Music Preview: Paul Johnson pioneered the rock that started the wave

By Jonny Whiteside

May 17, 2016 9:53 PM PT

When fledgling guitarist Paul Johnson organized the rock ‘n’ roll sounds rolling around in his teenage brain and filtered it through his own sunny Redondo Beach prism, he came up with 1961’s immortal, flamenco-tinged “Mr. Moto,” a record that codified an entirely new pop genre — surf music.

Johnson, who appears Saturday at Burbank’s Viva Cantina, borrowed some of Duane Eddy’s impudent twang, took a pinch of Joe Maphis’ high-velocity country pickin’, added a jigger of Link Wray’s stark, six-string drama and suddenly found himself at the center of a critical rock ‘n’ roll upshift. And he managed at an amazingly early age.

“I was 15 when we recorded ‘Mr. Moto,’” Johnson said. “Growing up, as a kid, I was always listening to the radio and I loved instrumentals, Duane Eddy, the Fireballs, Link Wray — he was a big hero to me, “Rumble” was pretty compelling. All those records really got me fired up. My sister had a friend who was a folk singer and one day she saw we had an old beat-up guitar lying around the house and she asked if I’d like to learn how to play. I said, “If you can teach me how to play Duane Eddy’s ‘Rebel Rouser,’ yes!’ So there it was.”

He quickly mastered the instrument, put together a combo, the Belairs, with his friends (guitarist Eddie Bertrand, drummer Richard Delvy, saxist Chas Stuart and pianist Jim Roberts) and after “Mr. Moto” became a regional hit, they gigged everywhere they could — usually at Elks Lodges or Eagles and Knights of Columbus Halls.

By ’62 they were house band at their titular Club Bel Air in Redondo, a private teens-only club with its own stringent rules — members must be ninth-graders and up, and no one older than 21 allowed — where they drew capacity crowds every time they performed.

“I was in the right place at the right time,” Johnson said. “In the beginning, we just played what we wanted, the instrumental music, but the surfers all liked it. Then ‘Mr. Moto’ came out, it got a lot of radio play and, in retrospect, it takes on even more significance as one of the very first surf music hits.”

“I was a beach kid. I hung out there quite a bit and I did some surfing — not a lot because I was much more into playing the music. But it was a genuine phenomenon, the way this music was adopted by the surf culture. There was a real identity and energy to the whole thing.”

Johnson displayed an absolutely mind-bending artistic reach for a 15-year-old, and along with Orange County surf monarch Dick Dale, became one of the most critical practitioners of surf music.

The profoundly influential regional craze served as an evolutionary link between Eddy and Wray’s late 1950s post-rockabilly atmospherics to the modern blues-informed acrobatic style of players like Lonnie Mack, extending the chain of rock ‘n’ roll custody which climaxed with Jimi Hendrix’ pyrotechnic virtuosity. Unfortunately for Johnson, surf collapsed as quickly as it had risen to prominence.

“After the Beatles hit, surf music was immediately passé,” Johnson said. “I had been there at the very beginning of surf music with the Belairs, and later I had a couple of other surf bands, and started doing studio work, surf and hot rod stuff. But after the hippy revolution, I had a folk-rock band that had a pretty close brush with fame, but I moved up to Mendocino and then up to Eureka, where I came to Jesus and got saved, stayed away from all the psychedelic craziness.”

“I’ve been involved with music ever since, making music pretty much all the time. I finally moved back here to Southern California in the mid-’70s but there was no interest in surf or instrumental music. By ’79 I was hanging around with [artist] Rick Griffin, who started out as a surfer artist, then dropped out, went hippy and also came to Jesus — we followed a pretty parallel track. But he was getting back into the old surf records, had started collecting and we both got excited about surf music all over again, and the New Wave scene was suggesting a return to those simpler musical values, so I got a band together, the Packards, and did an album called ‘Pray for Surf.’”

Johnson fought his way back, gigging alongside punk bands and finding an entirely new audience.

“We discovered that there was a growing interest worldwide — suddenly I was getting letters from all over saying, ‘Oh, we’re glad you’re back.’ I didn’t think anyone had noticed I was gone! We started doing some live shows, playing at Madam Wong’s, all those clubs and became part of this 1980s surf revival which just kept growing, in fits and spurts, and it finally really became popular.”

At Viva, Johnson, along with a dozen other local guitar slingers, will pay homage to his childhood idol and influence, the great Link Wray, the subject of the 13 Guitar Rumble, an annual Wray tribute, now in its 11th year.

“My love of the music keeps me going, for sure, and with surf music and instrumental musicians, it’s like being part of a big family,” Johnson said. “It really is a community and whenever there’s an event, like the 13 Guitar Rumble which I’ve been a part of for quite a few years, everybody comes out and it’s wonderful, like a family reunion. And the show is always amazing — 13 guitars playing “Rumble” is really something to experience. It never loses its charm.”

Who: The 13 Guitar Rumble with Paul Johnson, many others

Where: Viva Cantina, 900 W. Riverside Dr., Burbank

When: Saturday, May 21, 3 to 6 p.m.

Cost: Free

More info: (818) 845-2425 www.vivacantina.com

JONNY WHITESIDE is a veteran music journalist based in Burbank and author of “Ramblin’ Rose: the Life & Career of Rose Maddox” and “Cry: the Johnnie Ray Story.”