When a waiter approaches and informs me that a Mr. Johnson is on the telephone, I can’t help but roll my eyes. This, I’m supposing, is one of those tacky last-minute cancellations so common in this line of work. I rise to take the call, preparing myself for the worst.

        Surprise, surprise. I couldn’t be more wrong. My assignment (and delinquent lunch date) Trent Johnson has not called to cancel our meeting. He has called to apologize for being twenty minutes late.

        He explains that he has run into a bit of a snafu at the studio and promises an imminent arrival as soon as he can break away.

        Coming back to my chair, I can’t help but marvel. I have been in this business almost twelve years and never once, in all my experience, have I ever seen an artist be that considerate of a journalist. Never.

        When Johnson finally does arrive (almost an hour after placing that call), he yet again apologizes and yet again explains why he was so late. “I had no control over it. I’m so sorry,” he says, genuinely meaning each word.

        A profuse, heartfelt apology - not exactly fitting with the “bad boy” depiction of Johnson by the supermarket tabloids. Of course, there is a very good reason for that: Trent Johnson is not a bad boy at all.

        Upon coming face-to-face with him, I begin to realize something: Despite it being my job to write much of it, you can’t believe everything you read.    

        In person, Trent Johnson is striking beyond description, both physically (he is five feet nine inches of pure charisma, with an easy smile, soulful eyes, a contagious joy and an attention-grabbing bright red tint to his chin-length hair) and psychologically (after only a few minutes of conversation, it is stunningly apparent that he possesses a maturity and depth far beyond his years - which newly number twenty-three). He is respectful and polite, as well as being a candid and insightful interview. In a nutshell, not what I was expecting at all.

        Johnson attributes the changes to a number of things, the most profound being his “breaking free” from the addictions that had become the talk of the industry. He has been clean for five hundred, ninety-two days (as of this writing) and admits that it is not as easy as some would have you believe.

        “Oh, man,” he says, shaking his head, “it’s not fun. It’s not easy. Let me level with you - it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. But you know what? It’s also the most rewarding, best thing I could have ever done for myself. My life is so much better now. I have so many things now that I did not have then and that I would not have had had I continued down that road. It was not easy. It’s never going to be easy. For the rest of my life, I have to deal with those feelings, but it’s not something that’s impossible. Yeah, I have days when I am tempted to relapse, but those thoughts are only fleeting. When I look at the life I have now, in comparison to the life I had then, there’s no way I’d ever go back. I’m too happy. I would never give this up. Never.”

        One of the things Johnson’s new sobriety acquired him was love. He and his girlfriend, former model Cecily Coleman, just moved in together. He describes her as “the best thing to ever happen to me” but admits that this honeymoon period of sorts has been “an adventure, to say the least.”

        “It’s hard to adjust to living with someone else, especially if you’re accustomed to living by yourself,” he says. “Really, it’s like being married. There’s that giddy thing at first like, ‘Wow! You don’t ever have to go home! This is home!’ and that lasts for, like, a week. Then it’s like - and this is her talking, not me - ‘Hey, pick up your damn shoes! I’m sick of tripping over them!’ It’s been really cool. We’ve learned so much about each other. When you live with someone, you can’t really hide anything from them. Again, it’s like being married. When you’re dating, you always see somebody looking their best and you’re always on your best behavior and now, we see each other first thing in the morning and in every possible mood. We joke that the way we know it’s love is that neither one of us has killed the other.”

        Speaking of marriage, have the happy couple made any plans? Johnson smiles. “You know, that is entirely up to her. We haven’t talked about it. I wouldn’t be averse to it a little later, but right now, things are cool. If she decides she wants to get married, hey, great. If not, that’s cool too. I would be happy either way. I know this sounds horrible, but marriage isn’t really that big of a deal. It’s just a piece of paper. And I don’t need a piece of paper and a ring to tell me how much I love Sess or how right it is that we’re together. Really, like I said, we feel like we’re already married. If we have kids, we probably will, for their sake, but if not, we won’t. At least, not anytime soon.”

        That brings up something else: kids. “Oh, gosh, don’t talk to me about kids!” Johnson says laughing. “Not now. Man, I’m only 23. Not for another ten years!"

        All joking aside, he admits that he eventually would like to have “one or two,” but is in no hurry to do so. “I am not mature enough. No question. And I’m not ready to make the sacrifices I would have to for the kid. I like sleeping too much. I like sex too much. It just wouldn’t work. And I’m not really sure I know how to be a dad. Sess would make a great mom - I have no doubts about that - but I have to wonder sometimes about what kind of dad I’d be. Right now, I’d probably be an awful one. I’m serious. That is the absolute truth. I’m not ready yet.”

