Josiah Johnson enjoying small venues - BlueRidgeNow.com

As his former bandmates in The Head and The Heart continue to increase the public’s awareness of their music, Josiah Johnson is still out there playing his folk-inspired songs.

His shows — which include stops at coffee shops, fans’ homes, and larger venues — may not have the gravitas of where his old band performs and that’s OK with Johnson.

“I’m really enjoying having the experience of being more connected to the people I’m playing for and I love playing for small rooms,” said Johnson.

One of the former frontmen and creators of The Head and The Heart (he took a hiatus from the band to work on sobriety in 2016 and hasn’t returned) has three North Carolina shows this week. He has a sold out show Thursday at Orchard Coffee in Waynesville, a free show at New Belgium Brewing in Asheville on Friday, Nov. 22, and a show at The Evening Muse in Charlotte on Saturday, Nov. 23.

Johnson is in the process of making a solo record and said he sent in some edits on final mixes last week. There isn’t a name for the album, he said, but added that he hopes to release the music in late spring or early summer.

For now he’s touring with several other musicians and playing the songs that he has written in the past several years, along with some of the songs he wrote with his former band.

“Probably all of the songs, except for maybe the last one, were written before I knew that I would be making an album or whether or not I would play music for a living again,” he said.

“When I took a break from The Head and The Heart to work on sobriety, I really wasn’t in a good creative space either and I think that really tied together,” he continued. “I began writing songs the way I always used to write songs, which is to process what is happening and to feel better. The writing of the songs happened really slowly and over time. I do really love the craft of it. Even though it was just in my head, I made it really feel like it was just for me. I still love (songwriting).”

At a time where most all musicians have songs on the Internet for fans to absorb, Johnson doesn’t have much. His name can be found on Spotify, but no songs are there. There’s one video, for “Sea Monster Song,” that was professionally done and uploaded to YouTube and several fan-shot fans are on his website.

His name, though, is well known among fans of the current folk-rock movement and he said the new album will have that vibe, but will be more “soulful and almost gospel-ly, but definitely still based in the folk music tradition and folk rock. It’s the kind of music I like to play … but feels a little broader.”

Johnson said he still sees his former bandmates every few months and is happy to be in the crowd singing songs that he helped write along with the hordes of other fans. The group’s ongoing success hasn’t been missed by Johnson.

“A few years ago it was tough, in the sense of that I lost my one shot,” he said. “Since then, in the last couple of years, it’s felt really clear to me that if that was my one shot then that’s great and I’ll do something else and that would be fine. If that (band experience) was this amazing thing that I did in my 20s and then I became, like, a social worker or therapist, then that’s what happened next. It was really nice to have that peace. As I’m doing this I don’t feel the need to match that or get something back. It feels fresh and it’s own thing.

“That was a long time coming and a lot of hard feelings and a lot of fear about what the future might have. I think I’m in a really good place right now.”