Johnny Marr Rocks The Ohana Fest With Selections From "Call The Comet" And The Smiths' Favorites

DANA POINT, CA-

“… When I was younger, whenever thought “The Smiths”, I though “Morrissey”. It wasn’t until I was older, and I really started paying attention to liner notes (do kids still even read them?) and music news, that I was introduced to Johnny Marr. I was a big fan of Modest Mouse, and when he joined the band in 2003, I went down the rabbit hole to learn all about him and what a musical badass he was. Not only was he a member of The Smiths and Modest Mouse, but he was also in The Pretenders and The The. He also co-wrote almost all of The Smiths songs.

When he took the stage at The Ohana Fest, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. To be frank, I didn’t even have an idea of what his singing voice sounded like. But as soon as he started to perform “The Tracers” and into The Smiths’ “Bigmouth Strikes Again”, I was like, “Holy Cow, who needs Morrissey?” Johnny was a very capable vocalist to my happy surprise. But his guitar playing, however, was otherworldly. There is a reason why Johnny’s skills on the electric guitar are so sought after, and that skill was on full display throughout his Ohana Fest performance.

His set was a solid mix of his solo material- predominantly of music from his 2018 album Call The Comet– The Smiths and an Electronic cover, but the true highlight of the his performance was when he invited Eddie Vedder on stage for his finale for a performance of The Smiths’ “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”. It was one of those Ohana Fest once-in-a-lifetime musical moments that I spoke of at the start, that had the whole festival singing along, and something that I will never forget …”

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