Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Justin Johnson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Justin, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today. I’m sure there have been days where the challenges of being an artist or creative force you to think about what it would be like to just have a regular job. When’s the last time you felt that way? Did you have any insights from the experience?
Since I monetized my poetry, the thoughts of being a “regular” person with a “regular” job comes up often. Once I started to give my art to the world I now have to worry about other aspects that have nothing to do with my art (promoting, marketing, social media, videos, having a presence in the scene, etc). I get a thrill at creating, everything else previously mentioned is extra and unnecessary for me. I use to think this is what I wanted, to get paid off my artistic craft like some of my personal favorite artists, but I see why so many of them venture into other fields and stop releasing art publicly like they use to. This industry is so chaotic, selfish and misleading more often than I’d personally like. It’s a greedy machine concerned about the dollar than the actual art it’s using to make income. Not to mention an artist these days is expected to keep pumping out content to please these social media algorithms and to stay in front of these short attention span audiences. I have no problem creating everyday, but having to cater and alter it to some social media platform standards for “engagement” is wack. If you’re a fan of me you’ll see my work cause you’ll eventually seek it out just like you would for your other favorite entertainers. Currently I’m working at a promising start up and I’m slowly integrating myself into cybersecurity, because while I like the idea of getting compensated for my craft, I no longer want it to be my main source of income in the future. I will not allow money to ruin my creative endeavors or abilities at the end of the day I do create for me first. I will sacrifice all that I’ve built so far as “status” just to be able to make art in private for myself and the select few individuals that are interested.
Justin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I’m Justin Johnson an author, poet, and writer born in Manhattan and raised in gloomy Bergenfield, New Jersey. Some of my earliest memories I have are making cities with my Legos and Hot Wheels and writing short stories of my favorite books I could read at the time. In grade school I would always be writing or reading while the teacher was teaching, because I was uninterested in what they were saying. I even wanted to drop out once I hit 11th grade, because I was just done and wanted to get my life started in music (I had no plan and a close friend talked me out of it). I went to the University of New Haven to become an Audio Engineer. because the thought of me graduating high school and going straight to work was frowned upon by family, friends and society. So instead of listening to my wants, I went to New Haven for one year, because all the people who pushed me to go convinced me they could afford all four years (that was clearly a lie).
Instead of accumulating more debt, I thankfully got to leave the state of Connecticut and return to the garden state. I got a few jobs and around 2015-2016 I hated my life. Didn’t know what to do about it, all I knew was I like music and writing. The one good thing about Connecticut was I picked up poetry because I joined the poetry club while I was there. I kept writing poems after I left and found out about the Bowery in Manhattan. They hosted poetry workshops every so often on Sundays. So I would take off of work and take a bus, train and walk the 15 minutes to the Bowery and improve upon my craft. And that was the shift that started making me take my writing seriously because people were enjoying my work. I never really cared if others liked my work, because if I liked it that’s all that mattered. Around 2018 I broke my fear of doing an open mic and got on stage at the Nuyorican and completely flopped, because I did not practice my poem at all and couldn’t stop shaking. Luckily, the poetry community isn’t as harsh as the comedy scene and I eventually started doing more open mics and was slowly becoming a regular in NYC. I was at so many open mics that people thought I lived in one of the 5 boroughs. I was just dedicated, I also hated being home so if it wasn’t for sleep I was at work, a cafe writing or an open mic. One thing I noticed when attending these open mics was people kept talking about the same things. F*CK DONALD TRUMP, AMERICA DOESN’T LIKE BLACK PEOPLE, I WAS *insert some type of emotional or physical abuse*, VERY GENERIC I WAS HORNY BUT I’M GOING TO TRY TO PASS THIS OFF AS EROTIC POETRY. Very rarely did someone approach these topics uniquely or even stray into other ideas and current events. I made it my mission to write about stuff other people weren’t talking about. Soon New Jersey was getting its act together with open mics and not having to pay tolls to perform was so lovely.
One thing that would happen a lot after I performed on a stage was people would ask to buy my book. Those were probably the best compliments because at those times I was still so fresh to the scene in both the writing aspect and the performing aspect (I still feel like that to this day). Granted I’ve been writing my whole life, but poetry was still fairly new for me and spoken word was something so similar and so foreign at the same time. Anyway after enough people telling me they’d buy my book that didn’t exist, I was like “I need to make a book”. Definitely had enough material as early as 2012 and for the current time (2019). It was just narrowing it down because once I picked the 1st batch of poems there were over 100 poems. So I started pulling poems that were similar to other ones that I liked more and dropped it to about 60 or 70 poems. Eventually after playing around with the order of poems and reading it over and over again I finally landed on 47 poems. I don’t remember that exact “ah hah” moment when I came up with the name “Scattered” for the title of the book, but it fit so well with the theme of the book in so many ways that I just stuck with it.
