“The blues knows no color or cultural bounds and that is as it should be. It is human. We're all human. Therefore we all can love it, listen to and play it no matter what we look like or where we live. I own my blues because it is in my soul.  It has nothing to do with race, culture or geography.”

Johnny Never: Modern Roots Blues

Johnny Never is a highly regarded finger-style blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, who has studied and performed Delta and Piedmont style blues for decades. His music is inspired by the old-time blues masters such as Blind Boy Fuller, Robert Johnson, and Charlie Patton, but he is no mere musical mimic. Johnny is a great song writer whose robust new interpretation of  the vintage blues sound is laced with a contemporary creative flair but feels so very honest to the spirit of the  original blues music. His own compositions possess the qualities of the genuine article, delivered through deft finger-style guitar work and heartfelt vocals. He performs both solo and with accompaniment in blues and folk festivals, bars and music halls, from Memphis to Canada. Johnny and Harmonica Player, John Colgan-Davis  were quarter finalist in the International Blues Challenge in Memphis in 2024. The core of Brother John is the duo of veteran Philadelphia blues artists, Johnny Never and John Colgan-Davis. The name "Brother John" reflects the strong bond of their musical partnership, as well as the humanity and enduring power of collaborative musical creativity that has always de- fined the blues.

(Photo: Johnny Never and John Colgan-Davis)

Johnny Never has been performing Delta and Piedmont style blues for over two decades and John Colgan-Davis has been performing since the 1970s. He performed with Bonnie Raitt, recording with her at WMMR in Philadelphia, and toured with Sparky Rutger and the John Cadillac Band. Mr. Never is a two-time quarter finalist at the IBC in Memphis and a consummate song writer, delving into the deep roots of the blues to create songs that "seem as much at home in the 2020s as they may have in the 1920s." His 2020 album Blue Delta got radio play around the globe. It made his top ten blues albums for that year. Brother John's new album, “Black Crow” (2026), has a full dozen original new blues and a cover of Charley Patton's Down the Dirt Road Blues.

Interview by Michael Limnios             Special Thanks: Betsie Brown (Blind Raccoon)

Why is it important to we preserve and spread the blues?

The blues is an integral part of world music culture. I am talking about the entire inhabited planet. If one thinks about it, and I am sure you have, that is pretty remarkable. Of all the great, well-trained and educated musicians throughout history who set out to "change" the world of music, it turns out that an organic music borne from the brutal realities of the Deep South of the United States at a time of racist oppression; a music performed mostly by African American musicians with little or no formal education, let alone music training, has had this astonishing effect on musical culture the world over. The blues doesn't care about the color of your skin or where you park your ass on this big blue planet. I offer you something I wrote a few years ago: "There really is something primal about the roots of Blues.  It is in our DNA it seems.  For over a century and a quarter this art form has not only endured but flourished. It has spread out like a joyous  musical virus to infect countless cultures around the globe, and not a generation passes by without being pulled by its buoyant gravitas, its graceful yet at times grim depiction of human woes and joys, and the poetic circadian rhythm of our shared emotional realities.  The vibrancy of young minds and hearts keeps propelling the blues forward."

It feels tenuous, but I feel the blues, because of its authentic humanity, is almost self-preserving. Though with AI, and music consumption being guided so much these days by cold algorithms, I do fear that honest music like the blues, may fade from our culture. If radio stations stop having blues shows we may all be in trouble. 

What does the blues mean to you?

Blues. I am a bluesman. I am not drawn to all music the way I am to the blues. I first heard the blues, the original blues, as a teenager. It was these old 78RPM recordings of Son House and I forget who else in the basement of a girl I had a crush on. I was fifteen. I had no general interest in music. But it hit me like a sudden rain over a music-parched landscape. One of those songs was "Empire State"  the other was "Death Letter". Son House. The eeriness of his guitar and power of his voice. I was so musically impoverished that I am not sure it even registered on me that he was playing a guitar. My household growing up was not a musical one. I wasn't allowed to have a stereo. Subsequently, I didn't listen much to music during my early development. But the experience of hearing Son House that day in that basement somehow latched onto and partnered with my teen angst, and a lifelong love of the blues ensued. Especially the roots blues. The crush on the girl faded, but the love of the blues blossomed into a lifelong affair.  It was not, as I say, love for music in general. It is love for the blues. As an art form, blues lets me express myself more keenly, immediately, and truly, than I think any of the arts I have pursued. I can, at this point in my life, sit down and play and it is instant relief and joy. However, it took fifty years of working at it to get here!  I love the genre and love writing in the genre and have come to realize how wide open and welcoming that genre can be.

