MAY 13/14/15

UNIVERSAL MUSIC

Jonny Lang
goes acoustic
on latest tour

HE HAS A new sound, new creative opportunities, a new direction in music -- and he's married now.

There have been a lot of changes in Jonny Lang's life since he opened for the Rolling Stones at Aloha Stadium and then Kakaako Waterfront Park a few years ago. This time around, he's the headliner, but reaching that status is probably the least important thing to him at the moment.

All grown up The 9th Annual Hawaiian Islands Rhythm & Blues Mele featuring Jonny Lang: The Acoustic Band Tour 2005 Where: Pipeline Cafe, 805 Pohukaina St. When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday and Friday Tickets: $35, $40 and $55; available at the club, Hawaii's Natural High, Jelly's in Aiea, Liquor Connection, Good Guys Music in Kapahulu, Hungry Ear in Kailua, Rainbow Books and Samurai in Kapolei or charge-by-phone at 926-3000 Call: (808) 896-4845

Consider, for example, that he's been performing on this most recent tour "unplugged" with a group of friends. While Lang trades off between electric, slide and acoustic guitars, he's backed by a band that includes piano, bass, electric violin, mandolin and drums / percussion.

"You find out all sorts of things about yourself playing this way ... doing a big rock show, you get away with a lot more," Lang said from Maui a few hours before playing at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center on Friday. (He went on to play the Big Island on Saturday, enjoyed three days off, then played Kauai on Wednesday. He wraps up his Hawaii tour with the two-nighter at Pipeline Cafe.)

"This whole acoustic thing started out as just an idea to go out and try something new, and it was only going to be for like a couple of months ... just to do something fresh. I was going to bring some of my buddies with me from home who are musicians ... and just do something new. But it turned out that the response we got was just so much greater than I thought it would be, and so we've been able to keep touring with it and it's been really fun.

"You're way more accountable for your mistakes doing a show like this," Lang said, "because you can hear every little thing, and so it makes you have to concentrate harder -- it did at first, anyway. Now that we've all kind of gotten used to it, we can just have a good time with it."

At this point, he doesn't plan to take the band into the recording studio. Doing a live acoustic show was "something that I've always wanted to do ... but the tour doesn't really mark a change in direction," he said.

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UNIVERSAL MUSIC Jonny Lang gets acoustic.

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ONE OTHER RECENT change in Lang's life came when he stepped forward to co-produce his third major-label album, "Long Time Coming," and wrote or co-wrote all but two of its songs. The music was less hard-core blues and more a stirring blend of rock and classic soul, with a bit of folk and gospel.

That may not have been a surprise to those who know him. Lang says he grew up listening to classic soul music, Motown and the funkier southern styles alike. He notes that while the term "soul" encompasses many styles of music, "to me, it's soulful music, whatever it might be -- rock or blues or something else."

He calls a quote we'd found about how he allegedly thinks of himself as a rock singer rather than a blues singer "a misquote," at best.

"I see myself more as just a singer; I don't know what kind of singer. Usually, when I start talking about my singing, I'm talking about the style of music and the general direction I've been heading, and that it's just always been what's naturally in me. When I started out playing music, it was blues." That what his guitar teacher played.

"I wanted to learn Nirvana songs and Stone Temple Pilots, and he was like, 'if you're gonna learn from me, you're gonna learn how to play blues. ... That's when I started to get into it."

Lang says his early days touring with the Rolling Stones "was crazy." Honolulu was his stadium debut as the Stones' opening act, "and it was kind of embarrassing, 'cause I lost my voice. ... but the audience was very good to us.

"(Working with the Stones) was just incredible, and I've just been blessed throughout, a lot of things that I can't attribute to my own doings."

AMONG HIS MOST recent blessings has been the opportunity to record an album of gospel -- which is not as big a stretch as it might seem, given its similar origins to blues.

"I'm signed to a record company that's not necessarily a Christian label -- and I don't necessarily want to be a Christian artist, quote unquote -- but gospel is the closest thing to my heart, and I've wanted to record it. Then the president of my record company just came up to me one day and said, 'Dude, you need to make a gospel record,' and I said, 'You're right, I do.' ... We're gonna start recording next month."

But the biggest blessing in Lang's life is his wife, Haylie, whom he met in "an absolutely meant-to-be moment" while he was playing a show in a Hard Rock Cafe in Los Angeles.

She was there with her parents and younger sister. "I think they were half there to see some musicians play, and half there just to eat dinner, but that's where we met, and I knew right away that I was gonna marry her. I just knew right then. I don't know how I knew, but I knew.

"She's my best friend. She sticks it out with me on the road. It gets boring if you're not doing anything on the road except traveling, but she is just so faithful to me, and loves me and really sticks by me, so I'm really grateful for her."

With a minute of time left, the interview turned to Lang's bonus live track on "Long Time Coming," a cover of Stevie Wonder's 1973 hit "Livin' for the City," and his decision to replace the word "colored" in a verse with "black."

"The connotation of the word 'colored,' as a white person saying it, just kinda like violated my consciousness. I had heard a live version of Stevie doing that song, and he said 'black,' so since I had heard Stevie do it that way, I did it that way."