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Raw Johnson
Hard Lessons
Raw Johnson

As structural anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss most famously noted, there’s a significant difference between the raw and the cooked. And what’s true for food, or social systems, also applies to music. What to make of a five-member Houston rock band that dubs itself Raw Johnson? Is the collective moniker just a sexual innuendo in sophomoric slang? Or is there an element of true rawness, a quality some of us sometimes crave, in its music?

Hard Lessons, the debut from this recently formed group, suggests that the answer to the first question is at least a maybe. And sadly, the answer to the latter, a resounding no.

Ain’t nothing raw about this highly processed rehash of sounds that has been the norm on mainstream FM pop-rock radio since the mid-1970s. Given the slick and vaguely familiar musical patterns and lyrical themes of the 12 original compositions, as well as the capable but unimaginative instrumentation and vocalizing, we might as well call these guys Warmed-Over Johnson. Or better yet, Overcooked Johnson.

Which is not to say that Raw Johnson isn’t musically competent. No, the respective members sound like real pros, the kind who pose self-consciously on arena stages and crank out soulless and insipid anthems for the masses. The guitar work by Dave Walsh and Hugo Rodriguez, complete with plenty of fret-running noodling and wa-wa pedaling, is generally crisp and well executed. The rhythm section, anchored by Rich Sellers on bass and Stevan Rutherford on drums, with keyboards by Chris Watkins, knows how to negotiate some heavily traveled grooves, and vocalist/lyricist Rodriguez sings with self-assurance and some dramatic flair. But none of it adds up to anything real, much less raw.

Instead, we get hugely derivative numbers such as “The Lucky One.” Here, power chords a-crunching, the guys seem to channel any of several thankfully long-gone ’70s supergroups (Boston, Journey, Foreigner — take your pick) while grandly articulating the dull hook: “You were always the lucky one / Never feeling no pain / If you could turn back the hands of time / Would you do it the same.”

In “Desert Moon,” the mood at first is toned down for some acoustic guitar strumming and ballad singing. But, as expected, it eventually builds toward another overwrought climax of power-rock pretentiousness. “All my life has been a search for something / Some folks search forever more,” the harmonious voices so earnestly sing. “But when your body’s shaking / And your head is aching / You’d better search for something more.” Then there’s a whole bunch of exceedingly common guitar fireworks before the tune returns to the simple acoustic phrases of the intro.

If you’ve never heard of Raw Johnson, don’t worry. Assuming you’ve been around for more than a couple of decades, you’ve heard it all before.