Johnny Azari

The Person
The Plan

?Johnny Azari was born in Shiraz, a city known for wine, poetry, opium, and revolution. At only a year old, he was relocated to a city known as New York; noted for grit, madness, money, and proliferation. These things had no influence on him whatsoever. Mr. Azari has been active in both subversive and artist endeavors since the age of 15.



?He has shared the stage with acts including The New York Dolls, Kiss, Nouvelle Vague, and Sussan Deyhim. He has collaborated with artists Shirin Neshat, Mohsen Namjoo, and David Kahn. A decade of work has seen him release 2 LPS and 6 EP's, score a feature film, co-write a play for Performa, tour EU and USA,create a handful of videos for youtube, two of which (occupation blues | freedom glory) enjoyed viral success, and has earned him attention from The New York Times, CNN, Huffington Post, Brooklyn Vegan, The New York Observer, and Fuse.



In 2011 he quit his band, citing differences of integrity, and left 10 years of work behind. He moved to the Adirondack mountains where he built Accelerated Entropy Studios. There, he spent a year in solitude and reflection.



The isolation and the wine alchemically solidified the revolution in his heart. Vinyl records sang to him the songs of American uprisings, of artists in picket lines and at civil rights marches, singing songs of resistance and change. He reflected on a country in turmoil outgrowing it's oppressive cruelty. He heard artists capturing the rapture of their time in song.



?As spring thawed, the seeds of a vision took root. He realized artists like Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, Led Belly, Jimmie Rodgers, and Son House were artists of the people. Their work did not exist independently of it's audience; they told the stories of the people and their struggle.



Now, he aims to take his stories to the people and to learn theirs. He resolved to carry on the traditions of old with mediums of new. With a van, a camera, a guitar, a laptop and head full of piss n' vinegar he has set out to do just that; to become a 21st Century Rambling Man.