John Paul Jones Featured on Danny Barnes’s “Man on Fire”

by Kevin Johnson Thursday, March 12th, 2020

Danny Barnes: Man on Fire Banjo player and eclectic songwriter Danny Barnes has just released a new album called Man on Fire, and it features some pretty amazing guests. That’s a bit unusual for the artist, whose unique style draws on everything from Appalachian folk to Memphis rockabilly.

“Normally I work by myself,” he explains. “I’ve learned to make records pretty quickly on my own over the years, but this time around I wanted to slow things down and open up the process to a circle of friends whose musical input I really value, to collaborate with a small handful of artists I consider to be true masters.”

Man on Fire features Dave Matthews (who also executive produced the album), Bill Frisell, Matt Chamberlain, and John Paul Jones. The Led Zeppelin bassist plays mandolin and bass on three tracks, while Eric Thorin handles double bass duties for the rest. Barnes recounted how he met the mighty JPJ to Fretboard Journal.

“One time I was playing over in London and he came to the show and we started talking and hanging out. He took me on this rock & roll tour of London, showing me where the studios were and telling me stories,” he said. “We went over to his house and screwed around in his studio. I got to play that three-neck mando/guitar thing that was in that poster that used to be in my room when I was a kid. He is a beautiful cat. He is so great, he deserves all the success he has achieved, his playing is spectacular. He can do one little part on a track and it instantly sounds like a killer record. I don’t know how he does that; if I did I suppose this would be a different conversation. Really a spectacular human being. I’m so blessed to have friends like that, super genius guys who are also nice and funny.”

Check out Jones’s dirty bass groove on “Awful Strange”: