians involved are planning a second album, a live one this time, that they will release on their own.

He considers his own misadventures to be among the least of the indignities suffered in the music business.

“The perfect show for me would be to open up for Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis, and back both of them up. They’re the greatest rock ‘n’ rollers of all time, and neither of them even have a recording contract! I mean they’re national treasures! This is Bach and Beethoven, centuries from now. But the record companies are not into music; they’re into sales, and the two living greatest rock ‘n’ rollers, bar none, aren’t recording. Nobody alive that I know will ever touch them. I don’t care about the Bob Dylans, U2 or the Springsteens. Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard 100 years from now will be recognized as the greatest. These record companies are so lame I can’t believe it.

“I’ve listened to those old records and I’ve met a lot of those old guys, and let me tell you, those were musicians. That’s where it comes from, and that’s all I am. If it wasn’t for them I might be washing dishes.”

Evan Johns & the H-Bombs will play at 9 tonight at Bogart’s, 6288 E. Pacific Coast Highway, Long Beach. Information: (213) 594-8975.