Published: July 12, 2008 03:18 pm            

On the cusp

Cleburne hip-hop artist hopes to change the world with his music

Scott Johnson wants to change the world. The 33-year-old Cleburne lyricist has been stringing together rap rhymes for years, but unlike most of the acts heard on mainstream radio, he’s not trying to simply entertain. His music aims to make people think.

While other acts on radio stations are spilling overused runs about Bentley automobiles and Cristal Champagne, Johnson is preaching about looking beyond hate and working together for the betterment of society.

“His music, to me, is what I feel hip-hop has been missing for quite awhile,” said Johnson’s friend and brother-in-law, Chris Gasca. “He’s got very intelligent lyrics that can hit regular people and relate to them.”

From lyrics about anti-gang violence and racial tolerance to rhymes about poverty and reality, it’s all part of Johnson’s dream of elevating social consciousness.

“I feel like I’m here for a purpose, and the purpose is greater than music,” Johnson said. “But the vehicle for me to speak and get my message out is through music.”

Johnson recently released “Clutch,” a hip-hop album made for and dedicated to the people. The album blends decades of influences and experiences into 23 tracks, all coming straight from Johnson’s heart.

“We’re all the same. We’re all fighting for the same goals,” he said. “Those are the people I make music for. Those are the people I want to be a leader to.”



Music in a minor

Born in Miami, Johnson’s parents divorced, and his mother moved the family moved to West Virginia when he was 1-year-old, relocating to Texas six years later.

For as far back as he can remember, music has been a passion.

“I was always singing everything that was on the radio,” he said. “I was one of those annoying kids that knew all the words to every song. I was just always around it.”

Johnson grew up with an eclectic blend of music in his home.

“My mom — she was a huge Elvis fan,” Johnson said. “So I got real acquainted with Elvis when I was small, and with James Brown and some of the older, classic ’50s-type soul music. Then my uncles had a whole different style. They were more classic rock.”

As he grew older, Johnson’s musical tastes began to branch out. He began taking in heavy metal, savoring the aggressive style.

“I was real heavy into Ratt, Dokken and Iron Maiden — all those guys from the ’80s,” he said.

About the same time, Johnson began spending more time with his Hispanic friends, taking in the sounds of Tejano music artists of the 1980s.



Hip-hop way of life

Absorbing different styles helped lay the groundwork of Johnson’s music, but his focus began to narrow in the late 1980s.

“My main journey started with Boogie Down Productions,” Johnson said.

The hip-hop trio out of South Bronx, N.Y., was a pioneering force in what would later evolve into gangsta rap. After hearing Boogie Down Productions, Johnson began listening to Public Enemy and other East Coast artists.

“I fell in love with all of that,” he said. “I had just discovered Metallica. So everything was real aggressive and fast. With Public Enemy, it was the same thing but with a whole new musical landscape. It was still hard, fast and aggressive. They were yelling, but they were yelling things that were completely opposite of Metallica. Yet it was the same. It was real powerful music.”

Not long after, Easy-E and West Coast group N.W.A. came on the scene, and “that changed everything,” Johnson said.

“Being a young kid and hearing them cuss like that and the things that they were speaking about, it blew my mind. It totally sucked me into it,” said Johnson, who was about 15 at the time.

After that, Johnson was hooked. Growing up in Arlington allowed him to hear many blends of music, and that continued to influence his future.

“At any given moment you could go to from Megadeth and N.W.A. to Latin hip-hop and Tejano,” Johnson said. “I was totally involved with it.”

Johnson also credits older country music from artists like George Jones and Dwight Yoakum as influences. He’s also taken interest in the soulful sounds of artists such as Sade and Babyface.

“I’m just like a big gumbo pot of music,” he said. “I can appreciate anything that’s out there.”

Using a wide array of styles helped give Johnson the courage to experiment with his own sound.



From true gansta to emcee

Johnson began mixing tapes and experimenting as a DJ, taking note of the melodies and sounds he heard.

“My mom was heavy into poetry at that time, and I started writing poetry as well,” Johnson said.

Johnson also began emulating the sounds and lyrics of his favorite hip-hop artists.

“I realized these guys are writing poetry, but they’re talking about something at the same time,” he said. “So I started trying to get my feelings out the same way.”

But a grim incident provided the fuel for Johnson’s ambitions.

True to his rap roots, the then 17-year-old Johnson was running with a gang. In 1992, an altercation with a rival gang for a shooting of one of their members left Johnson with a life-changing experience.

Johnson was stabbed six times in his torso, and he almost died.

“A friend of mine had told me ‘God saved your life. You need to do something positive with it,’” Johnson said. “I knew that I’d been saved for a reason, but I wasn’t sure exactly why.”

