Johnny Rod – one man band
Posted By Scott on October 11, 2009
I had a chance recently to hear the first set of Johnny Rodriguez at Shawn’s Back Door which is located just off Heatherdowns near Eastgate. I’m always interested in hearing one man band shows and Johnny’s been doing it for over a decade. He’s been playing Friday evenings starting around 9:30 at Shawn’s for quite some time.
I believe this was the first time I’ve seen him. I arrived about 9:15, payed the $1.00 cover and got a good seat at the bar with a view of the small stage. The place was near packed and it was a 30ish crowd but there were people of all ages there. It was quite obvious to me at least a couple dozen people were there to hear Johnny Rod play and had gotten seats in front of the stage.
The show wasn’t all just Johnny as he had a bass player and another guy doing backup vocals and sound control. They sure played some good old songs and Johnny switched from 12 string to electric with ease. He also played harmonica and guitar simultaneously on several songs. I also noticed he had an Apple notebook on stage which he used to bring up some lyrics for a couple songs. Add to that he uses a drum machine which never gets very loud. They did have a few false starts but they are a real relaxed bunch as is the crowd. Some of the songs they played had a lot of vocal harmony in them and the vocals sounded good over the PA system in Shawn’s.
I’ll definitely go back and see him again. I really enjoyed listening to those old hits of the 70′s and 80′s.
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