Eric Johanson’s ‘The Open Bayou’ Paves Its Own Road Between Blues and Rock

Eric Johanson has lamented in recent social media posts about a common and continuous refrain from promoters and music industry gatekeepers: He is too rock for the blues and too blues for rock.
It’s an all too familiar but frustrating critique, particularly considering that rock doesn’t just borrow from the blues — it was born from it. The lines between the two have never been clean, because they were never meant to be. They bleed into each other naturally, instinctively, the w