        Fair enough. In truth, Johnson is much too busy to be a daddy anytime soon. Just two months ago, he released "Free," the most confessional album of his nine-year career (and his debut as a singer - but a little more on that later) and is working on an as-yet-untitled greatest hits retrospective to release sometime next year. “That is the one I can’t hardly believe,” he admits, quipping, “You know you’re getting pretty old when you’re making a greatest hits record.”

        While no one (this veteran journalist included) would ever make the mistake of calling Johnson “old,” he has been around a while, something he says shocks him to this day. “You know, I’m going to be totally honest: I never in a million years expected this to last so long. I never took it very seriously. See, I was eleven when Faraday signed me and twelve when I made "Shakespeare’s Fantasy." I didn’t get it at all. To me, it was just one great big game. I was having the best time. When the first album came out and I had to go out on my first tour - that was when it started to become more of a job than a game. God, I was miserable. I was so young and I was so far from home. You honestly don’t know how difficult it was. I would literally get on the bus every night after the shows and just sob. It was horrible. I wanted to go home so badly.”

        It was then that Johnson first turned to narcotics. “That was my way of dealing with everything,” he explains quietly. “I was lonelier than I had ever been in my life. I was being expected to conduct myself in a manner that is simply impossible for a 13-year-old. I was expected to go out there and be an adult. I had to handle all my own press releases, I had to keep all my own appointments, I had to handle my own schooling. There is no way a thirteen-year-old kid can deal with those things. I have no idea why they thought I could. There were so many pressures on me and no one to turn to. I was homesick. I was with this whole group of older guys (Johnson’s former band, The Vagabond Trio) and I wanted them to think I was cool. I wanted to be accepted. And so, here was this option, what I thought would be a cure. And it was only the beginning of even more problems.”

        Today, a full decade later, Johnson can discuss the situation with candor and clarity, although some of it is extremely painful for him to recall. “A lot of the stuff that happened back then I sort of blocked out. It’s not like I couldn’t remember it, I just didn’t want to remember it. It was a hard, hard time. I think it’s hard being 13 anyway, without all that on you. And then, with everything else and so many contributing factors, it’s hell. It took some really comprehensive therapy to get me to really accept what happened then and move on. But God, let me tell you, going back there was probably even harder than living it the first time.”

        Johnson’s therapist in rehab had a theory: A shattered past was like a broken bone that had not been set properly and, thus, never properly healed. In order to fix the problem, the bone had to be broken again and re-set. That meant opening up a lot of old wounds.

        “It was so painful,” Johnson admits, over his fourth cigarette of the afternoon ("My one remaining vice," he jokes.) “I honestly thought for a long time that he was just this horrible, sadistic guy who liked to see me hurt. And of course, it wasn’t like that at all. All he was trying to do was help me. He just chose a funny way to do it. He would bring up all these things - he would make me remember all these things - and make me really confront how I was feeling. Not hide it. That’s what the whole drug thing was - hiding how I really felt. Shoving it down into something else. Something that understood me. Something that accepted me. It was a shield from whatever I didn’t want to face. Only thing was, it was killing me.”

        “There were so many issues I had to reconcile. So many resentments I had to let go of. It was very difficult. It’s hard even sitting here, almost two years after the fact, and talking about it.” Why, then, is Johnson divulging such personal information? He hesitates. “Because there is someone else in my same situation. Somewhere, somebody else, some other lonely, scared kid is out there, doing the exact same thing I was doing. And I feel like being honest about what happened with me will be somewhat of an encouragement to them. Not that anything I could ever say would ever convince them to seek help - that is a decision everyone has to make for themselves - but maybe it could give them pause. Maybe it could make them go, ‘You know, T.J. was here, too. And now, he has this peace and this love in his life that he never had before. I want some of that. I don’t wanna live like this anymore.’”

        “My hope is that my story can help others. I honestly believe that life is a constant learning experience. We learn from our mistakes, we learn from our pasts, we learn from each other. I want to help people. That’s what it all comes down to.”

        Another thing Johnson wants to do is set the record straight. “I have read so many untrue things about myself. So many things that have really infuriated me. And I feel that I owe my audience an explanation. Not so much a justification as an explanation. I want them to know the truth. Not what the tabloids say is the truth. The real truth. The whole truth. According to those things, I’m this horrible, ill-tempered, foul-mouthed, hot head that’s slept with everybody and doesn’t give a flip about anybody but himself. And I’m sorry, but that’s not me. I want everyone to know me. That’s probably what compelled me to make 'Free.'”

        "Free," Johnson’s first album in three years and his first since kicking his addictions, released two months ago and is already a runaway sensation, despite Johnson’s earlier reservations. “Really, I knew what I was doing was the right thing, but I was terrified about the avenue I was choosing to do it,” he admits, referring to his decision to actually step up to the microphone and sing on four of the album’s nine cuts.

