Musician Jack
Johnson was heading to Australia for a
series of shows when an invitation to go
on board the Crossing came through from
a good friend Kelly Slater. After the
tour, Jack flew out to meet up with the
boat. Another long-time friend, Chris
Malloy, adventurer Hans Hagen and
Australian hotshot Luke Munro made up
the rest of the crew. They journeyed to
a remote marine sanctuary in the Indian
Ocean controlled by the French military
and strictly off-limits to civilians -
surfers included. But the crossing had a
special mission: two French marine
biologists were on board with the French
Governments blessing to study the
islands coral reefs and, while they were
there, they may as well have a close
inspection of the surf potential - just
the passport our explorers needed. Here,
Jack talks about the trip, his music and
his life. - Kirk Willcox
Jack Johnson: When Kelly called me to go
on the Crossing, he told me the spot was
a potential set up for a really good
left, kind of G-Land style, but that
they hadn't really seen waves there. So,
it was kind of exciting because
sometimes you know that a spot's going
to be really good, but this was one of
those things where you were hoping it
was going to be good but you're going
with the adventure. A lot of times with
surf trips these days, you've heard a
spot is so perfect that if you don't get
it A-plus, it's sort of a drag. But this
was Exploration and that's always the
most fun when you don't really know what
you're going to get and you have no
expectations. |
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Sometimes it's hard to make time for a
surf trip, but this one just fit right
in. I've known Kelly for about 14 years
now. We first met when I was 13 and he
was 16. I was living with my family on
the North Shore of Oahu and it was
Kelly's second trip to Hawaii. I'd seen
him surf the year before on the sandbar
at Ehukai, next to Pipeline where we
lived, and my friends and I were all
blown away by how well he was surfing.
When we came back the following year, we
started hanging out a lot, as he would
stash his board under my house. At that
time he was still just easing into
surfing big waves, and we were just at
the age where you would start to push
your friends, but he passed us all up as
far as the size he would surf. It was
funny because I can remember people
going: "He rips and everything but
he's from Florida, he'll never surf big
waves…" But a winter or two later
everybody was just eating their words
cause he was charging bigger than
everybody.
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It was lucky we had no expectations of
The Crossing trip because when we got
there it was flat the whole time!
[laughs] Hans and Chris actually got
some waves the day after Kelly, Luke and
I left, but it was a great trip,
nonetheless.We were a pretty competitive
crew with Chris, Kelly and myself. We
all grew up together and then Luke Munro
fit right into the competitive aspect
too, and we'd just find things to
compete in, like we would pick up a rock
at the bottom and do that running game
on the bottom of the ocean where you see
how far you can go. We found this one
big boulder that had sand all around it,
so we were taking turns to see who could
do the most laps around it, and seeing
who could swim through the longest cave
and stuff like that. The beach was
pretty interesting. It was a really
small island, pretty flat with no
mountains; I think it was 15 feet on the
highest point of the island and it was
infested with mosquitos. There were a
lot of little rain ponds and the whole
lagoon was kind of dead and festering
with mosquitos, so we didn't spend too
much time on the beach. But we did go
exploring a little and there were a lot
of turtles being born in the evenings;
they would pop out of the sand, so that
was really neat. We were trying to save
them because the birds attack them and
it's like one out of every few hundred
actually lives or makes it to the ocean.
We were all excited because the French
Military guys who occupy the island
invited us in to watch the turtles
coming up and they were making a run for
the water the first night and this big
flock of birds came down and nabbed
every single one. So we were trying to
catch some and put them in a bucket and
save them until after dark and then let
them go. |
We surfed a little bit, just two-foot
waves, it was pretty small - actually,
one foot, it was tiny. There were some
sharks underneath us and one of the
camera guys on the trip, Mike Prickett,
had this new device that was meant to
repel them. It sent out electric pulses
and he was trying it out and it was
shocking him so that was pretty
entertaining. He had his snorkel on, and
you could hear him screaming through the
snorkel. He saw a few sharks. There was
a rumour that there was a 20-foot tiger
shark that they had pulled in a few
weeks before, so whenever we would go
scuba diving off this ledge you'd look
down, and it just looked like a mile
down or so, and you were just expecting
to see a big shadow coming out of there.
Fortunately, though, we never saw it.
Being on a boat puts you in another
world. There's so much time for
conversation in this day and age, but a
lot of times people just resort to
television or forms of easy
entertainment and that's the nice thing
about being out on a boat. When it gets
dark, it's either break out the
instruments or sit around and drink a
few beers and talk about things -
there's so much time to discuss things
on a boat. Kelly, Chris and I are always
talking, anyway, but it just gives you
more time to talk out there. Kelly had
just gone through some pretty heavy
stuff with his Dad passing away and
between Kelly and I a lot of the
conversation was about that - just
helping Kelly kind of get through that
and I think it was a good time for him
to be out there. That obviously started
up a lot of conversation, like, the
meaning of life, religious debates and
things like that.
