By Shawn Williams
Music City News
April 1986

Strolling around Nashville Fairgrounds during last year's Fan Fair, RCA Records recording artist Michael Johnson was approached by a camera-wielding woman in obvious pursuit of a souvenir snapshot, "Are you somebody?" she asked.

Not one to blow his own talented horn, Johnson humbly replied in the negative, though his modesty prevented him from mentioning the fact that he was, in fact, very much a somebody in music circles.

Johnson has recently been on the country music airwaves with his duet record with Sylvia, I Love You By Heart. Prior to his signing with RCA Records and diving into country music, Johnson had an impressive list of pop hits such as This Night Wont Last Forever, Almost Like Being In Love, I'll Always Love You and the blockbuster 1978 hit Bluer Than Blue.

But his ties to Nashville are not newly formed. Brent Maher (the man behind the board on the Judds and Sylvia's latest albums) produced Johnson's biggest hits and became reacquainted in the studio with the singer as he produced his debut album for RCA, "Wings."The first single Gotta Learn To Love Without You was released in late March.

Though Johnson cut his musical teeth elsewhere, he stresses country is no stretch for him. "I really came out of folk music and other than a love for Hank Willians I can't say that I grew up on country music," says the boyishly handsome 41-year-old. "1 was a typical teenager of my day. I Loved Chuck Berry and Elvis and that is where my roots are. But what I really love about country music are the songs. Country writers write songs with verses and bridges, and being a song man, I love it. In pop you write arrangements and allow for production and the lyrics are sometimes not good."

Born and raised in Denver, Johnson was thrust into the spotlight in his early 20s after winning a college talent contest. Part of his earnings were a tape recorder, a two-week performing engagement at a Chicago coffee house and a recording contract with CBS Records.

"It all sounds pretty terrific but it was really a rude awakening for me," he remembers. The tape recorder didn't work and they didn't tell me I wasn't going to be paid at the cottee house. The album sold a total of twenty-three copies, fourteen of which I know family members have," he laughs.

Currently a Minnesota resident, Johnson and his wife Sally, a professional gourmet chef, are mulling the possibility of relocating to Nashville with their two sons, Stan, five, and Leo, three. Though he has just recently reactivated his recording career, Johnson doesn't regard his new status as a "comeback."

"I think when you are visible for a while, disappear and then are visible again people tend to assume you went into selling aluminum siding or something," he jokes. "That's not the case with me. I've been doing concerts and stuff. So maybe this album will make me visible again."