It was homecoming weekend throughout the Southland, and Jack Johnson and his team brought their A-game to the Hollywood Dish on Saturday for evening either sold-out programs: “Y’ all came prepared to sing, right?”
As Hurricane Rachel swirled off the coastline, Johnson and his band dealt with L.A. to a collection of the singer-songwriter’s greatest hits for the final shows of his North American trip on behalf of SURFILMUSIC , an intimate documentary directed by Emmett Malloy chronicling Johnson’s advancement from internet user to filmmaker to artist.
Beneath a pleasant, periodically drizzly night skies, the laid-back 51 -year-old provided 2 hours of classic hits gone along with by his longtime band– that includes standout sidekick Zach Gill, that fulfilled Johnson throughout their very early days at UC Santa Barbara and accompanies the rocker on whatever from accordion and harmonica to piano and melodica– as browse footage and family members video clips supplied a beachside background.
For those of us in university when Johnson increased to prestige, it was a timeless evening for the primarily Gen X group, as our own children are applying to university these days. But midlife looks good on Johnson, and his dedication to the hits delivered a wave of feel-good moments throughout the quasi-beach celebration.
Johnson dove right in with “Mudfootball (For Moe Lerner),” from his 2001 debut studio album, Brushfire Fairytales , adhered to by “Sitting, Waiting, Wishing”; “Bubble Toes” (with a corresponding intro/outro of the Steve Miller Band’s “Continue Rockin’ Me Child” and “Take the Money and Run”); “Banana Pancakes,” followed by a soulful cover of Dolly Parton’s” 9 to 5; “You and Your Heart”; a stripped-down “Break down” (with Johnson’s vocals rising alongside his trademark ukulele); “Inverted”; “Staple It Together”; “Wasting Time”; “Constellations”; and “Do You Remember.” “Holes to Heaven,” Johnson’s 2003 tune concerning a father-son bonding journey, resonated with the carolers, “And there were numerous fewer questions/ When stars were still simply the openings to paradise.”
Longtime friend Ben Harper signed up with Johnson onstage for “Flake” and a cover of The Wailers’ “High Tide or Reduced Trend,” and fellow web surfer Kelly Slater appeared for a cover of Jimmy Buffet’s “A Pirate Checks Out Forty,” just two people trading knowledgeables to and fro late night on a beach.
The encore of “Better Together,” most likely a first-dance wedding song for several in the group, was a fitting suggestion that, yes, we are.
Opener Hermanos Gutiérrez, a Latin important duo formed in 2015 in Zurich by Ecuadorian-Swiss bros Alejandro Gutiérrez and Estevan Gutiérrez, capably established the tone with soulful instrumentals, including the sweet slides of lap steel guitar. The brothers come with Johnson on ball game to SURFILMUSIC– which premiered March 13 at SXSW and is now screening at pick movie theaters nationwide– and joined the vocalist onstage for a mashup of tunes from the soundtrack.
