Jack Johnson - Sleep Through The Static - Review

For those of you who are big fans of Jack Johnson you certainly will be happy with the new cd. Jack adds a little of a different feature on this one and adds some electric guitar, but still it hass the same mellow tone as many of his songs from the past.

Having lived in Southern California and being exposed to the waves, sandy beaches and Jack Johnson surf movies this one fits right in. Even though I have recently moved away from my beach shack to a place in the middle of the country, Kansas City, I still miss the sun, waves and warm weather. Listening to a little Jack Johnson, closing my eyes, puts me right back there to my place of comfort.

The new cd was recorded with 100% solar power. I bought a digital copy, so I tried to help do my part a little in the process of helping the environment. It's always good to see artists take a stand and do what they can to influence others.

This cd is filled with some great tunes. They are more on the mellow side, but that's my thing. Starting off with All At Once, you feel that typical JJ beat. It's a wonderful song that sets you in the mood for the rest to come. Sleep Through The Static, the title song is add a little more beat and is a lot like Times Like These from his previous release. Hope keeps the beat up following into a nice little ballad called Angel. Enemy is kind of a day dream song that's how I feel.

If I Had Eyes was the single that was released before the rest of the cd. It's a little more electric, but a wonderful beat and mix of drums, piano and guitar in this one. Much of it it sounds like several other of Jacks songs. I guess I could say that about the whole cd. Really it has a bunch of wonderful songs. Same Girl is a nice acoustic ballad type song, short and sweet.

What You Thought You Need, Adrift, Go On are all great acoutics songs. They Do, They Don't as well as While We Wait, Monsoon and Losing Keys finish off the cd. If you bought the cd on iTunes you get a one minute funny song Goodbye.

I really love it, every song from end to end. I would highly recommend picking this one and if you haven't heard much of Jack's work, you could pick up any one of his cds and be in good shape. Gone are the days of Jack showing up at Lou's and jamming for an hour or playing the small venues. Still, it's well worth your time to get to see him perform live if you get a chance.

Enjoy!

Note from Jack:

My friends and I have just finished recording a new album called Sleep Through the Static. At this point in my life I weigh about 190 lbs and my ear hairs are getting longer. I also have a couple of kids. My wife popped them out, but I helped. Some of the songs on this album are about making babies. Some of the songs are about raising them. Some of the songs are about the world that these children will grow up in; a world of war and love, and hate, and time and space. Some of the songs are about saying goodbye to people I love and will miss.

We recorded the songs onto analog tape machines powered by the sun in Hawaii and Los Angeles. One day, JP Plunier walked into the studio and told us, "It has been 4 to 6 feet and glassy for long enough," and so we gave him a variety of wind and rain as well as sun and so on. And Robert Carranza helped to put it all in the right places.

After inviting Zach Gill to join Adam Topol, Merlo Podlewski, and myself on our last world tour, we decided to make him an official member of our gang. So our gang now has a piano player, which probably makes us much less intimidating, but Merlo, our bass player, is 6'3" so we are still confident.

All of these songs have been on my mind for a while and it is nice to share them. I am continually grateful to my wife who is typing this letter as I dictate it to her. I hope you enjoy this album.

Mahalo for listening,
Jack Johnson