Kevin Johansen is a singer/songwriter who plays with the band The Nada, which blends humor, funk, rock and often times a milonga 2/4 beat. His music has been nominated at the Latino Grammy Awards for “Album of the year”, “Song of the year” and “Best Music Video.” He will be playing this weekend at La Feria de Libros in La Rural at 8 p.m. on Sunday, April 26th. LPBA spoke with him about his life, upcoming shows and, of course, his music.
You’ve had a pretty crazy life. How did it all begin?
I never realized how crazy my life was until I got back to Argentina after living in New York in 2000. I got to New York in October of 1990 with a “JAP” (defined as a Jewish Argentinean Princess, poor girl). She wanted to take classes to be a dancer—and she was a great dancer—and we were quite in love. I said, “Let’s get married before we go so you have all the paperwork in order and everything is cool.” We got married here in Buenos Aires and moved to New York.
I would have gone back to San Francisco, that’s where I grew up as a kid. I followed the lady, as it usually happens. She was a beautiful person. I had an Argentinean drummer friend that said, “Why don’t you go down to the downtown strip, to CBGB’s, they might like your stuff.” I was writing in Spanish and English already, lots of songs, your typical cutting-edge singer/songwriter and I was lucky enough to get a gig there.
I remember it was Tuesday night at 8 p.m. with three buddies helping me out there. Hilly Kristal, the owner was there and he heard me and came up to me after the show and said, “I like what you do.” He was this old bear of a guy, big fella. He let me play there and record there and that was really cool because I was able to start developing things.
Were you in touch with Hilly as CBGB began to go downhill a few years back?
He passed away in 2007. It was pretty metaphorical that he would get sick and die when his joint was dying. I was in touch with him and we met up quite a few times towards the end. In August of 2006, he was sick and I spoke to Louise, who was his right-hand woman. She said, “Give him a call at the hospital, he’ll be happy to hear from you.” For some reason, I didn’t call…I thought I’d call him later or I’d catch up with him later and then he died. I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. He was really an important father-like figure to me. He really helped.
It was funny he looked like one of the ZZ Top guys, really big, grumpy, deep-voiced. People were scared of him, he was pretty large, but he took a liking to me. He would also get angry with me and ask, “Why aren’t you playing?” I had broken-up with this girlfriend I had and stopped playing and he says to me, “If you get depressed then write depressing songs.” I have a song on Sur, o no sur called “Go on” that’s dedicated to him because he used to say to me, “Go on, keep writing.”
What was CBGB’s like?
The New York years (1990-2000) were good and very underground. You’d sell CDs after the shows and the good thing about CBGB’s was that you had people from all over the planet come to see you. You’d always have a crowd. Even if it was just 40 or 50 people, you’d have a crowd with a Japanese couple, some Mexicans, some Germans, some people from Brazil or Argentina. It was cool.
What was it like when you moved to New York coming from a teenage life in Buenos Aires?
Initially I loved it and I felt really comfortable with the city. Both cities had a sort of European feel to it, New York being more from the North and Buenos Aires being more from the South of Europe. Lots of Italians, lots of Jews, cobblestones, lots of things in common. I did feel comfortable, but obviously I had to work and had tons of jobs. I worked at a hotel as a waiter, busboy, bartender, basically as anything that they needed. I worked at the U.N. as a tour guide part time and as an interpreter.
The hotel job was good except for the Irish manger that was always on my case. He didn’t like me, he didn’t get me, he thought I was weird: “What are you? Are you Latino? Are you gringo?” I made him nervous. O’Donahue didn’t quite get it. I have to admit I wasn’t really interested in the job.
When did things really come together?
The New York years were probably my formative years. I came back to Buenos Aires with a record called The Nada, the first album before Sur, o no sur. It was actually the fourth album recorded at CBGB’s of those independent CDs we would sell outside of the shows and I brought it back here with me in 2000 and showed it to my musician buddies that I knew from before and they said, “This is good stuff.” A friend of mine, a musician named Axel Krygier said, “There’s a guy named Javier Tanenbaum that has a small independent label called Los Años Luz. He’s really cool and I think he’ll really like it.” I had those songs like “Guacamole.” The whole problem with Hilly was that he would be on my case about the bi-cultural aspect of it. He would say horrible things like, “Write tangos in English!” You had to brace yourself.