“ miss the feel and sound of the old blues. The great writing, rhythm and soul of the old of time blues - just sends me! I fear the marketing influences of algorithms will take even more of the soul and humanity away from the blues. It will become less honest. I am proud that Black Crow was made by humans, for humans.” (Photo: Johnny Never)

How do you describe your sound and songbook?  What's the balance in music between technique and soul?

I consider my music Modern Roots Blues. But, quite frankly, what is that? Our culture and society has changed incredibly since the first recorded blues. We are enlightened by phsyco-sexual awareness, racial awareness, technology, women's rights, a complete redefining of gender roles. The nature of work and love has changed. The nature of war has changed. The nature of our understanding of nature has changed. We've become grotesque consumers and for all the "well-being" physco-babble in the form of blogs, videos and articles, people are now feeling more emotionally isolated than ever before. Yet the blues drives on. It may be even more relevant today. My music deals with timeless, emotions, even if they have changed in context with the times, and contemporary themes and perspectives, including, as is a tradition in blues, social commentary. But above all it is the blues. It is simple, moving and human.

I am told that my playing sounds free and unencumbered. I am glad. I want it to feel genuine and honest too.  My music is not mono-emotional. I feel flexible and adaptive in my creative approach. I draw influence from Delta, west coast, swing, Piedmont, Chicago and folk. I am self-taught. I don't play in the style of anyone else. My songs come out humorous, serious, jazzy, Piedmont-esque, Delta or folky. The only thing I strive for is to not be overt, not to be a mimic, and for the music to feel fresh and alive. All I have ever studied is the blues and so I feel that whatever I play and write, it can't help but be blues. 

What's the balance in music between technique and soul?

Technique and soul absolutely must coexist. Lyrics, vocals and instrument have always, always worked as a whole in the blues, especially the early blues. You listen to Son House, or Charlie Patton, or Lonnie Johnson or (name anyone of the period), the soul comes from it all working as one: instrumental technique, vocal quality, pacing, timing, breath, lyrics, and passion. I would hope people find all that in my music.

“I have learned that there is a certain bond between musicians. I like the collaborative nature of blues and the linear, iridescent threads of riffs and lyrics that stich together the blues from a hundred years ago through all the decades since, through today and into tomorrow, as if it were one continuous song that echoes human woes, angst, sorrows and joys.” (Photo: Johnny Never and John Colgan-Davis)

How did your relationship with John Colgan-Davis and the idea of Brother John come about?

A little back story: For a number of years I had the honor of my harp player being a fellow named Zep Harpo. A great harp player. We had a fair number of great harp players in the Philly area including Steve Guyger and Mikey Jr. Zep was as good as it gets. I was absolutely honored when he asked if we could play together. It was an opportunity to learn from a master! We played as a duo for years. After we decided to go our separate ways, I looked for years for another harp player to no avail.  Zep was a hard act to follow and I was spoiled. A mutual friend of John and mine, another amazingly gifted musician and writer named Brian Kors, suggested John and I try each other on for size. Brian had met John through the Society of Quakers.... but that is another story. It was 2019. John's band, The Dukes of Destiny, hadn't been playing much. They were an electric band.  But John liked the idea of doing an acoustic thing.

I was doing a lot of solo that year, but invited John to join me on a gig. And it was OK. I don't think either of us thought "OMG,this is great." I had been trying to get tracks completed for the album "Blue Delta", so I invited him over to try and lay some harp on "Shake it Up and Boogie". Just to see what would happen. I really wasn't sure what to expect. Whatever my expectations were, he shattered them. It was great!  He took direction really well and we ended up with a killer track. So we started to work on playing together. And the thing is, he was really willing to work at it, even after having played with Sparky Rutger, the Cadillac Band, Bonnie Raitt and leading the Dukes of Desitny for decades! He was open, honest and willing.  Weplayed as a duo for handful of gigs that year. One of the first ones was at Jamey's House of Music in Landsdowne, PA, a great blues venue. When we got a standing ovation at the end, I was floored. There was some sort of mojo there.

Then the pandemic hit. During those stressful years we kept seeing each other, working on the music and refining it. He is a great listener, not just to the music but to ideas about approach and sound too. He has a great range, is so very flexible, willing to adapt, and a great partner to work with. Working together I think we both grew a lot. I am, undoubtedly a better player because of him and he is a better player because of me.  The whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

The idea of Brother John: From 2019 'till early in 25, we hadn't really settled on a name - but were referred to as either "The Two Johns", or just "The Johns". I wasn't really enamored with either.  I do take my music seriously and either version seemed too irreverent and maybe even comical.  That later point driven home when I went to the rest room of a music venue in which we were performing and there was a "Two Johns" poster taped to the wall above the toilet. It was funny. But I didn't want it to be.