        “I had never taken a singing lesson in my life and I knew it probably wasn’t my greatest talent, but it was something I really wanted to do. I had come to the point where I could no longer get my point across without words. I had a story to tell. A story that music alone couldn’t possibly convey. So I wrote these lyrics. It started with ‘Stay,’ for Sess. And then, there was ‘Falling,’ a metaphor for all those times I felt tempted to give up. I had great help on that one from Tony Millerstein. He’s awesome. He really is.”

        “And then, there was ‘Public Hideaway,’ which I call the most autobiographical song on the record, even though I didn’t write half of it. What happened was I began the words right after I got out of rehab and it was a little too soon. It was too hard to finish, so I put it aside. And Phoenix Reeves - my best friend, who, at that time, was nothing but a casual acquaintance - actually went snooping through my stuff, found that song, finished it and played it for me. I was so mad! I guess he thought I’d be so honored and I’d sob or something, but I wanted to kill him! I couldn’t believe that he’d invade my privacy like that. God, I was mad. I didn’t talk to him for weeks. But you know what? He did a great job. He softened the whole thing, giving it a more hopeful upswing. And he wrote the best melody to go along with it. Really, he’d done a great thing. I just had to come around about it. That was, in fact, the very thing that really bonded us - him finishing that song for me. I owe him so big for that. Really, I doubt I could have ever finished it alone. And now it’s sort of an anthem of mine. All because of him. I owe him big."

        “‘Free’ was actually the last song that I wrote for the album. I had written, like, thirty songs and this one was the very last and it became the focal point for the record. It summed everything up in a great, little package. I remember writing it and saying, ‘There it is - my title cut.’ I was so proud of it.”

        Lyric sheets in hand and proposition in mind, Johnson paid a visit to his boss, president of Faraday Records, John Faraday. “I gave him all the lyrics, told him my ideas and asked for his blessing. Needless to say, I didn’t get it,” Johnson recalls laughing. “He goes, ‘Um, no. I really don’t think you should try that.’ And I was so insulted! I was like, ‘Are you trying to tell me I can’t sing?’ And he pretty much went, ‘Yeah.’ But he eventually gave in - on the condition that I get vocal training. Hey, small price to pay. And it’s helped me out tremendously. It worked out great.”

        Recording was incredibly difficult, but all during it, Johnson was convinced he was doing the right thing. “It wasn’t until everything was already in the can - when it was too late to change anything - that I really started freaking. I was so scared. I thought, ‘Maybe John was right. Maybe I can’t sing. Maybe nobody’s gonna like my voice. Maybe nobody’s gonna relate to my lyrics.’ I was stressing beyond belief.”

        Thankfully, Johnson had no real reason to be so worried. While reaction to his first vocal single, love song “Stay,” was somewhat mixed, the naysayers have since come around. “There was this one guy,” Johnson remembers. “He reviewed the album after hearing ‘Stay’ and ‘Free’ and he wrote this really sarcastic review, likening me to Bob Dylan - and we all know what he meant by that - and just saying all these little snide things. And then, maybe a week ago, I got a call from him. He said he had finally heard the full album and apologized for the snap judgment. I guess it had to grow on him.”

        There is a "Free" tour planned to kick off later this month with Johnson and lady love Coleman co-headlining, with newbie Reeves as opening act. “I’m trying not to be nervous,” Johnson says. “I know I don’t have a reason to be. I’ve been on tour five hundred times. It’s just this is the first time I’ve ever been on tour and sang. Singing on a stage is a really daunting thing. I’ve only done it, like, twice, so I’m stressing a little. Sess is telling me to be calm. To just go out there and do it and I know she’s right. It’s just hard. It’s going to take some major getting used to. And some major meditation.”

        Another thing Johnson attributes his newfound peace to - his spiritual re-awakening. “For the longest time, I ran from it. I didn’t want anything to do with it. I thought it was all a bunch of rituals. Nothing that would ever impact your life. Just a bunch of rules.”

        Raised Catholic, Johnson is now a practicing Buddhist, something he admits has raised a few eyebrows - especially among his family. “They don’t get it. They just don’t understand it. I don’t guess I blame them. I didn’t used to understand it, either. Sess is the one who introduced it to me and at first, I thought she was crazy. It’s definitely not for everyone, but it’s been such a calming, equalizing thing for me. There is a marked change in me. My family has seen that, how peaceful and how happy I am now and how Buddhism has helped me with that, so they’ve accepted it a little more. We’re becoming much more tolerant of each other. That’s a good thing.”

        There are a lot of good things going on for Trent Johnson right now. After weathering his fair share of storms, he seems to have found a safe harbor of acceptance, love and freedom. In my opinion, no one deserves it more.