Overview

Johnette Napolitano was the singer and bassist for Hollywood, CA alternative rock band, Concrete Blond. 

How Could Hell Be Any Worse?

Napolitano was the receptionist at the front desk of Gold Star Studios, where the mastering for BR's first EP had been done. 

Johnette: "I worked in this studio called Gold Star Recordings and this kid came in one day and he had a punk band. (...) Brett Gurewitz came in and he said he had a band called Bad Religion and we took them into the studio. They wanted to do six songs on a 7-inch and that is nothing a mastering engineer wants to do on vinyl, but Brett gets his way, he wanted to do it, and he did it. So he learned the record business real quick as we all know."^[1]

When they gave a copy to Johnette, she was so impressed that she asked them to have her boyfriend, Jim Mankey (also of Concrete Blonde, and Sparks) produce their next album, How Could Hell Be Any Worse?; she assured them he would get them studio time etc. BR thanked her in the liner notes.

Generator

She was supposed to sing on Generator (the album) but at that time was in London working on her own record.^[2]

Struck A Nerve

When BR were recording vocal overdubs for Recipe For Hate, Johnette happened to be in L.A. She contributed backing vocals for Struck A Nerve.^[3] She also had a cameo in the corresponding music video.

Television

For Stranger Than Fiction, she co-wrote Television with Brett.

References