At only 16, blues singer fulfills his life’s dream and becomes an overnight sensation

By Jane Ratcliffe/ Special to The Detroit News

So what were you up to when you turned 16? Dragging mom down to the Secretary of
State’s office to get a driver’s license? Escorting your all-time favorite cheerleader to the
prom? Sneaking dad’s razor and foam for a first shave? And, no doubt, they were all
mildly to ridiculously exciting. Yes?
Sorry to burst your memory bubble, but meet Jonny Lang. He’s put a whole new spin on
sweet 16. And your own sweet 16 may suddenly look, well, dull.
To celebrate his coming of age, he released his debut blues album, Lie to Me, on A&M,
and within months became that rare bird in music: a true overnight sensation.
Picking up the guitar at 13 after seeing a local blues band play, the blues virtuoso by 15
had a record contract in hand.
Startling many record business veterans, the album debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s New
Artist chart and closed out 1997 having held steady at the No. 1 spot on both Billboard’s Top Blues Artist and Top Blues Album charts. His closest contender: the late Stevie Ray Vaughan and his band Double Trouble. Not bad for a teen-ager with a hankering for the blues.
Growing up on a farm in North Dakota near the now-legendary Fargo, Lang knew from the get-go that singing was his bag. His entire family was musical -- his mom and three sisters all sing, and his dad used to play drums in a country band.
"I always knew, ever since I can remember, that I’d be a singer," he told Live. "I just always knew."
So let’s take a minute and talk about how the voice of a weathered, wizened, whisky-worn traveling blues man can emanate from an adorable, angelic corn-fed ... kid. That’s a toughie.
Or how in just three years of guitar-playing time he can have the likes of B.B. King call him one of the two most promising new blues players he’s heard. Not only that, but he’s even jammed with the legend.
"Actually, I didn’t feel like I was ‘playing,’" Lang told Request. "It was more like I was getting a lesson from the master. But everybody told me he kept looking at me and smiling. That was awesome."
Others who have smiled on him, both literally and in the form of inviting him on tour as their opening act: Aerosmith, the Rolling Stones and Blues Traveler.
Cynics may quip that such a wholesome teen-ager can’t possibly know the skinny on the rough side of life enough to make his guitar, and his heart, ache in that I’ve-seen-it-all-and-lived-to-tell way. But Lang would disagree.
"Everybody’s got their problems," he explained to Rolling Stone. "But that’s not where I draw my energy to play. I don’t draw from negative things. The blues are universal. I just feel fortunate to be playing at all."