{"id":49263,"date":"2025-10-16T14:52:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T14:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/16\/photographer-eric-johnson-remembers-cruising-new-york-with-dangelo\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T14:52:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T14:52:11","slug":"photographer-eric-johnson-remembers-cruising-new-york-with-dangelo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/16\/photographer-eric-johnson-remembers-cruising-new-york-with-dangelo\/","title":{"rendered":"Photographer Eric Johnson Remembers Cruising New York With D’Angelo"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n\t
\n\t\t\tO<\/span>
\n\t\t<\/span>n October 14, the iconic singer D\u2019Angelo<\/a> died of pancreatic cancer at 51. Tributes and recollections<\/em><\/a> of the <\/em>Brown Sugar, <\/em>Voodoo, and <\/em>Black Messiah artist poured in from all over the world, including from legendary photographer Eric Johnson, who posted never-before-seen pictures he took of the soulman in the nineties. Johnson, who\u2019s shot the likes of Notorious B.I.G, J Dilla, Lauryn Hill, and directed Maxwell\u2019s \u201cTil The Cops Come Knockin\u2019\u201d music video, told us about his chance first encounter with D\u2019Angelo in the nineties, and hanging out with him during a guerrilla-style photoshoot.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\n\tBack in the nineties, my best friend was Sarah Anne Webb from [British band] D\u2019Influence. She would come to New York [and] hang out with me. I had this little \u201866 Mustang convertible we\u2019d drive around the city. My friend had a photo studio on 25th Street [in Manhattan], and there was a recording studio a couple of doors down that all the rappers used to work in. One day, me and Sarah were parked on the street. It\u2019s a summer day, just chillin\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWe see this dude, little guy, [and] she thinks he\u2019s cute. So she yells from across the street, \u201cYo, you like fat girls?\u201d And he was like, \u201cHell yeah!\u201d That was the first exchange I ever had with D\u2019Angelo. I didn\u2019t know who he was at that point.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t[One or two years later], Interview Magazine<\/em> hit me up and said that they wanted me to shoot three upcoming artists. I didn\u2019t have a studio, so I was like, \u201cI\u2019ll invite them to Brooklyn to my apartment and take them on the roof.\u201d Sarah was staying with me [at] this particular moment as well. Three [acts] came: this band called Brooklyn Funk Essentials, Faith Evans, and D\u2019Angelo. Sarah says to me, \u201cYo, that\u2019s the dude that I asked if he liked fat girls.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen you look back, it\u2019s so interesting. What were the chances that I would be with this big girl who would ask D\u2019Angelo if he liked fat girls? And then for him to show up at my house? It was so interesting that I was hanging out with Sarah this time [as well] because she lived in London. I feel like something drove us to each other in the most chill, genuine way. There\u2019s lots of blocks in Manhattan. There\u2019s lots of hours in the day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n

\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n

\n\tI felt like [at the shoot] D\u2019Angelo was a bit detached from being in a group. You could tell when people are intermingling and [being personable] vs. someone who\u2019s kind of like, \u201cI\u2019ll just stand over here by myself.\u201d The idea of all of these people being introduced together\u2026when you look back, you can tell that\u2019s not necessarily D\u2019Angelo\u2019s style. So it was a dry photo with all these people. When he got back to Interview<\/em>, they were like, \u201cYou know what? Let\u2019s just do everybody separate.\u201d So I shot all of \u2019em separately, and me and D\u2019Angelo became cool. We didn\u2019t have a budget, I would always have a 4 x 4, like a Jeep Pathfinder or something like that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI would just meet somewhere and whoever I was shooting would hop in the Jeep and we\u2019d drive around and [take] photos. That\u2019s my thing anyway, I feel like I\u2019m good on the spot. When I was young, I would like to see those photos in London of those punk bands, Sid Vicious and shit. It\u2019s just something about that badass attitude. I feel like because I came into the scene with alternative-punk taste, I was turned on by raw photography [where] you could see a picture of The Clash on the street. That inspired me to shoot people like that. I felt like if you are in middle America or any place and you have this idea of New York, what would be cooler than the idea that you could go to New York and run into D\u2019Angelo on the street?<\/p>\n

\n\tI always wanted to give people outside of New York a really normal idea of what it could be out with the homies hanging out. Playing music, getting stoned or whatever, but documenting it and taking photos. And you can see in the photos [with D\u2019Angelo], he\u2019s smoking blunts in some of the photos. It wasn\u2019t like we felt like smoking blunts or whatever was druggie. Everyone smoked, but everyone was getting their work done. I mean, you\u2019d look back at what he was producing. It was insane.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n

\n

\t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n

\n\tI posted a photo yesterday<\/a> and told a little bit of that story. It\u2019s my most popular photo of all time. We\u2019re all young. We\u2019re driving around listening to new music, listening to demos, talking about music [and] what we were working on. It was mostly talking about music, because when you look back, it really was so many badass records coming out all the time. So I was really psyched to be a part of it. Everyone\u2019s kind of checking out what other people are doing. [Those] were my first couple of [exchanges] with D\u2019Angelo. Our personalities were really compatible and cool. If you were in shoots, an artist would bring a cassette or CD of their demos. So anytime you\u2019re going to meet an artist, you\u2019re going to hear something. I felt like the first time [I heard his music] it was him [playing it], but then he started building up steam, doing radio, videos, and things like that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>

