by Metropol | September 16, 2026 8:34 am
“It’s kind of alarming as you get older because you realise, ‘I am now that stupid old idiot who doesn’t understand anything; that’s actually me’.”
Kiwi singer-songwriter Greg Johnson talks to me on a video call as he takes an evening stroll around his neighbourhood in downtown Santa Monica, California, where he’s lived for the last 25 years. He turns his phone around so I can see what a warm evening on the corner of Sixth Street and Washington looks like. It looks peaceful.
One of New Zealand’s most respected singer-songwriters, Greg has a career spanning more than 30 years, 13 studio albums, an APRA Silver Scroll and a string of songs – such as Isabelle – that have become part of the soundtrack of Kiwi life.
I’m talking to him before his Christchurch show at the Town Hall on 8 November as part of his 60 tour (expect a guest appearance from Mel Parsons), so called because of his recent milestone birthday. On the day we speak, though, Greg has mixed feelings about reaching three score years. “It’s sort of awful to be 60 in so many ways because you know it’s over. No one takes you seriously anymore in music, that’s for damn sure. You’re over. But at the same time, it’s kind of like all the pressure’s off as well, so you don’t really care.”
At this point, I feel the need for a tough-love intervention. He’s about to play the legendary Hollywood nightclub Whisky a Go Go; his 14th studio album is due out in October, he goes bodyboarding most days; and he’s married to one of the world’s most kickass women, Hollywood stuntwoman Kelli Barksdale. He’s hardly ready for slippers and a pipe.
I tell Greg that I believe he needs to embrace his post-60 era of Madonna (68), Mick Jagger (83), Annie Lennox (71), Paul McCartney (84), Bruce Springsteen (76), Rod Stewart (81), Iggy Pop (79), Chrissie Hynde (74), and the like. Compared to these artists, he’s a relative teenager.
He sighs in agreement. “Yeah, I know. Perhaps I’m thinking in the old ways and I should be thinking in new ways. It’s a strange age, isn’t it? It’s all in your own head, which is really quite disturbing because things in my head turn into all kinds of strange things,” he says.
Stranger things
One of Aotearoa’s most accomplished and enduring songwriters, Greg lived in Auckland until he was about 35, before getting a record deal in Los Angeles. “So my manager and I moved here. We settled in. It’s sunny every day. Then I got married to a beautiful woman from Memphis, Tennessee. We had a baby and now that baby, Ruby June, is 14 years old.”
That ‘beautiful woman’ who Greg took as his wife is world-famous stuntwoman and actress Kelli Barksdale. Arguably the hardest woman in the world, her decades-long career has seen her break most bones in her body and suffer multiple concussions. “She was just Actor Award nominated for her work in Stranger Things. She mainly doubles as kids because she’s really tiny. Name a movie, and she’s probably in it. She’s been in Star Wars, Wonder Woman, Ant-Man and the Wasp… everything you can think of.”
Back in town
I ask Greg what people can expect at his upcoming show.
“Well, because it’s the 60 tour and as I’ve been raving about how it’s such a weird age, I thought I’d reinvent myself a little bit. I’ve got the full band, and I’ve got two guitars in the rhythm section. I want to do the tunes that people will expect me to do, as well as a few they don’t. But I want to do them as though they weren’t my songs. I’m trying it out this weekend, doing a little solo gig in Hollywood at the Whisky a Go Go, actually.”
Greg Johnson’s upcoming 14th studio album, Some Night Somewhere, is out on 5 October. To support the new album, he’s doing a six-date national spring tour, bringing his 60th birthday show to the Christchurch Town Hall on 8 November. Book tickets now through gregjohnsonmusic.com or plus1.co.nz.
Source URL: https://metropol.co.nz/greg-johnson-at-60/
Copyright ©2026 Metropol unless otherwise noted.