courtesy of Goner Records
Ross Johnson
Ross Johnson, having laid down the back beat of underground Memphis bands for over forty years, is on the verge of spilling the beans.
He’s worn the hat of the rock ‘n’ roll librarian, historian, chronicler, and/or raconteur for some time now, both penning a definitive remembrance of the Antenna Club in The Memphis Flyer‘s own pages, and serving as an articulate commentator on the local scene, either on camera or across the table from you at the bar.
Now, his perspective has been distilled under the title Baron of Love: Moral Giant, soon to be released under the Spacecase Records imprint. To ready us for the full onslaught, Johnson has been softening up the target audience with short bursts of close-range excerpts and interviews. His Back to the Light podcast appearance, reported here last week, was just the beginning. Tonight, you can hear even more Johnson-isms when Goner TV takes to the internet once again.
The Spacecase-related blog, Bored Out, has published a few excerpts from the book, full of tantalizing details on the making of some stone-classic “alternative” records, and tonight Johnson will read even more. Here’s a taste of what to expect, courtesy Bored Out:
I was working as a sack boy in the summer of 1972 at one of the local Big Star (yep) chain groceries. Jim [Dickinson] would usually shop for groceries there mid-afternoon Friday while my drumming idol Al Jackson, Jr. shopped at the same Big Star on Friday around dusk. They were the only customers who ever tipped me for carrying their groceries out.
One day I got the nerve up to speak to him as I was loading groceries into his car and said: “You’re Jim Dickinson, aren’t you, and you recorded with the Flamin’ Groovies on Teenage Head, didn’t you?” Years later Jim admitted that he thought I was going to ask about The Rolling Stones but was impressed when I mentioned the Groovies instead. We had an extended conversation in the parking lot about the Teenage Head session and he enthusiastically mentioned that he got paid $700 by producer Richard Robinson for one night of work on the record. I got in trouble with grocery store management for staying in the parking lot so long, but the conversation was worth it.
Doesn’t the thought of getting Ross Johnson in trouble make you want to read more? Stay tuned for the book, and content yourself for now with a visit to tonight’s installment of Goner TV.
GONER TV Ep. 4: Ross Johnson live at Goner Records, Friday, September 11, 8-9:30 p.m.