New To Hot Press: Wolff sing the blues

WOLFF frontman Johnny Stewart may not be from the American south, but listening to his music, you certainly forget he’s from Wexford.

“I think that sound came about from growing up with my dad,” he reflects. “He plays guitar and we always listened to the likes of Bob Dylan, Neil Young and Eric Clapton. I never thought there were any other types of music growing up. Honestly, when I first started writing, I thought that you had to play acoustic type of songs to be a singer-songwriter. But then I started listening to John Mayer and in particular his song ‘Gravity’. I mean, he’s a singer-songwriter, but he’s still got this amazing guitar sound, energetic and soulful.

“I then went back to the blues, BB King, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Jimi Hendrix. I happened to have my amp beside my one day, and turned it up and just played this riff all of a sudden. I realised this is actually where I want to go. So I wrote this song called ‘Hey Now’. I went all in on this loud, bluesy, grunge rock thing.”

This grunge rock thing seems to be working out pretty well for WOLFF, with one of the band’s singles used as the soundtrack to a Wexford GAA ad played at Croke Park. It’s also earned Johnny the attention of some of Ireland’s best young acts.

“I saw Hermitage Green a few years back at a gig in Wexford,” he recalls, “and I went up to them and said, the next time you’re here, I’d love to play with you. I didn’t think I’d hear back from them. But then a few months later they were like, we’re coming back, we remembered you and looked you up. We’d love for you to play with us. And then I saw them on the main stage at Electric Picnic – it was amazing.”

Wolff will play at Monroe's Live, Galway, on May 6.