Then one day at a bar gig, an enthusiastic young listenercommented on how tight we were and that we were like brothers. (Except for the obvious).  But he was right.  John and I are like brothers.  And we both looked at each other and almost simultaneously addressed each other as "Brother".  I liked it and John and I decided when the album came out we would fly under the moniker of "Brother John - Johnny Never and John Colgan-Davis".

“The blues is the blues. I put a whole lot of time and energy into creation and performance. I believe my music is relevant, as such. Though my target demographic is older, much of it speaks to emotions and issues that people face regardless of age. I can't begin to understand the music business or how tomake my music seem relevant to others.” (Photo: Johnny Never and John Colgan-Davis)

Do you have any interesting stories about the making of the new album “Black Crow”?

Probably the most interesting thing is that I recorded New Sovereigns Blues on a 1927 Oscar Schmidt Sovereign guitar that had belonged to a dear friend who passed away a decade ago and was lent to me by his wife for the occasion. That guitar was difficult to play but, oh, the sound was so perfect! 

Other than that, I did some studio juggling. I searched and searched for a studio that might understand what I was trying to accomplish with these blues of mine. I even called Paul Rishell to ask him if he recommended a good place for recording acoustic blues. Paul and Annie, I spoke with both of them, were absolutely gracious. There were a few studios they liked, but they were all booked (and were far away). So I went with a local studio, Morning Star. Spent a day in which the studio producer kept insisting that I be metronomically absolute. And while he wasn't entirely wrong, I realized that if I recorded there, I could end up spending tens of thousands of dollars I didn't have, doing re-takes. And the other was that, as much as I  believe in a fluid tempo to create feel and soul I wanted to refine my timing a bit more!

I weighed out the idea of recording the tracks myself. I could be free to make errors, do it over and over without the angst of having a money-meter running. I weighed that against having a huge learning curve as far as filling in for a recording engineer that had been doing it all his life. In the spirit of absolute hubris, I did end up doing a lot of the recording and preliminary mixing. I feel I got better performances even if the recorded tracks may have been a bit more pristine with better microphones and an experienced engineer. One thing  I had going for me was I recorded most of the tracks in my wife's painting studio, which has great acoustic qualities.

What do you miss most nowadays from the blues of the past? What are your hopes and fears for the future of?

I miss the feel and sound of the old blues. The great writing, rhythm and soul of the old of time blues - just sends me! I fear the marketing influences of algorithms will take even more of the soul and humanity away from the blues. It will become less honest. I am proud that “Black Crow” (album) was made by humans, for humans.

“The blues is an integral part of world music culture. I am talking about the entire inhabited planet. If one thinks about it, and I am sure you have, that is pretty remarkable.” (Photo: Johnny Never)

Why do you think that Acoustic Blues music continues to generate such a devoted following?

I didn't know that it does. If it does, I assume, as I stated earlier it's because it just hits the right place in people's psyches. The Blues just seems so very human. I mean, this is why I like it. (Soit is just ego-centric speculation if I say that is why other's do too). I think there is a lot of acoustic popular music these days too. Acoustic music seems more personal, easy to hear and digest. I think it offers a kind of finesse and beauty. Yet it is electric blues that commands more attention with its drive and electric power. I can relate. I love good, soulful, electric blues.  

As the older generation of acoustic stars - Taj, Guy Davis, Keb Mo, and those contemporary masters begin to fade away, I worry about the future of the genre.  From what I understand, even Alligator Records is shying away from acoustic blues. Certainly streaming sites are no help - the algorithms are about math, not music. They destroy the chances of anyone just stumbling across something like a good acoustic blues that moves their soul. If local radio stations start cancelling their blues programs... is that the death knell? That said if one knows what to ask for, you can find a lot of the old blues on You Tube.

It is true that the demographics of a major portion of blues aficionados are elderly or already dead. - as they die off, will there be enough interested lovers left to perpetuate the genre? It's uncertain. But John and I are surprised, amazed and sincerely gladdened when we see young people gravitate to our performances and express interest. I have not actually tried to add it up, but I am thinking maybe as much as 20% of our mailing list is people under 35. Many of those are in their twenties. That gives me hope. Many of these young people come to me after a show and they are in awe, not because we are amazing musicians, but because in all their young lives they have never heard anything like it. And they are taken with it.Perhaps similarly to the way I was taken by Son House in that basement all those years ago. The first question emanating from the wide eyed faces is: "What was that?" Many have never heard a harmonica. A fact that astounds me.   But they are enthusiastic. Or maybe they're just drunk.  

I hope that somehow enough young people have the opportunity to listen to and become fans of blues and specifically acoustic blues. The challenge is that they stumble across us, hear us in a bar and respond to the music, then never see or hear this kind of music again. It is not a common asset in our culture. It's certainly not coming up on streaming searches.