What have you been doing recently?
We did a couple of shows at the Maipo. Maipo, [which was] like a legendary cabaret that was big in its heyday back in the 60s and 70s. Now it’s been totally reformed. It’s beautiful. It’s like a little velvet box for 600-700 people. We did two shows there kind of presenting this last book we did with Liniers, a book called Oops . Liniers is the guy that does Macanudo and we’ve been doing shows live together where he draws on a pad and it’s projected behind the band and he sort of busts our chops. It’s really nice.
Liniers is a young guy, about 35, and he just put out a book that came out in December called Ediciones de la Flor . He was telling me that he just had lunch with Matt Groening the other day. Matt has an Argentinean girlfriend who’s in a group called Mondongo. And he was telling me, “Wow, I can’t believe I just did that.” Liniers, he’s a great guy, a wonderful cartoonist. We’ve been working with him on-and-off for about 4 or 5 years, he’s a buddy of mine.
Did you get to meet Matt Groening also?
No, unfortunately. Matt Groening isn’t the only one with an Argentinean girlfriend right now. Al Pacino has got an Argentinean girlfriend, Robert Duval, [Francis Ford] Coppola, well almost. Matt Damon has two kids with his wife. He’s quite successful with the ladies.
What about you?
I have two daughters from the first marriage and a boy from my current. His name is Tom. It’s funny because the mom came up with Tom, and I have an uncle named Tom, my dad’s brother, and they don’t get along too well. I gave him his middle name Atahualpa, so it’s Tom Atahualpa Johansen.
You’re half Argentine and half American?
I grew up in the states until the age of 12, mainly in San Francisco. My father was originally from Denver and I then became what I call an “Argen-teenager,” living here from 12 to 24 in Buenos Aires and briefly in Montevideo. When I left to New York it was just the right age and it was good for me to connect and go back and see what that was all about.
The Johansens came from Norway and my father was 4th or 5th generation. They were originally based in New York then moved to Kansas City and kept going west. My mom was born and bred in the Buenos Aires middle class. She got a scholarship to University of Colorado in Boulder in ’61 and they met there. My mom was big into Spanish literature and to her dismay when I finished high school here in Buenos Aires I told her I just want to be a songwriter and not pursue literature. She saw that I was clear so she was pretty cool about it.
Did you imagine that this would happen?
No, no, not at all. I had no idea. The only idea I had was to stay motivated. I’m kind of prolific and lazy at the same time, in a good way. I kind of went with my instincts. Thanks to those years at CBGB’s, I gradually figured out what it was like to play in front of a crowd: learning how to relax, learning to sing in front of a mic, knowing I had a couple of good things in my favor. I had a good voice, basically good songwriting skills, pretty good formation thanks to mom. I studied classical guitar when I was 14 for a couple of years. The feeling was someone has to “get it,” touch a nerve at some point. I had some good songs under my belt and when I got back that was kind of what happened. It was like, “Oh! All of these years in New York came to fruition here.”
Any songs that The Nada performs that stick out?
We have a lot of ironic songs in Spanish. There are a couple of songs like “Desde que te perdi” (Since I Lost You) off of the album City Zen, that was a good hit for me. It was one of those that wasn’t an instant hit, but kind of grew on people. They ask for it a lot. The whole game with it is the title “Desde que te perdi.” The guy sings in Spanish, “Desde que te perdi, se estan enamorado todas con mi ” (since I lost you, everyone is falling in love with me). Everything is going great. It’s in contra of that typical romantic song that the Latinos do a lot: since I lost you I want to kill myself, etc. That song touched a nerve.
Did you always think with humorous undertones when you were songwriting?
I was never conservative and I’m really against the typical singer/songwriter that never delves into anything besides self-pity. I tried to fight against that a lot and within myself as well. Then I eventually found a niche. There’s an area that is sort of grey that I feel comfortable in. Mark Twain said, “The only trouble with humor is that no one takes it seriously.” We have a history of dealing with comedy that can be deep at the same time. With music it’s an open ball game. People get a little antsy when there’s a joke or an ironic twist in a song. They misconstrue it or take it as not being deep, which is a mistake. The only people that are not being deep are the ones that are saying that, that are not giving it a second reading.
John Harris & Jed Rothenberg
LPBA Staff
