BIO

SUPERNATURAL RADIO
2024

As a singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer, Jonny Polonsky quietly exerts a magnetic pull throughout popular music. He is a solo artist releasing his music, and his immense talents have attracted a cosmic cohort of generational icons into his orbit. At the same time, he releases his music; he is also the rare musician equally comfortable on award-winning and chart-topping albums alongside the late Johnny Cash, Neil Diamond, and The Chicks as he is pushing boundaries in tandem with Puscifer, Tom Morello, and Tim Commerford. He is the very definition of a “journeyman artist” and is one of the most sought-after musicians in the world.

His solo projects feature a striking and singular voice amplified in 2024 on his new LP, Supernatural Radio, available on Stone Gossard’s Loosegroove Records.

In the beginning:
Jonny grew up in Chicago, where he cultivated his passion for music as a performer, multi-instrumentalist, and songwriter. He cut D.I.Y. demos on cassettes and sent them throughout a postage-driven pre-internet underground. He found a champion in Frank Black of Pixies, who produced Jonny’s demo and shared it with legendary producer Rick Rubin. The iconic music executive signed a 21-year-old Jonny to his label, Def American (American Recordings). 1996 saw him unveil his seminal full-length debut, Hi My Name is Jonny, to critical acclaim in Rolling Stone, The New York Times, and MTV. 24 years later, a Belgian documentary, Hi My Name is Jonny Polonsky, nodded to the title and chronicled his 2020 headline run across Belgium.

In between, Jonny amassed one of the most impressive catalogs in music. His collaboration with Rubin notably extended to a string of influential records. Jonny handled electric guitar, acoustic, lap steel, piano, and bass duties on The Chicks’ five-time GRAMMY® Award-winning multiplatinum smash Taking the Long Way [2006]. The latter bowed at #1 on the Billboard 200. He performed on Neil Diamond’s gold-certified 12 Songs [2005] and Home Before Dark [2008], marking the legendary vocalist’s first #1 debut on the Billboard 200. Jonny played guitar on Cash’s American V: A Hundred Highways [2006] and American VI: Ain’t No Grave [2010], even performing on one of the final Cash-penned tunes, “Like the 309.” He joined forces with Puscifer as a co-writer, multi-instrumentalist, and touring member on a pair of acclaimed full-length records, V is for Vagina [2007] and Conditions of My Parole [2011]. He has worked with everyone from John Frusciante, Flea, Steve Vai, Pete Yorn, Joe Satriani, and Sammy Hagar to Slash, Jerry Cantrell of Alice In Chains, Slash, Serj Tankian of System of a Down, and Lisa Loeb in addition to the late Wayne Kramer of MC5 and Lemmy Kilmister of Motörhead.

Simultaneously, he continued to progress as a solo artist across albums such as Intergalactic Messenger of Divine Light and Love [2012], Fresh Flesh [2018], Kingdom of Sleep [2020], and Power and Greed and Money and Sex and Death [2020]. Along the way, he upheld a tradition of attracting dynamic guests into the studio, including the late Mark Lanegan [Screaming Trees, Queens of the Stone Age] and Cedric Bixler-Zavala [The Mars Volta, At the Drive-In]. Linking up with Loosegroove, he unveiled Rise of the Rebel Angels in 2023. It incited the applause of American Songwriter, The Big Takeover, and Guitar Player who christened him “incredibly prolific.”

In 2024, he delivered his most irresistible, impactful, and inimitable songs via Supernatural Radio. For the LP, he enlisted a murderers row of collaborators: drummer Jack Irons [Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pearl Jam], pianist and organist Benmont Tench [Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers], guitarist and background vocalist Alain Johannes [Chris Cornell, Queens of the Stone Age, Eleven], and drummer Steve Jordan [The Rolling Stones], to name a few.

Tench best summarized this body of work: “Jonny Polonsky’s latest record, Supernatural Radio, is a special one. It’s no longer than it needs to be, just exactly long enough to get you where he wants you to go.”

The sound of a freight train on the album powers up the title track, “Supernatural Radio.” Guitar wails like a siren as his breathy vocals weigh heavy on a trudging beat. Taking a left turn, strings uplift a hypnotic hook as he notes, “They all sing along on supernatural radio.” Elsewhere, an unexpectedly sunny groove underscores “Sleepwalking Through The Wrong Life.” Manic whispers pierce through airy keys on the refrain, giving way to a fret-burning solo. Lush orchestration and softly strummed chords set the scene on the finale, “Something Like An Angel.” Barely containing raw emotion, he laments, “If I had one more day, I would tell you how I feel, but you’re something like an angel now.”

With more brewing on the horizon, Jonny continues to shine at the center of a sonic universe that’s distinctly his own.

“I started making this record in early 2021, with the idea that it was going to be done quickly, cheaply and by myself. Three years, half a dozen boyhood idols, one Macedonian orchestra, and many thousands of dollars later, it turned out to be none of those things. Behold the epic splendor and sonic majesty that is Supernatural Radio!” - Jonny Polonksy

“I started writing the songs in early 2021, just after lockdown. I wanted to make music that was fun and uplifting but still talked about what was going on in the world and how I felt about it all. (Yes, a cheerful Covid record!)” - Jonny Polonsky

“Sometimes I write to articulate how I already feel, but often I will write and discover how I feel about something and it becomes a revelatory thing for me. Or I use the process of writing as a way of changing how I feel to how I want to feel.” - Jonny Polonsky

“I produced the record myself and recorded all my parts at home, and the guest musicians all recorded at their homes as well. Alain Johannes mixed the record and he also played some amazing guitar and a bunch of other instruments on several songs. Al is a true musical force of nature. Every musician on this record was a teenage hero of mine. It wasn’t even designed to be like that, it all just kind of fell together that way.“ - Jonny Polonsky

“Polonsky has continued to release critically lauded, if not necessarily commercially massive, solo efforts, making him something of a cult favorite among rock and pop aficionados in the know. At the same time, he’s experienced a remarkable career as a collaborator, with his name attached to recordings by everyone from Johnny Cash (he played on his posthumous releases American V and VI) and Neil Diamond to Tom Morello, the Dixie Chicks and Donovan. Polonsky continues to be incredibly prolific.” - Guitar Player

“Now decades into his career, Polonsky has shed the fresh-faced, quirky sheen of his debut, but his skill with hooks has only gotten sharper—as has his ability to rip a killer guitar solo” - Chicago Reader