An Exclusive Interview with Surfer and Musician Jack Johnson

Jack Johnson grew up on the North Shore of Hawaii and started out not as a musician, but as a competitive surfer, entering surf contests in his teenage years.

With the release of his first new album in nearly five years , All the Light Above It Too, including the new single My Mind Is For Sale , I figured now was a great time to publish an exclusive interview I conducted with Johnson a short while ago covering his early surfing days, how he went from being a filmmaker to a musician, and his favorite places in the world to surf.

Here is surfer, musician, and environmentalist, Jack Johnson.

Whats the experience like to have like thousands of fans surrounding you, all wanting just a piece of Jack Johnson?

Its a trip. I mean, to do the autograph and selfie thing is weird. Seems normal for the first 10 or 15 minutes, then it just kind of gets into a weird zone where I'm kind of a robot.

No, its good. Things could be worse, too. Its a lot, the girls are pretty. (Laughs)

Whats the weirdest, the most bizarre, off the wall thing somebodys ever asked you to sign?

People get pretty funny sometimes and ask you to write something specific. And sometimes they get kind of nasty or whatever and you start thinking, "What if this thing shows up somewhere?" You know, 'Thanks for humping my brains out' or something weird. Its just like, Come on, Im not going to write that.

Do you get asked to write autographs in weird places too?

Yeah. I get that a lot. Im a married guy, so I can't go with most of them. Sometimes its like a shoe or something like that and I don't really care, Ill do it.

Were you a musician first or a surfer first?

Surfer, way before the musician. I started surfing before I can remember. It was growing up in Hawaii and having two older brothers that surfed, and my dad surfed, and so I was out like riding tandem with my dad way back when.

And then I got my first surfboard when I was probably five or six years old. I remember getting the hand-me-down from my brother. It was pretty funny, it was my birthday and it was wrapped up like a bow around or something. As I was looking, I go, "Wait a minute, thats Petey's board! Ive seen that thing around here already! Theyre re-gifting!" But I was stoked, it didn't really matter. It was an old single fin.

Anyways, Id been surfing since then and music kind of came into my life around 14 or so. I started to learn how to play guitar chords. My life is more focused on extreme sports and surfing. I mean if I have the choice between snowboarding, or surfing, or something like that, and doing music, its usually the surfing. Sometimes I have to commit to doing a whole tour and all that but when Im back at home, guitar is always kind of a nighttime thing for me. Or when the waves aren't good.

Have to pay the bills. The money comes from the music.

Yeah. Its become a nice balance. I mean, its something I love to do but it keeps the surfing really pure. I get to just surf for fun.

Its a little bit of a sacrifice sometimes too, anytime you decide to make it a living or a business, but its kind of different because with music, especially the kind of music I make which is based on lyrics, its kind of about sharing the song. So when you go out and play in front of a crowd it actually feels pretty natural.

Whereas surfing, I love going off and finding a spot where nobody else is around, just a couple friends. And surfing the contests, it was kind of weird. I used to do that a little bit in high school, and had a lot of fun but wasn't something I was kind of really anxious to do for the rest of my life.

The way you got started is pretty interesting. You were doing a surf film basically, right?

It was called Thicker Than Water, and we were working on that and actually a bunch of things happened right at the same time. I got a chance to meet Ben Harper because we had been using some of his music in the films that we were making, and then G. Love and Special Sauce as well. And those are both bands I liked a lot.

We were just using their music because we liked it. And then by chance they ended up being interested in surfing, too. So I got a chance to hang out with both those guys and surf, and we played some music together and they were both really supportive.

Ben came and played a little bit of my record, and G. Love used one of my songs on his record that we sang together. That was a huge deal. I mean it really sparked things for me in the music world, meeting those guys. And then also making the soundtracks for the surf films, that really helped a lot too.

You know youre ridiculously big time when youre asked to be the musical performer on Saturday Night Live. Its been years since youve been on. Whos hosted the last show you performed on?

David Spade. Which is cool because he had so many classic skits. I played SNL once with Toots and the Maytals . Ben Harper and I got to sit in with those guys. It was amazing. It was just an honor to get to kind of hang with them, and the best part was all the rehearsals and hearing stories. I mean, hes the first guy to ever use the word reggae in a song. Hes pretty much one of the founders of reggae music and so he had stories about Bob Marley and stuff when they were kids. They used to hang out, and it was a real trip.

And then he is pretty funny too. Like the song, we rehearsed it probably 10 times. You do a run through day and then you have a dress rehearsal. We played the same song every time, its called Pressure Drop.

And then came time to do the thing. Theyre counting down. Theyre like, "All right, ten, nine," right before the real take. And he walks over to me, hes like, "Jack, Jack. What song are we doing?" And I was like, "Pressure Drop". And hes like, "Okay, good." And he counted off and started up and man, he was the real thing.

Somebody take his bong away.

Yeah, exactly.

And are the rumors true about how the Saturday Night Live after parties are just off the hook?

It was, yeah. It was nuts. There was the after party and there was the after-after party. Theres probably the after-after-after party. I didn't go to that one. Man. We lasted till four in the morning. It was pretty fun.

Which in New York is like 2 a.m. here in California.

Yeah. Donald Trump was the host of the show, too. And if you ever get a chance to watch the rerun, check it out. During the part where everybodys waving goodnight at the end, I reach over and give Donald Trump bunny ears.

Did his hair try and bite you?

I didn't get that close. (Laughs)

This is where I was caught off-guard because Jack then turned the interview around and randomly started asking me surfing and snowboarding questions.

What's your sport of choice?

It used to be close between surfing and snowboarding. In the end surfing won out.

Was it a trip at first, to have the fins? You don't turn on your heel and your toe as much as snowboarding?

Quite a bit different, yeah. Much more heel and toe, much more pronounced kind of where youre at.

Yeah, its hard. The first time you try snowboarding, if youre used to surfing and you don't have skegs on the bottom of the board, its just sliding. Its almost like riding a skim board, I found. Because we used to skim board a lot in Hawaii, in summertime, and its a lot like using the edge of the skim board to do a turn.

Totally. And I surfed first. And then when I started snowboarding, for the longest time I just wanted to ride toe down like I'm riding frontside. Its crazy.

I know what you mean, yes.

Youve been all over the world surfing. What are your favorite spots?

I like surfing Indonesia a lot. I like Hawaii a lot, I mean just because I grew up there and a lot of the spots I surf all the time. You start to know exactly where and how the wave breaks. You know how it is, like you surf one spot all the time, you know how the sections going to be and so you get real comfortable. But I like Santa Barbara actually. I spent a lot of time going to school there and so Rincon and those point breaks are pretty unreal when they get good. Its just not quite as often.

Which island in Hawaii did you grow up on?

I grew up on Oahu, on the North Shore, right by Pipeline, basically.