Watch Jack Johnson Recording New Album in Hawaii
Jack Johnson is about to release his sixth album, From Here to Now to You, and head out on a long tour. This exclusive video captures a more laid-back time: directed by Johnson’s manager, Emmett Malloy (who also directed Mumford & Sons’ film Big Easy Express and the White Stripes‘ Under Great White Northern Lights), the video captures Johnson goofing off and recording with his band in his Oahu, Hawaii studio, a short bike ride from his home. A remarkably intimate look inside the normally private Johnson’s home life, we see him surfing near his home, playing with his kids and working out melodic cuts like “Home” and “Shot Reverse Shot” with his band.”I just really like having the kids all around and friends in there listening to the songs, having a beer while we’re playing,” Johnson tells Rolling Stone.
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He wrote the songs mostly late at night. After his wife, Kim, and their kids went to bed, he would head to his kitchen table with an acoustic guitar and four-track recorder. The fingerpicked ballad “Never Fade” is about meeting Kim 20 years ago at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Another highlight, “Radiate,” is about his six-year-old’s freewheeling imagination.
“It gives me paranoia at night now – is it too personal?” Johnson says. “That’s been a balance I’ve had to find.”