Carissa Johnson’s Blue Hour gets physical release for the first time
Boston-based singer-songwriter Carissa Johnson recently released her fifth studio album, a ten song LP called Blue Hour. The record is her first non-acoustic solo album since 2016 as she has traditionally released music with her band The Cure-Alls in recent years. Johnson and The Cure-Alls even triumphed at Boston’s iconic Rock and Roll Rumble in 2017 and took home the Boston Music Award for New Act of the Year that same year.
Talking about her choice to go back to recording solo Johnson says: “I used to feel like I had to be more restrictive or formulaic and force the songs I was writing to fit my ‘sound’ but now I want my sound to grow and change with me,” says Johnson. “I used to be so protective and would overthink the lyrics I’d write, not really saying exactly what I wanted to. It’s been a process of getting over feeling super terrified and vulnerable, but I’m trying to embrace it and write exactly how I feel.”
The record was created by primarily by Johnson and producer Benny Grotto at Mad Oak Studios and mastered by Jeff Lipton and Maria Rice at Peerless Mastering. To fill out the sound, Johnson worked with sessions musicians, including guitarists Tanya Venom, Lukas Kattar, Steph Curran, bassist Sean McLaughlin, and drummer Ryan Manning. “I brought in a bunch of friends to play on the record, I wanted it to be really collaborative,” says Johnson. “All of the people who played on it are good friends that I’d worked with before, so there was a really healthy back and forth between taking direction and getting their personal flourishes on the album.”
Carissa Johnson’s most recent album, Blue Hour, is now available in record stores for the first time – HERE.
See Carissa Johnson this fall around New England:
