Allen Has High Hopes For His Latest AlbumThe title of Mark Allen’s new album – “Johnny the Tree” – comes from a nickname he got when he was 5 years old. “That Johnny the Tree comes from a nickname an uncle of mine gave me when I was just a little boy, 5 years old. Every time that he would see me, he would never call me by my name. It would be Johnny the Tree,” Allen explained. He will have copies of the album from Sweetwater on Sept. 25 and will be available immediately at Karma, Wooden Nickel and through his email at markallenrocks@gmail.com for $10. A CD release party will be in November. There are nine songs on the album by him and his band, Mark Allen & Co. He said there is a bonus song on the album called “Misery,” written by his cousin. Allen said they did the song a long time ago and decided to include it because people seem to really like it. All the other tracks were written by Allen. The three songs from his mini album released earlier this year also appear on “Johnny the Tree.” The album was made at Eppley Studios in Warsaw, with the master taken to Sweetwater for production. “All I can say about this is it’s raw. It’s not live, but it’s as raw as raw gets. It’s as close to live as possible. That’s what I like about it because you definitely hear all the good stuff,” he said. Allen’s band includes bass player Zack Scumaker, his son, Tage Allen, and Dean “Shady Kenny” Chaplin. Allen and his band will be traveling to Nashville, Tenn., over the next couple of months. He’s heading to Nashville on Monday to record at Third Man Records, which is owned by Jack White of The White Stripes, he said. He’s going to record a few songs from his album onto two vinyl albums, one of which he said he will leave for White. “I want to do it where I can hang it on the wall. I still have my turntable where I can listen to it because I’m into that vintage stuff, I’m into that sound. I’m into those kind of cords on the guitar where you do hear that stuff from the past,”?he said. While he’s in Nashville, he said he’ll be meeting with two other bands, which he couldn’t name. In November he and his band will play at a venue called The End where Allen said bands like The Black Crowes, The Vines and The White Stripes have played. One of his songs, “Hey, Baby, I Got You,” is featured in the local, low-budget, independent movie “Touched,” which is set to premiere locally Sept. 24. His band will play First Friday in downtown Warsaw Oct. 7 and Cheers pub in South Bend Sept. 28. “We’re getting around. We’ll be playing in Indianapolis, playing at the Sinking Ship, too. We just have a lot of stuff lined up through the end of the year,” Allen said. “But my main thing is with this album. I’m really pushing this one.?This is my main one. This is the one I’ve been waiting on. There’s some good stuff on it. These songs are songs that mean a lot to me.”
