Music
marc t. michael
Still Crazy Talented After All These Years Johnette Napolitano keeps on rockin’ in the New World
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T HAS BEEN ALMOST A QUARTER CENTURY SINCE THE release of the breakthrough album “Bloodletting,” but Concrete Blonde vocalist and bass player Johnette Napolitano still has “the ways and means” and on Thursday, January 9, she will take the stage at Rhythm & Brews in a rare solo performance culled from the greatest moments of a music career spanning four decades. Although she is best known for her work with Concrete Blonde (her well-crafted lyrics, cool bass riffs and unique voice led the band to the forefront of the alternative music scene in the late ’80s and early ’90s) Napolitano has had a no-less-impressive solo career. Numerous albums, guest shots and collaborations read like a “who’s who” of classic new wave, pop, punk and alt-rock performers. Debbie Harry, Richard Hell, Richard Gano, The Talking Heads (minus David Byrne) and Wall of Voodoo founder Marc Moreland are just a few of the artists and performers that have shared the stage and the studio with Napolitano. If one may accurately judge a musician by the company they keep, then clearly she was and is a well-respected member of alternative music’s classic hierarchy. Unwilling to limit herself to the standard
10 • The Pulse • January 2-8, 2014 • chattanoogapulse.com
“rock star” persona, Johnette has an extensive resume of musical contributions to television and motion picture soundtracks, production credits, voice work, acting, writing—and is a visual artist to boot. In short, she is a Renaissance woman thriving on artistic expression, driven by the need to create. Mirthful and mischievous, she has an easy laugh particularly when discussing her own work. When asked how she came to choose bass as her instrument the key word seemed to be “necessity.” “I didn’t set out to play bass,” she recalls, “but we couldn’t keep a bass player and so I had to learn to play bass. It was hard to play. I’ve been playing guitar since I was nine years old, but it was really hard to learn to play bass and sing at the same time.” Her bass playing is solid, well-suited to