“Blues. I am a bluesman. I am not drawn to all music the way I am to the blues. I first heard the blues, the original blues, as a teenager.”

(Photo: Johnny Never)

What is the impact of Blues on the racial and socio-cultural implications?

As far as I am concerned - the blues is about as diverse and multiethnic as any genre ever. Even as it emerged from Africa American post slavery culture, and even if the audiences around us are mostly blue-haired white folks, it is embraced and performed by people all over the world! My last album, Blue Delta, got radio play and a review in Congo! The blues knows no color or cultural bounds and that is as it should be. It is human. We're all human. Therefore we all can love it, listen to and play it no matter what we look like or where we live. I own my blues because it is in my soul.  It has nothing to do with race, culture or geography.

How do you want the music to affect people?

I don’t spend much time thinking about how I want people to be affected by my music. I feel blues in general is a cathartic experience and I preach that when I perform. Of course I want people to enjoy it. I want them to listen to it. A lot.

What are some of the most important lessons you have learned from your experience in the music paths?

In General, after decades of pursuing these blues, the simple answer is that the more I learn, the more I discover that I need to learn and the more I want to learn more. I believe that if I were to live to one hundred (and was still cogent), that I could keep learning and improving to the end. My playing has brought me close to people who possess innate musical ability. You know the kind. They seem to be born with the music already in their brains. It's like genetic memory. They are amazing people who can hear a song once and know it, and then play it back on an instrument they've never seen before. God, I love people like that! I have come to believe, having studied this music for so long, that while some folks seem pre-programmed specifically for music, anyone can learn it and can keep learning and improving if they keep the passion for it in their heart. That is what I teach my students.

I also like comparing the transient and temporal qualities of creating music as an art, with more static art forms like painting. With painting, you can put down a stroke of paint and stop, and look at it, consider it in context to the paint already laid downand evaluate its effectiveness. You can do that for hours, or days. It doesn't move. It doesn't change. Only your mind and perception can change.  With music, once the note is released into the air, it is gone. You can't sit and stare at that single note in context to the others, unless you are one of those people who can replay an entire movement in their brain's ear. Those folks do exist. But I can't do that. I can play a sequence over and over, but it's not the same. Recording however, gives me the opportunity to do that. Listen and reflect. The ability to record has made me a much better musician.

I have learned that there is a certain bond between musicians. I like the collaborative nature of blues and the linear, iridescent threads of riffs and lyrics that stich together the blues from a hundred years ago through all the decades since, through today and into tomorrow, as if it were one continuous song that echoes human woes, angst, sorrows and joys.

“Technique and soul absolutely must coexist. Lyrics, vocals and instrument have always, always worked as a whole in the blues, especially the early blues.  You listen to Son House, or Charlie Patton, or Lonnie Johnson or (name anyone of the period), the soul comes from it all working as one: instrumental technique, vocal quality, pacing, timing, breath, lyrics, and passion. I would hope people find all that in my music.” (Photo: Johnny Never)

What are you doing to keep your music relevant today, to develop it and present it to the new generation?

That is a great question. The blues is the blues. I put a whole lot of time and energy into creation and performance. I believe my music is relevant, as such. Though my target demographic is older, much of it speaks to emotions and issues that people face regardless of age. I can't begin to understand the music business or how to make my music seem relevant to others. That has to be music marketing, doesn't it? Or does it mean changing the very nature of the music so it fits in a popular mold? Either way, this is a great question. Perhaps one more for my publicist! I grew up with LPs and then CDs. I don't even know where to beginwhen it comes to something like how to present my music to a new generation. Other than I understand it is all about tic toc or vapor or some other social network app that seems pretty vacuous and not robust enough for serious thought or serious music. I am open to suggestions. It seems access to alternative music, like roots blues, is extremely limited. There are something like 126 million songs on Spotify and, from what I understand, approximately 100 thousand are added every day. Much of it these days is AI generated.

What I have seen is that the blues, or at least my blues, does indeed attract some of the younger generation – but it's local and live. I am not sure how my music would ever find an outletwhere a great number of young people will ever get exposed to it. I don't think TicTok is going to do it! I think back to when I found the old blues.  It was because there were LPs. There were radio shows that would play it. But “albums” are no more. People don’t buy music. So – the answer to this great question might just be: I play live; young folks hear it and want to know more, but next to none of them even knows what a CD player is. Few of them know that Spotify exploits artists. Short of getting really lucky, my music, and much music like it, and better than it, will likely never reach the ears of more than a handful of young streamers.

Johnny Never - Home

(Photo: Johnny Never)