Alain Johannes

Since releasing Walk the Moon in 1987 together with his wife Natasha Shneider—a fellow songwriter, bassist, and multi-instrumentalist—guitarist, songwriter, producer, and engineer Alain Johannes has remained a fixture in American rock and pop. In 1990 the couple formed the hard rock power trio Eleven by bringing in drummer Jack Irons. Between 1991 and 2003 they put out six albums, among them Avantgardedog in 2000, and they also wrote and produced Chris Cornell’s Euphoria Morning in 1999. Johannes wrote, co-produced, and performed on Mark Lanegan’s Bubblegum in 2004. His extensive credits further encompass production, session, and touring contributions with Queens of the Stone Age, Them Crooked Vultures, PJ Harvey, and Desert Sessions. Following Shneider’s death in 2008, he surfaced with the solo album Spark and supported it on worldwide dates. Three tracks from his catalog appeared on Dave Grohl’s Sound City: Real to Reel documentary soundtrack. In 2014 Hifiklub released the documentary Plans Make Gods Laugh: A Drift About Alain Johannes, while Johannes independently issued the solo collection Fragments and Wholes, Vol. 1. He co-composed the score for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Wildlands with Steve Ouimette and returned to the role alongside Alessandro Cortini and Norm Block for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint in 2019. The solo album Hum arrived in 2020.

Born in Chile in 1962 and the nephew of Nueva ola musician Peter Rock, Johannes moved with his family to Los Angeles during his teenage years. Having played guitar, bass, and composed songs since age eight, he started his first group, Anthym (later renamed What Is This?), while still in high school; the lineup featured future Red Hot Chili Peppers members Flea and Hillel Slovak. In 1987 the newlywed Johannes partnered with Russian keyboardist and bassist Natasha Shneider on Walk the Moon. Three years afterward the pair added drummer Jack Irons to create the progressive hard rock trio Eleven, which issued five studio albums across twelve years.

Throughout that span Johannes appeared on dozens of recordings by alternative, indie, and grunge artists, supplying guitar to Jason Falkner’s Presents Author Unknown and co-writing material for Danish rock band the Royal Highness and numerous other acts. Johannes and Shneider co-wrote and co-produced Chris Cornell’s solo debut Euphoria Morning in 1999. In 2004 he wrote, co-produced, and played on Mark Lanegan’s Bubblegum. He later produced and performed on releases by Natalie Imbruglia and No Doubt.

In 2005 he joined Queens of the Stone Age, handling bass and guitar on Lullabies to Paralyze and Era Vulgaris before departing two years later. Johannes subsequently entered the side project Spinnerette led by the Distillers’ Brody Dalle, toured as a sideman with supergroup Them Crooked Vultures, and co-wrote Adam Lambert’s 2012 soundtrack single “Time for Miracles.”

After Shneider’s death in 2008, Johannes concluded a prolonged period of mourning by issuing the 2010 solo album Spark as a tribute to her and promoting it around the globe. He collaborated with French art rockers Hifiklub on the 2012 album From Coast to Coast. One year later he supplied three songs to Dave Grohl’s Sound City: Real to Reel documentary soundtrack, including “Your Wife Is Calling,” co-written with Pat Smear and featuring Grohl, Lee Ving, and Taylor Hawkins, plus “Centipede,” which featured Grohl, Josh Homme, and Chris Goss and served as the collection’s first single. Johannes performed with Grohl’s Sound City Players during the accompanying tour.

In 2014 he appeared on and became the focus of Hifiklub’s documentary Plans Make Gods Laugh: A Drift About Alain Johannes while also producing its soundtrack. That same year he began studio work with PJ Harvey. In 2015 he produced K’s Choice’s The Phantom Cowboy and Edith Crash’s Partir.

Johannes performed on Harvey’s The Hope Six Demolition Project in 2016 and spent the next two years on its touring cycle. He made his video game scoring debut in 2017 with Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Wildlands, again partnering with Steve Ouimette. He also self-released Fragments and Wholes, Vol. 1, performing every instrument and vocal himself. A year later he took part in one of Jan Douwe Kroeske’s final 2 Meter Sessions workshops, the host having passed away that year. He returned to game scoring with Alessandro Cortini and Norm Block on Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint in 2019.

Late that year Johannes contracted severe pneumonia and nearly lost his life. While recovering he composed songs and narratives. Working solely with acoustic guitar, he shaped a group of pieces that channeled his grief over the losses of his parents, Shneider, and Cornell. Once fully recuperated, he entered the studio and recorded the material in twelve days during early 2020. The resulting album, Hum, appeared on Ipecac Recordings at the close of July.