Jonny Lang’s latest CD adds funk to bluesy rock

Published 9:00 pm Thursday, July 1, 2004

Jonny Lang, the guitarist who exploded onto the scene at age 15 with the bluesy 1996 CD, “Lie To Me,” hadn’t put out a CD in five years until “Long Time Coming” finally arrived in stores in October.

Lang, who plays in Seattle Saturday, nearly released a CD about three years ago. But when his record company said “We don’t hear a single,” it sent Lang down a considerably different path as a songwriter and musician.

Lang had recorded about 30 songs with David Z, who had also produced Lang’s 1998 sophomore CD, “Wander This World.” Then Interscope Records bought Lang’s label, A&M Records. Second thoughts by both Lang and the new regime at Interscope/A&M put his third record on hold.

“I felt satisfied with the album, but I just … something just wasn’t right to me,” Lang said of the CD, which he said sounded similar to his first two CDs. “And I felt like this was going to be a really important record for me. It was kind of a crossroads.”

Interscope had some doubts as well and suggested that Lang get together to write some additional songs with Marti Frederiksen, who has become one of rock’s most in-demand songwriter-producers because of his collaborations with Aerosmith and Ozzy Osbourne.

Lang’s promotional team at Interscope/A&M now has 14 new songs it can consider for singles, the result of a songwriting collaboration that blossomed into a full-blown recording project. In the end Lang and Frederiksen cowrote 12 of the songs on “Long Time Coming,” while Frederiksen also produced the CD and played bass and drums on most of the songs.

“Long Time Coming” promises to reshape Lang’s image as the next great hope for blues-rock and a guitarist who many predicted would fill the void left by the 1990 death of Stevie Ray Vaughan.

“Wander This World” had hinted that Lang’s musical tastes stretched beyond the blues-rock music he had featured on “Lie To Me,” the CD released when he was 15. That second CD, while still emphasizing the bluesy side of his music, also suggested Lang had a taste for soul, Motown and funk.

The new CD brings those influences fully into the forefront. Only two tracks truly fit the blues-rock mold so familiar to Lang’s fans.

Instead, “Long Time Coming” is dominated by songs that blend rock, soul and funk. A poppier side to Lang’s music also emerges.

“Just like everybody, you have your own original style in you,” said Lang, noting that he had grown up listening to Motown and soul and didn’t discover blues until his early teens. “It was just what was in my heart to do.”

“Long Time Coming” also shows that being a hotshot guitarist is not on Lang’s list of priorities. There are still some concise solos, but Lang and Frederiksen have clearly stifled any guitar-hero tendencies that Lang showed earlier in his career.

Lang’s music isn’t the only thing that has changed: He got married and embraced Christianity.

“There was just some stuff I was doing, some things I was involved in that were destructive in my life,” Lang said. “I wasn’t really looking to have a relationship with God at that point in my life, but nevertheless he decided to touch my life and totally turned me around and changed my heart. …”

The spiritual influence is evident in the lyrics of several songs on “Long Time Coming.” Lang said, though, that he didn’t want to be too explicit about his newfound spirituality.

“I know what it’s like to not want people telling you about your faith and you feel like it’s being shoved down your throat and stuff like that … I kind of wanted to respect that.”

Jonny Lang

With Keb Mo: 7 p.m. Saturday, Pier 62/63, Seattle; $45, 206-628-0888.

Jonny Lang

With Keb Mo: 7 p.m. Saturday, Pier 62/63, Seattle; $45, 206-628-0888.