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Jon Geffner
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I was the kid in "Almost Famous," dabbling in rock criticism in college and studying musical minutae. I admired Dave Marsh, Lester Bangs, and Greil Marcus almost as much as my musical heroes Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. After college, I gave up rock criticism to find my own musical path. I had been writing songs and gigging since my SUNY Potsdam days in the late 1970s and early 1980s. I was raised on the early rock and roll of the Beatles, the Stones, and CCR. However, it was my discovery of Dylan and Springsteen in the mid-1970s that fueled my desire to create music. Through them I learned that music could be more than entertainment; it could provide an avenue for expression and act as an agent of change. Bruce and Dylan also led me to other great artists. By tracing their influences, I found my way to Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Johnny Cash, and Hank Williams.
My style of music is either rock and roll with a twang or country with a rock-and-roll edge. It depends on the audience, the venue, or my mood at any given time. Many of my favorite songwriters hail from Texas. These include Steve Earle, Guy Clark, Nanci Griffith, and Townes Van Zandt. Other influences include John Hiatt, Nick Lowe, and Tom T. Hall. I have played in various Long Island bands since the mid-1980s, among them the Rockerfellers, the Feds, the Lincolns, and Roy Wilson's Honky Tonk Boys. I have been performing solo in clubs and coffee houses in Manhattan and Long Island and occasionally as part of an acoustic duo called Good Dog Nigel (named after a particularly twisted John Lennon poem) with my good friend of many years, Jim Mulligan. I have recorded three CDs: "Every Country Road . . . Every City Street" and "Departures and Arrivals" (both available through CD Baby and iTunes) and the unreleased "Nice Problem to Have" (available through me). My wife Linda and I live on Long Island with our three cats Fonzie, Mookie, and Ella.