Johnson was part of a gang and had immersed himself in gangsta rap from artists such as Dr. Dre and Cypress Hill, a lifestyle that was reflected in his music. But after the attack he began to step back and evaluate both his life and his music. He and his family moved to Cleburne to escape gang life and start anew.

“I was confused because I knew that God had saved my life,” he said. “So I had this spiritual, political, deep calling to do something positive. So I was trying to figure out if I was a gangsta rapper, am I political or religious?”

Using what he’d learned and the array of music he’d been exposed to, Johnson laid down his first studio-recorded song in ’93, and he’s never stopped.



Bringing the new to old school Cleburne

Moving a hardened city boy like Johnson out to early ’90s Cleburne didn’t make for the easiest transition.

“When I first got here I was the only dude wearing Dickies and listening to the music I was,” he said.

At the time, Cleburne’s population was almost totally white and heavily based in country music, Johnson said. Folks would point to Johnson and call him a wannabe.

“I didn’t fit in here at all,” he said. “But now it’s really diverse. We’ve got people from everywhere. Since moving here I’ve really come to appreciate it.”



The emergence of an artist

Johnson continued writing and recording for years, but it wasn’t until about 2004 that everything connected for him, he said.

Johnson began studying music theory and the patters that make up songs. He also began collaborating with fellow artists over the Internet, letting them sample his rhymes and lyrics and add to them.

“I made a whole album with a guy in London that I’ve never even met,” Johnson said.

Since then, Johnson had continued working with artists all over the U.S. using the Internet. One of his closest collaborators has been Bradley Swanson, aka Low Tolerance, of Portland, Ore.

“Over the last five years I have produced about a dozen songs with Scott and have watched him grow leaps and bounds, not only as a lyricist, but also as a producer in his own right,” Swanson said. “For the most part, Scott turns to me when he wants to do something either real funky or real out there.”

Holly Cole, Swanson’s wife, is also featured on some of “Clutch’s” tracks. Johnson said Internet collaboration is a simple process.

“I would get the beats from them, make the songs here, and send the songs back to see if they like it,” he said. “After that, we’d post it up on the Web and get opinions on them.”

Johnson credits the opinions of listeners on the Internet with greatly helping him grow as a lyricist.

“Nobody owes you anything on the Internet,” he said. “Nobody’s going to kiss your [rear].”

Johnson heard both good and bad comments, taking what he could from each and applying it to his music. It’s not always easy.

“Some people just say ‘You suck,’” he said. “OK, fine. If I suck, then I suck, but at least tell me why I suck so I can get better at what I’m doing.”

Despite some naysayers, Johnson had heard enough that he believes he’s grown significantly as an artist.

“That’s really helped me out over the last four years,” he said. “I’ve just been motivated by it.”



The birth of “Clutch”

“I wanted to make an album. Around August of 2007, I felt like I hadn’t accomplished anything,” Johnson said. “I was trying to figure out what people wanted from me.”

Johnson retrieved two of his tracks that had been downloaded the most on the Internet and began breaking them down. He realized people appreciated when he was honest and kept his message real and true to life.

“I don’t like what’s going on with music on the radio because there’s a formula to it,” he said. “The lyrics aren’t there. There’s no lyrical integrity anymore. But there’s a hot beat, and there’s a catchy hook. So how can I do this without sacrificing my lyrics?”

Johnson said he grew up at a time when stealing lyrics from others was considered a sin, but it is now rampant in today’s music society.

“I had to keep my lyrical integrity and still make it catchy,” he said. “That’s what I was trying to accomplish with ‘Clutch.’ ”

The album is made up of all the different sides of his personality, Johnson said. From politics to comedy, pure rhymes to social consciousness, it’s all there.

“It’s everything that’s inside of me,” he said.



The road from here

Johnson said he hopes to build on what he’s done and continue to improve himself. His music is so different from what’s out today that he doesn’t expect a major label to sign him. But he hopes that with enough effort, people will continue to recognize that his work and his goals of changing the world can come true, he said.

“It’s different,” Johnson’s wife, Jessica, said about her husband’s music. “There’s nothing out there like it right how.”

Gasca said Johnson’s music gives people a different perspective.

“As far as relating to people today, his work is like the golden age of hip-hop but reborn with his lyrics,” Gasca said. “I feel that if people just give him a chance and listen to him, they can be impressed with his style of writing.”

Being a white artist invariably brings comparisons to Eminem or Vanilla Ice, but Johnson said there’s no similarities beyond their shared skin tone.

“We’re completely different,” he said. “It’s always Eminem or Vanilla until they [listen to] me and realize ‘Wow, this guy’s like neither one of those other guys.’”

For information about Johnson or “Clutch,” visit www.scottjohnsononline.com. “Clutch” can also be purchased at cdbaby.com, digstation.com or at Country Tobacco No. 2, 709 W. Henderson St., in Cleburne.

        

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