\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEric Johnson<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\n\tI asked [photographer Jamel Toppin], who was my assistant that day, if he remembered anything about [shooting] D\u2019Angelo. He [messaged back], \u201cI rolled 1 million Blunts. It was the day that you and I first met, actually. I was working in a Supreme store. I left on my lunch break and came to meet you with my portfolio. I had a pound of weed in my backpack that day. You hired me on the spot, I called the store and quit, and we went out to shoot D\u2019Angelo that afternoon. He smelled the weed and became super pumped. He had a five-pack of Phillies in his pocket. I used to see him around the city a lot over the years. And every time he remembered that day. Outside of the [shoot for] album packaging, I think that was one of his first shoots because [\u201cBrown Sugar\u201d] had just come out.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tYou can see my assistant in the back of D\u2019Angelo [in one of the photos] because we have the trunk of the 4 x 4 out, it\u2019s kind of like a studio. That\u2019s funny: Imagine having a five-pack of the Phillies and not the weed. That means you\u2019re going to bring something to the table. I think it\u2019s adorable. But he also knew who he was; he was going to find somebody with weed.<\/p>\n

\n\tDominique Trenier, [D\u2019Angelo\u2019s former manager], was one of my friends, [and] got in trouble somehow [one day in the nineties]. We were in court [at the same time]. Everyone\u2019s waiting to get their time in front of the judge so they could decide how much you\u2019re going to get, and I was like, \u201cIs that fucking Dominique Trenier?\u201d I happened to go Club Trinity [later that night], Dominique and D\u2019Angelo are [there]. Dominique was like, \u201cYo dude, was that you in court?\u201d And I was like, \u201cYeah, what was you there for?\u201d He\u2019s like, \u201cI can\u2019t even get into it.\u201d But it set the tone on just how live we all were. Clearly D\u2019Angelo was a little bit live too.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen we were hanging out in the club, he and Dominique were saying how crazy it was that he couldn\u2019t get signed in the beginning. It was still at that stage where you\u2019re like, \u201cWow, this is happening.\u201d Everything that was going to happen hadn\u2019t happened yet. I remember seeing the video for the \u201cMy Lady\u201d remix, Erykah and all those girls in it. I was like, \u201cWow, this guy really is doing something.\u201d It was cool to watch because he was the homie. He was so nondescript, the way that we chilled. He wasn\u2019t walking around like a rockstar, and you can tell in those photos. I just like the idea of getting people at a certain time, when they\u2019re just about to [blow up].\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s something so soulful about D\u2019Angelo. His integrity musically was just so layered. At his peak, which I would say is the Voodoo<\/em> album, you put that up there with Prince or Sly Stone or something. He\u2019s definitely one of those greats at his peak. Some people argue that the shelf life was not so long because of the amount of time and the amount of product. But if someone puts out something that\u2019s fucking good, I don\u2019t care how much they put out. D\u2019Angelo didn\u2019t put out that many albums, but Voodoo<\/em> is up there, production wise, with the best albums of all time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWithout social media, you kind of lose touch a little bit. For some reason I wasn\u2019t ever the type to follow up relationships with any of the artists I worked with. The ones that I stayed the closest with were the ones who would hit me up all the time. I remember that day he gave me his number and I just looked at it because I was like, \u201cWhat am I going to do with this? What the fuck am I gonna call D\u2019Angelo for?\u201d [Laughs]<\/p>\n

\n\tIf one of my assistants worked with another photographer and D\u2019Angelo shot with him, he\u2019d be like, \u201cYo tell Eric I said, \u2018What\u2019s up?\u2019\u201d So that was it, because you never really think you\u2019re not going to see each other anymore. You don\u2019t remember when you [stop] seeing anyone because you\u2019re just in the moment. But then you look back and you be like, \u201cOh shit, I haven\u2019t seen [that person] in a while.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI remember when I found out [he passed], my friend Rosie Perez [called] like, \u201cAre you okay?\u201d And I was like, \u201cWhat?\u201d She\u2019s like, \u201cD\u2019Angelo died.\u201d I was like, \u201cNo, absolutely not. It was wild.\u201d In the beginning I was so depressed. Then I looked through the photos. I just happened to have that album. It made me not so sad. I was like, \u201cWow, I\u2019m really glad to be a part of that.\u201d And so many people are part of his existence. I saw that one where he was smiling, and I never noticed that photo before so I shared it. I feel like [that] slice of life is really sweet and enduring and honest. He looks very endearing in his youth and smiling. I love being able to tell that story in my photos<\/p>\n

\n

\n

\t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n

\n\tA couple of years ago when I was on vacation, I was with my friend Molly Hunter, and she had a studio. Angie Stone called us in Malta to talk to Molly because she wanted Molly to help her son record at her studio. Molly was like, \u201cI\u2019m with my friend [Eric].\u201d And even though I never shot Angie Stone, she put me on the phone with her. I was telling Angie, \u201cOh, I love you, blah, bla.\u201d but she was more like, \u201cTake care of my friend Molly.\u201d I gave the phone back, and then when Molly got off the phone, she said, \u201cD\u2019Angelo was there [with Angie] too, and he was like, \u2018Yo, that\u2019s my boy. He was photographing me all the time back in the day.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI just thought [with how we] lost touch with each other all that time, to say my name and he\u2019d be like, \u201cYo, that\u2019s my boy,\u201d that was a really funny detail. That\u2019s the last thing I\u2019ve ever heard [from him] after all these years. He was still like, \u201cYo, that\u2019s my boy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n