Johnny Hollow

Reviewed by Rhianna Cote
The Ontarion
Publication Date: October 19, 2006

Last Friday night at the Guelph Youth Music Centre, a local band by the name of Johnny Hollow took the stage. Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas came to mind as the appropriately selected Friday the 13th music played melodic masterpieces with a chilling air.

Background images of spooky weeping dolls and a fluttering humming bird set the mood for a creepy and contagious performance. Johnny Hollow is so entrancing that not a soul dared to move or speak throughout the performance time. As magic radiated from the stage, it became evident that this band’s style is in a league of its own.

As a quick techno-like beat played a constant rhythm, the lead vocalist belted out her beautifully enticing voice while playing a keyboard piano. As a compliment, a cello, an electric guitar and a bass played in the background to create a world of melodic mystery.

Johnny Hollow is a band that Guelph can be proud of producing. Hypnotically inventive and truly refreshing, Johnny Hollow is the epitome of that which makes the world just that much more strange and beautiful.
- The Ontarion

December 2003...

An impressive and powerful debut from the Canadian-based trio, Johnny Hollow. Vincent Marcone, Janine White and Kitty Thompson present themselves less as a band and more of an exquisite mesh of audio and visual concepts. Together the three have created an exquisite Freudian soundtrack of songs that point a magnifying glass at society’s ideals of good, evil, beauty and ugliness. These morality tales have been told before but Johnny Hollow presents them in a new and unique light. Their sound is a lush mix of electronica/exotica/gothic/classical with an emphasis on keyboards, cellos and voices.

Ron Sawyer
- Fiend Magazine - Australia

Review by Andreas Nilsson
Stockholm, Sweden


For years I’ve been going on about how no one really seems interested in renewing what is called goth. The genre seems to have lost itself sometime around 1986 and done nothing to gain vitality and power again. Now I’ve seen the light! From Canada comes the record no one who’s into goth or any kind of dark music should miss. This is not just music, this is a piece of art worthy a place in the gothic hall of fame just next to Lisa Gerrard and Rozz Williams.

It’s really hard to find the words to describe something that just blows you away. Let’s start with the cellist, Kitty Thompson. This woman shows no respect whatsoever for what’s supposed to be done with a cello and it’s just lovely! Cello is beautiful but rather boring, huh? Not if you use it along with some guitar effects. The sounds she creates with her instrument is something that would make Blixa Bargeld nod his head and say “Yeah, that’s the way it’s done”. Get the picture? Add to that some drum machine rhythms and keyboards that does not sound like the traditional stiff goth stuff but more like something Massive Attack would program in a moment of melancholy. Then there is the fantastic voice of Janine White sounding like she never done antying but singing. When accompanied by Vincent Marcone’s dark and tender voice it’s like the air stands still for a moment. The songs are lovely little pieces, dark and gloomy as well as happy and cheerful. Johnny Hollow are the missing link between Dead Can Dance and All About Eve and I love it!
- Moving Hand Magazine 2004

Review by Coreen Wolanski
2003

This debut full-length from Ontario's Johnny Hollow is one to pick up if you need some goth/darkwave that extends outside the reach of the usual Peter Murphy and Siouxsie Sioux proto-goth sounds. Sixteen songs (as well as several half minute instrumental tracks) complete this eerily beautiful collection. The weeping strings of cello and violin and delicate piano add a neoclassical touch to the electro-acoustics, making for a blend of traditional and contemporary gothic sounds. They don't go overboard with any genre conventions in particular and in that regard create their signiture sound. There's a lot going on musically, and I was shocked to find out they are only a trio, sharing all the instrumentation and vox between them. The disc has an overall feel of a soundtrack to a strange dream, like perhaps one where you're lost in a forest of willows on some foggy autumn night - to give a general visual. Janine White masters the spooky lead vocal style with a breathy, sensual and elegant delivery. - Exclaim Magazine - Canada