"If you play by yourself, you have to learn how to play all the parts," says Johnson of his highly innovative style which brings together alternate tunings and frantic arpeggios, simultaneous moving basslines and chords, ringing harmonics and hammer-ons ("Jaco Morocco," for Jaco Pastorius), aggressive two hand tapping on the neck ("Prometheus Meets The Digital Age") and all manner of percussive effects on the the body ("Get Funked") into an organic whole.
"For better or worse, my stuff is a process of natural invention," he says. "I have almost no theoretical knowledge of chords and scales. But I've spent millions of hours practicing and found something I think of as my own." He may be doing it all wrong, but. it sure sounds alright. Fingertip Ship resounds with more power, passion and beauty than most solo guitar albums. It's the calling card of an intuitive genius.