Johnny Gates Discusses “Brooklyn Nights,” His Love for the Yankees, and Touring with Rod Stewart in an Exclusive Interview
He started a band when he was in high school, toured with Rod Stewart, and won over America’s hearts on the 2017 season of The Voice. Now, Johnny Gates has just released his newest single, “Brooklyn Nights,” with another one (“Baseball”) coming out on December 7th and a solo EP due out in January. I recently had the chance to sit down with Johnny over a coffee to discuss his latest projects, new music, and the biggest lesson he learned from Rod Stewart.
Let’s start with “Brooklyn Nights,” Johnny’s soulful, slowly-building acoustic that tugs at the heart strings:
There’s no doubt that Johnny can sing, but perhaps one of the most impacting things about him as an artist is the meaning with which he no doubt imbues his songs. They come from a very personal place, and “Brooklyn Nights” is no exception. When I asked Johnny what the song means to him, he said “I would always take the train in to NY from home in Providence, and me and this one girl – we were dating at the time – we both wanted to move here. She was in school and I was doing the band, but we always had this plan of moving here after that. So we would come to NY all the time and go to Brooklyn and be like “Oh, we’re going to live over there, or do this and that.” But it didn’t work out – I ended up moving to Nashville after that, but then one time I was back out on the road, and we were playing in New York, and I jut went back over to Brooklyn. It was my first time there without her, and it just felt different, you know? It wasn’t even like a good or bad thing, it was just like, it was very weird how a place can feel so different when someone’s not there. And so then I went back to the Mercury Lounge and like before the show, I started messing around with that idea, and ended up writing it down there, and it was like, trains would come by and stuff…and the green room at that club, it’s a small little green room, it’s probably been there forever, and it’s like kinda creepy, so it was a weird place to write a song, but it was also sorta fitting at the same time.”
I mentioned to Johnny that this story about how the song came about sounded almost like a movie. Laughingly, he responded “Totally! It’s cool because we actually just did the music video, and we did it all in Brooklyn, and so it definitely has story line vibes…it almost looks like a film. That’s coming out Friday. It’s actually my first big music video.” When I asked him what it was like shooting his first video, he responded “It was wild. It was cool because we were only there for two days, so we did everything in two days. And the call times were like, 6am out in Bushwick, because we wanted to get the sunrise from the roof in Brooklyn, with the whole concept of waking up after a Brooklyn night, so it was just nuts. And everybody that we worked on the video with, we’ve all become really good friends. We all text each other, we’ve already been hanging out this week, we kinda became a crew,” he laughs.
While Johnny is currently focusing on developing his career as a solo artist, he speaks fondly of his time with the band and assures me that they are not breaking up. In fact, it was the quiet times when the band was just sitting together playing acoustics that Johnny enjoyed the most. Life changes and different schedules meant that the band didn’t have the same amount of time that they used to have to play together, and this ultimately led Johnny to the realization that creating music was a passion he could pursue and develop for himself, as a solo artist.
He was lucky enough to learn from the best of the best, having opened for Rod Stewart with his band several years ago. While I’m sure Johnny learned many things from a living legend like Rod Stewart, I asked him one thing that stood out to him. “Professionalism,” he responded unhesitatingly. “It was kinda nuts to watch. You think that someone at that level – – not that they would phone it in, but that it would be like ‘okay, we have the set down.’ But during sound checks, for example, he’d be up there, and if something wasn’t really played right, he would cue the track, and the track would start playing in the speakers – like the actual song from the album – and he’d go ‘See, that’s the part.’ I think he wanted perfection up there, because he’s such a pro. And watching his stage presence – it was unbelievable.” Johnny also strives to maintain a presence on stage and connect with his fans. “I approach music from the fan perspective – because I started out as a huge fan before I was a musician.” Johnny elaborated on his love for live shows, explaining how in high school he would keep track of the dates that bands would come in to town, and would feel the Christmas-morning-like anticipation of seeing a show. “I remember the excitement I felt, the excitement I still feel at seeing a show I’ve been waiting for. And when I’m up there on stage I think, ‘People took off work for this, people traveled for this, hired a babysitter for this’ – so I want to make sure it’s an awesome experience for everyone.”
With a lot on the horizon – music video releasing on Friday, a new single coming out next month, and an EP at the start of the new year – Johnny’s excitement was visible. Building off of the success of his single “Cliche,” which was released a few months ago, then “Brooklyn Nights” (released a few weeks ago), Johnny is even more excited for fans to hear his latest song, “Baseball.” “I’m a big baseball fan, and it has a New York reference – it’s actually about going to a Yankees game, I’m a Yankees fan even though I grew up in Providence going to Fenway. But it was the season that they were closing down the old Yankee Stadium, and it was the season right before they closed it down. I was like…I need to go to Yankee Stadium before they close it down, so I called up an ex-girlfriend of mine who was a Red Sox fan, and we went down to the Yankees game, and it was just like a really fun experience. So that’s what the song is about. I think you guys are a gonna dig it. It’s a different kind of song, and we have some mandolin on there, I’m super excited about the track.”
Johnny Gates clearly has a lot in the pipeline for his dedicated fan base. Keep your eyes and ears peeled for his “Brooklyn Nights” music video debuting this Friday, November 9th, his next single “Baseball” due out December 7th, and be sure to scope out this powerhouse singer’s EP coming out January 2019.