The Penticton Art Gallery kicked off their Spring concert series Sunday with a pair of roots rockers of Dave Soroka and the Prairie Daughters along with Johnny Ninety-Nine and her amazing and infectious blend of Roots and Americana.
Johnny Ninety-Nine (above and right) took the stage first, accompanied by fellow singer-songwriter Radar Bullwinkle (left) before being joined for a couple of songs by Soroka (right, at back). The series of seven concerts continues on March 26 with Ivan Boudreau and John Pippus.
Prairie girl Jobi “Johnnie” Mihajlovich has been playing music since she was big enough to crawl onto the piano bench in her parents’ Albertan mobile home. By age 6, she was competing with music students more than twice her age at the provincial level in composition. Since then, she has eagerly attempted every aspect of the Muse she had an opportunity to explore, and has finally come full circle to an individual style heavily influenced by the Howlin’ Wolf, Hank Williams, and Hendrix she was raised on. This past January, worn smooth by a year on the road and ready to plug in and crank up, Johnnie was back in the studio with long-time producer pal Luke de Villiers. The new album, A Whole Box of Shells is a rustic twang of two players and one microphone that builds to the multilayered overdriven swamp sludge of wreckless modernity. This sophomore album, draws from Johnnie’s deep well of heritage and highways, farmers to outlaws, Roseburg to Bajina Basta. Every song is a loving gesture of respect to all the things that came before it. It tastes of depression dustbowl thirst, quenched with back-forty moonshine, and taken on down to the dancehall.
Hailing from Grand Forks, British Columbia, Dave Sporoka has been writing songs since 1969 when he got his first guitar, to date he’s written about a thousand songs. For many Dave is best known as the “Fish Man” setting up his 1 ton truck along southern British Columbia highways selling fish. You may not have met the man but there is no way you can avoid the brightly coloured signs which line the hi-way announcing that the fish truck is in town. He has uploaded over 100 songs and videos onto YouTube, which has only helped add fuel to his growing reputation of a mythical figure in the Canadian indi music scene. With an ever growing cult following from British Columbia, clear across Canada and down into the deep American South, his songs are humorous, contagious, heart wrenching and capture the emotions and stories of a true Canadian troubadour.
