Monica Topping
Radio Radio Radio

One of the most common threads in metal music is references to mythology, comics and Dungeons and Dragons. The Long and Short of It is no different.

“We’re pretty nerdy,” says Ben Johnson, the band’s lead singer. “My brother and I are way, way, way into comic books. “

Johnson’s older brother Tim plays drums in the band and is, of course, blamed for Johnson’s love for the world of comics.

“It totally is his fault,” he says. “He’s my older brother!”

The Long and Short of It went so far as to have named their full-length album, which came out last year, “Caw!: An Unkindness of Ravens” — a reference to Sandman Comics.  And if you didn’t know, an unkindness is the plural for a group of ravens (like a gaggle of geese or a murder of crows).
“It’s as if the songs are each birds, and it’s like a flock of birds,” says Johnson. “That’s what it alludes to, a little bit, among other things.”

The San Diego heavy rock band has been together for about seven years now, though its members have known each other for well over a decade. The brothers met bass player Brian Barrabee when they had moved to Santa Cruz from San Diego in the early ‘90s, during what Ben Johnson refers to as their “collegiate years” (though he admits, “we didn’t, any of us, go to college all that much.”)  They met guitar player Matt Strachota upon their return to San Diego.

Oddly, having known each other for nearly 40 years, this is only the third time the Johnsons have been in a band together.

“We both played drums, like I’ve played drums in other things that I’ve done throughout time, so we haven’t been in that many groups together unless I’m singing and he’s playing drums, which this is the third,” explains Ben Johnson, who plays drums in Hostile Comb-over.

The Long and Short of It was formed at a time when Ben Johnson’s band at the time was on the road to breaking up and Barrabee’s band was doing the same. Tim Johnson hadn’t been playing music at all, at that point, so the three decided to search down a guitar player and start playing.

“We were talking about a couple of guys and they didn’t work out and we didn’t really audition anybody, we just kind of talked about it, and we just hung out with the first guy we asked,” says Ben Johnson. “We just started practicing (with Strachota) and it just worked out really well and we’ve been doing it ever since.”

The Long and Short of It has released two full-length albums and two EPs, but Ben Johnson says the band doesn’t really play anything off of the first album and EP, anymore.

“All of our songs have been getting more and more interesting to us and better,” he says. “We write as a collaboration, so it took a while to get where everybody wanted to get.”

“We pretty much just play our last full-length album and this seven-inch now, and we have been for about a year-and-a-half.”

The San Diego band has just released their second EP on seven-inch vinyl and CD, featuring brand new tracks “Welcome to Gnarlsberg” and “The Lancet.” Ben Johnson did the art work for it.

“We’re just pleased as punch with it,” says Johnson. “It’s kind of a meaner, more straight-ahead sound than some of the other things that we’ve done before. We’re excited about it.”

The Long and Short of It’s current tour is taking the band up through California, to Seattle, and back home through Portland and San Francisco. They have two Humboldt shows, allowing them to hang out for a day and take in the sights, which Ben Johnson notes is almost completely unheard of, on tour, but that’s how it goes when a band schedules its tour around playing at the Alibi on a Saturday night. This is the band’s fifth time doing so.

“We now book the Alibi first, or do something with Ian (Hiler, the Alibi’s booking guy) first, and then we book our tour around that,” he says. “There are not a lot of people who put in the work and the passion that Ian brings. He takes care of everything and it’s just a treat — it’s really a treat to have somebody like that, to be involved with them. If you can’t tell, I’m in love with the guy, so we stop through there every time we go through.”

The Long and Short of It will play at the Alibi on Saturday, March 6, with Dragged by Horses, who will be playing their first local show in six months. Doors for that show open at 10:30 p.m. and there is a $5 cover.

On Sunday, March 7, The Long and Short of It will play at the Lil Red Lion, at 5th and P Streets in Eureka, with Australian psych rock band Electric Jellyfish and local heavy blues band The Hard Ride. Music starts at 9:30 p.m. and there is a $3 cover.

Both shows are 21-and-over.