Johnson Plays Fast and Tight With His Music

Eric Johnson’s image is a far cry from that of your typical guitarist from Austin. In a town known for no-frills roots music, salt-of-the earth values and manly-man denizens, Johnson is like a fey poet from the planet Oddball.

The baby-faced 42-year-old, who plays tonight and Saturday at the Galaxy in Santa Ana, comes off like some twisted cross between Jimi Hendrix, Donovan and Merlin the Magician. His music might be described as metallic/psychedelic/New Age, with staggering technical dazzle.

His most recent album, “Venus Isle,” was six years in the making--quite a stretch even considering Johnson’s reputation as an obsessive. The time and prudence spent on the project is much apparent: The album unfolds in opulent layers of sound, like an aural version of Disney’s “Fantasia.”

There are those who relish every chilling guitar run and sheet-of-sound production lick. Others think the guy plain out went overboard. Johnson understands and even shares both views.

“We did the record over and over, just trying to find a vibe for it,” he said on the phone recently. “I’m happy with most of it, but there’s a few songs on there that really bug me. If I’m real honest about it, I just went too far with them, trying to get them just right.

“I think when you’re dealing with art, you get that original muse and you’re inspired on this spontaneous level where you get something that’s very beautiful. Now if you want to go for elegance, that’s fine. I enjoy that effort to reach a certain milestone, although I think sometimes in that effort you want to push the envelope a little bit. As you push the envelope, you gain certain attributes, but you also start losing some of that original spontaneity. On several songs, I just went too far and lost some of the vibe.

“There’s a lot of validity in what people say. . . . ‘Man, be careful, don’t go too far out or you’ll lose something.’ There’s definitely been some constructive criticism.” He bridles, however, when people call him a perfectionist. “That word, ‘perfection.’ . . . What I try to do is far from perfect, and if it ever headed toward being perfect,” he said with a laugh, “then it would be imperfect because there’s no such thing as perfect!”

He was born and raised in Austin but was more taken with the rock he heard on the radio than he was with the local blues and hillbilly music. He studied piano as a boy and took up the guitar at age 11. He cites the Yardbirds, Cream, Jeff Beck and Free as major influences, but he is most passionate about Jimi Hendrix.

“It’s pretty evident that in his unique expertise about guitar playing, and putting it in a place where no one ever did before, he never lost sight of the song or the music or the purpose for trying to convey his music. His guitar playing, no matter how strong and explosive it was, still supported his message in the music. I think that’s really important. Otherwise, you can have this huge pomp and circumstance, but the actual foundation is still a little weak. Hendrix had the whole package.”

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Hendrix’s sway is particularly apparent in Johnson’s delicate, graceful chord voicing. “Venus Isle,” Johnson’s fourth album, is also layered with subtle, pillowy work on the lap steel guitar. The effects often are ethereal. But Johnson can also shred with the best of them, and he seems to have a keen instinct for knowing when to do what. While his sheer speed and ease with scales can be astonishing, there is never anything extraneous about them.

He has received a number of honors, including a Grammy for “Cliffs of Dover” in 1990, Guitar Player magazine’s “Best Overall Guitarist” award for four consecutive years and inclusion in Musician magazine’s list of the “100 Greatest Guitarists of the 20th Century.”

* Eric Johnson plays tonight and Saturday at the Galaxy Concert Theatre, 3303 South Harbor Drive, Santa Ana. Venice opens tonight, Insight on Saturday. 8 p.m. $28.50-$30.50. (714) 957-0600.