Check out John’s story!

He walks into the club unnoticed by most of the people there. He smiles, however, as if he recognizes everyone in the place. In crusty cowboy boots, he quietly ambles across the room with an easy grace and finds an empty seat at the bar. His faded denim shirt with pearl snaps, threadbare Wrangler jeans that expose his knees, and his longish, curly locks and handlebar moustache are all perfect compliments to a frame that looks natural only when it's leaning on something. He orders straight Jack Daniel’s whiskey, "in a glass, please," and then introduces himself to the first person that looks his way. By the end of the night he’ll have a lot of friends here. Ah, this is where John Williamson feels at home...but this is not the only place.

When he graduated from school, John’s mama asked him, "Now, what do you want to do with your life?" He answered, low-slung and southern, "I want to feel at home everywhere I go." And that is just what he has done. He’s traveled for years now, and he’s camped in his pickup truck or on the ground in about forty states. In doing so, John has developed a network of cherished friends and family across the United States, all of whom are a small part of him. They shine through in his relaxed smile, in his deep, sometimes dark and brooding gaze, and in the songs he writes as he makes his way down the road.

As a child growing up in South Georgia, John found his influences early. His mama remembers him sitting in the floor with headphones nearly swallowing his five-year-old ears, listening to eight-tracks and vinyl records. Willie Nelson was on top of the charts in 1976 and John became an instant fan, especially of the story ballads like "The Red-headed Stranger" medley and "Phases and Stages." He bought his first Waylon Jennings album when he was in the third grade. And he cried when the plane carrying the Lynyrd Skynyrd band went down in ‘77, for their music had touched him so that they felt like his friends. Although John didn’t know it, a solid foundation was forming for his own songs, more than ten years in the future.

Farming came down the line from both John’s parents, and he began to learn that life was about hard work, good family connections, and a solid understanding of the brevity of life. He took all three and ran with them, living life to the fullest, making mistakes and trying hard to learn from them, his sub-conscious soaking up all of the love, laughter, and pain as subject matter for songs. John’s first song came to him while he was working on a neighbor’s farm, taking tobacco out of a curing barn. He ran to his truck to write down the lyrics and nearly lost his job in the process. But something had emerged that would soon become more important to John's heart than anything else. He was eighteen years old. The lyrics were primitive and the melody was rough, but John Williamson’s musical journey had begun.

Over a decade later and living mostly in Nashville, Tennessee, John’s still writing songs about life as he sees it. The open road, the family farm, love, heartbreak, whiskey. His self-titled debut album is as earthy and organic as John himself. Listen to his music and find that your hearing is not the only sense you’re using. Feel the brisk wind on craggy mountain peaks. Taste the desert dust kicked up by a herd of southbound longhorns. Smell the fresh-tilled red clay, the waft of smoke from sagebrush on a crackling campfire, the welcome aroma of a river at midnight. See the tears in a lonesome lover’s eyes. Live through the memory of a man who’s traveled the back roads, walked all night under a full moon, paddled peaceful waters, and felt fire in his heart that can only be shared through music - his music. John Williamson knows the meaning of life, and he sums it up in one word. Live. Take the good with the bad. Play the hand you're dealt. Enjoy the good times. Laugh. Cry. And above all else, live.

He’s the guy at the bar with a smile on his face. He’s also the shy, quiet presence down by the river, watching the setting sun. He’s on a tractor, a ladder, a horse, and a front porch swing. He’s a carpenter, a farmer, an outdoorsman, a traveler. But most of all, John Williamson is a songwriter whose lyrical and musical highway leads straight to your heart.