I have a friend who is an audio engineer (Julius Caban @Cevser__) and I recorded an audio version of the book as well. I felt really proud and accomplished. I really was about to be an author! I was gearing up to release in either March or April of 2020… and yeah suffice to say that didn’t happen for obvious reasons if you know what happened in America in March 2020. Fast forward and the book finally dropped in January 2021.
Since the book has dropped I’ve done more shows as a headliner, more podcasts and interviews and have submitted my work to other outlets and have been published by a couple of said outlets (Genre Urban Arts and Apricot Press in the UK!). With the help of Dave and Stereotype Co I was able to launch a merch collab with them for one of my poems out of the book. I’m now working on getting my poetry over instrumentals so I’ve been working with some of my producer peers I’ve met over the years and working on a music project! Currently working on a 2nd edition for “Scattered” that’s in the final editing processes and hopefully will be released in the top of 2023 (HOPEFULLY). The 2nd edition will contain artwork and even more poems so it’s somewhat of a deluxe if you will. I’m also currently working on my 2nd and 3rd poetry books I plan on releasing in the future.
Honestly I don’t know how to sell myself. I like to write and perform so if you need poetry or an entertainer in your life, live event or podcast you should consider me. Poetry is criminally under looked as a platform and more so as an art and I’m one of the many trying to change the public perspective of it.
Outside of the artsy stuff I like to workout, read, go to the nude beach, listen to music and consume craft beer, tequila, rum and whisky. I’m working on getting back into kickboxing or some kind of fighting style.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
BRING BACK TALENT
Art is subjective and yadda yadda yadda, but let the artist who actually bleed, sacrifice and relentlessly work at their craft be the ones who get the views and “engagement”. I do not want to deter people who pick up some kind of art form as a hobby or stress reliever. Please continue to do what you do if it makes you feel good and adds quality to your everyday life. This is for the lames that are trying to profit and build clout and attention “the easy way”. These types of people are trying to pass off content and products as art, to make a quick buck and get internet fame because they can’t harness their skills to do something beneficial for society. The rapid decline in talent is atrocious and people underestimate how the power of great art affects the rest of society. My mission is to only put out quality art and celebrate quality art. All the phony stuff needs to be eliminated or take a back seat.
How did you build your audience on social media?
Honestly, my presence on social media is pretty mediocre, when I am consistent I do notice the “numbers” go in an upward trend and I get more followers and “engagement”. Poetry is pretty easy content to post everyday so I can either post a video of me reciting a poem or post the written version on some Canva background. I will say though real world engagement is where it’s at. I’m fortunate enough to live in the NJ/NYC area so going to a live show is never impossible. Having someone record your live performances from your phone while you perform is another great way to post content. You can post that same video in so many ways and once you get more videos you can edit and crop them together in many different ways and put them over whatever trending sounds are happening on Instagram and Tiktok. The trick is to keep posting. You can even repost videos from a month or two again because people either missed it, forgot or you’ve gained new followers that might not have scrolled back. Always post and always promote your work. If you want people to see your work you have to keep posting it. Realize “no one cares” people are getting hit with multiple pages of content and you have to fight against that. So keep popping up in their timelines by resharing the stuff you worked so hard to post on the internet.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/johnsonsoldout/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/itsjustjohnson/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/JohnsonSoldout
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcsME9L-g0W81uS2mHzHuNg
- Other: Book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08SV28L11/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_fabc_VP5ETX9T6ZF31SE9HD9A Audio Version of Book: https://www.audible.com/pd/Scattered-Audiobook/B08XZXJL4W?qid=1616691906&sr=1-1&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1&pf_rd_p=83218cca-c308-412f-bfcf-90198b687a2f&pf_rd_r=2T6X7SWPXQE0E6VFFKZB Merch: https://www.stereotypeco.com/johnsonsoldout Poems Accepted by Apricot Press: https://apricotpress.co.uk/2022/06/10/internal-reflections-in-the-rain-and-the-world-is-yours/
Image Credits
@Elmzqphotos @sirtheloniousphotography @thenamerazzle