Jason and the Scorchers
From left:Â Warner E. Hodges, Perry Baggs, Jason Ringenberg, Jeff Johnson
Jeff Fest, the concert coming to Eastside Bowl on Saturday to benefit Jeff Johnson, is more than an event to help a friend in need. It is a tribute to one of Music City’s trailblazing musicians.
Johnson is best-known as the bassist for Nashville rock heroes Jason and the Scorchers, and former bandmates Jason Ringenberg and Warner Hodges are reuniting to headline the show. The Scorchers’ 1980s contemporaries Royal Court of China and Government Cheese also are on the bill, which kicks off at 4 p.m. and includes five bands Johnson was associated with: Raygun, Friend or Foe, The Black Keytags, Thunderhawks and Arrows Aloft.
Johnson was living in Tijuana, Mexico, when he suffered a stroke on Sept. 19. He was taken to Sharp Hospital in San Diego, where he received early treatment vital to his recovery. He is now in a rehab facility in Knoxville, where his girlfriend lives, and friends who have visited him there are encouraged by his progress. There’s even an outside chance he will be able to attend the concert.
When the news of Johnson’s stroke reached his friends in Nashville, plans soon began to take shape for what would become Jeff Fest to help with Johnson’s medical expenses. Hodges recalls being contacted by longtime local concert promoter and radio host Whit Hubner about joining in. Initially, Hodges thought he would perform with his own band “because the Scorchers really are no longer an entity,” but then he reconsidered.
“I thought, you know what — I might just reach out to Jason,” says Hodges.
Hodges called Ringenberg, who not only wanted to play the show, but wanted to do it as a Jason and the Scorchers show — there hadn’t been one in Nashville in a dozen years. In place of Johnson and late drummer Perry Baggs, Ringenberg and Hodges will be joined by Sean Savacool on bass and Brad Pemberton on drums.
With Jason and the Scorchers set to top the bill, momentum began to build. The lineup grew to include eight bands, and all tickets were sold several weeks in advance. While the concert is sold out, you can still donate to the GoFundMe campaign established to help offset Johnson’s ongoing medical expenses.
The outpouring of support surrounding Jeff Fest is a testament to Johnson’s place in Nashville music history, and the respect and admiration that place has earned him.Â
In ways not always apparent, Johnson was instrumental to the success of Jason and the Scorchers. A guitarist who moved to bass in the Scorchers in deference to Hodges’ singular talents, he wrote many of the band’s most memorable musical hooks. By the time Johnson teamed up with Ringenberg, he already was a recognized leader in the local rock scene. In fact, Johnson, Hodges and Baggs — the three original members of the Scorchers behind frontman Ringenberg — came from Johnson’s earlier band The Electric Boys.Â
“Jeff was three steps out in front of every one of us,” says Hodges. “All of my records that I got into at that age were hand-me-downs from Jeff. Jeff was already through that musical phase and on to the next thing.”
As with his records, Johnson soon grew tired of the bands he was in, which would lead to him starting another.
“He would get these bands to where they’d just be hyper popular — people frothing at the mouth to go see them,” Royal Court lead singer Joe Blanton says. “They’d just be ultra cool, like going to see Velvet Underground or something. Then he was off to the next thing.”Â
Music was not the only area where Johnson was a leader. Blanton notes that his advanced sartorial sense was helpful to Royal Court of China.
“He knew about the trends before we got the news,” Blanton says. “So he was always the coolest-looking guy. And he always looked a little different than everybody. He loaned [bassist Robert Logue] a leopard-skin coat that we used in our first A&M video. That’s what Robert’s wearing, and it was really cool. He was the coolest-looking one of us.”
In 2021, Johnson teamed with Hodges and Jonathan Bright in the rock trio De Piratas, and many of the riffs and melodic hooks that powered their outstanding debut F.U. were his. Bright will be playing drums for the revamped Royal Court lineup, and during their set, Blanton says the band will give a nod to Johnson’s work with De Piratas by performing “Real” from the trio’s debut. For Blanton, Johnson is “the closest thing Nashville has to Keith Richards.”
Tommy Womack, whose band Government Cheese was heavily influenced by Jason and the Scorchers, echoes that sentiment.
“There are a lot of people in the world, millions of people, who play rock ’n’ roll,” Womack says. “Jeff is rock ’n’ roll. He understands it from the ground up.”