The French scientists were great, and we
had so many questions for them. It was
cool to see how into their jobs they
were and actually how on it they were
every day, waking up and scuba diving
all day. They were surfers themselves,
but they took it really seriously and
they were doing work all day every day
and it was nice just be able to ask them
questions and learn so much from them.
We played a lot of music on the trip. I
probably played every song that's on the
new record, on and on, because I was
showing them all to Kelly and Chris.
Kelly and I have been playing music
together for a long time. I started
playing guitar when I was 14, a few
years before Kelly did, but he picks up
things really fast. I showed him how to
play some chords and he just quickly
caught right up. We always played music,
just sitting around the house, and we
were learning the same songs, a lot of
Van Morrison, Jimmy Buffett and Cat
Stevens. There's one song on the new
album called "Holes To
Heaven." I wrote it on the boat
trip for the Thicker Than Water video a
few years ago. It was about travelling
and all the things you have to do, and
all the things that happen on the way to
try to find surf. The chorus is:
"There were so many fewer questions
when stars were still just the holes to
heaven," because I was reading this
book about ancient beliefs and what the
stars were. It was talking about how
they used to think that the light was
coming through. The boat we were on kept
breaking down, and we had to go back to
this one port over and over, and it was
technology that was holding us back from
getting to the surf. I was thinking
about the times when things were simpler
and there were less questions and that
led to the song. So I was just playing
with that one a little bit; it always
makes sense when I'm out on a boat. My
Dad always says that the song sounds
like a boat's diesel engine to him. |
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As far as song writing process goes,
usually I'll just be sitting around with
the guitar and I'll start mumbling
something and then I might just come up
with one or two words or just a melody.
It could just mean nothing and then…it
sounds silly but a lot of times when I'm
surfing I will write the actual words. I
later figured it out: when I was a kid
and I used to watch so many different
surf films and, say, it was Curren or
Occy and I wanted to be just like them,
I would watch their part over and over
again. I would just rewind it over and
over and there might be a TSOL song or a
Social Distortion song and that song
would get stuck in my head from watching
it so many times. Then when I was riding
a wave, I would start to sing that song
so that it would make me feel like I was
more like Tom Curren. While doing a
bottom turn I might be singing a song
that was in his part, just in the back
of my head; it didn't have to be out
loud. I got so used to doing that I
would always be singing while I was
surfing. I think probably a lot of kids
do, just to make if feel like you're in
a movie almost, and so singing became
part of surfing for me. Now, when I
write my own songs, I'll kind of get
just a melody in my head that doesn't
have any words to it yet and I'll be
surfing and subliminally by the end of
the session some times I'll have a line
or two worked out in my head. That
happened on September Sessions. I wrote
the song "F-Stop Blues," and
people sometimes ask me what that song
means. It doesn't necessarily mean too
much to me, its just sort of like the
words that I worked out in my head while
I was surfing on that trip. Sometimes I
will just derive the meaning afterwards,
because everybody can interpret it
differently, anyway.
This was my first time on The Crossing,
and the Indies Trader sure is a nice
boat. It's really well set-up for just
having fun, whether it's scuba diving or
fishing or surfing; it just has it all.
The trip was definitely really important
for me. I was pretty excited about
getting waves, so it was kind of a drag
to not have surf, but at the same time
it was just relaxing to be away from
phones and things like that on the boat.
My life's hectic, but at the same time
its all stuff I enjoy. It's not like
I've gotten really busy doing accounting
or some boring day-to-day job. I've been
travelling the world and all that, so
it's all stuff I enjoy. But it get's
hectic and the only break I ever need is
just to get some surf. The actual
lifestyle isn't that much different;
it's really just travelling with friends
still cause all the guys on my crew -
the sound technicians, drummer and bass
player - either surf or snowboard….
they are all just like my surf friends,
really. It's just the travelling to
different places where I don't usually
get to surf, so I get a little surf
hungry, but it's not like making some
big sacrifice and being away from
friends. I think just being near the
ocean in general is where I need to be.
Even if I'm not getting waves, there's
always something to do there. I learnt
to scuba dive on the Crossing Trip and
went down to about 120 feet and we got
to see some incredible black coral. It's
a great thing to learn; getting to spend
time under the ocean surface is pretty
neat. The ocean has so much energy and
life in it; it's just kind of where I
need to be.
I left the boat with Kelly and Luke, as
I had to do a show in Seattle,
Washington. It was pretty last minute. I
left the island, flew to Mozambique and
then down to South Africa to Durban and
then flew to this little island off the
West Coast of Africa, and from there
into Atlanta, Georgia, and then on to
Seattle. A quick little bus ride and
then a sold out show in front of 8,000
people. It was pretty crazy.
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