“Count me in”: The one role Johnny Depp couldn’t refuse
Johnny Depp has always had a foot planted in both worlds in Hollywood. Most people would be content reaching the top of the world as an actor, but Depp is more than capable of playing a decent guitar lick when the time calls for it and has proven to be an integral part of The Hollywood Vampires behind the scenes. While the general public is still more familiar with his career as a film star, that doesn’t mean that Depp gives any less of himself to his opportunity to play with anyone under the sun.
But, really, Depp’s journey as a musician seemed to go hand-in-hand with his acting career in the beginning. It’s the age-old saying that all actors secretly want to be musicians, but listening back to the way that Depp’s career unfolded, the video he made for Tom Petty’s ‘Into the Great Wide Open’ seemed to be the one moment when both of his worlds first started to converge on top of each other.
Even though he was quickly becoming one of the biggest celebrity heartthrobs of the 1990s, he was never afraid to throw his hat into the ring on mainstream records. On paper, him playing guitar on Oasis’s Be Here Now should have been the moment when everyone realised the Manchester legends were getting out of hand, but listening back to his solo on ‘Fade In-Out’, it’s clear he was taking inspiration from all of the great blues rockers that had come before him.
It’s not exactly a mistake that the guitarists that Depp was closest to were people like Joe Perry from Aerosmith. He always thrived on listening to the kind of blues licks that Eric Clapton and Peter Green helped cultivate in the late 1960s, and even though he admits to be nowhere near as good as someone like Perry behind the fretboard, he knew that getting the call to work with a Beatle would have been unthinkable even by musician standards.
But Depp had always been friendly with Paul McCartney since they first met. He had been more proactive in working with the former Beatle during his run of albums in the 2010s, but whereas the video for ‘My Valentine’ was a far bleaker affair than Macca’s typical videos, getting the chance to appear in the video for ‘Early Days’ came with a caveat ripped straight from Depp’s musical dreams.
“I happened to ring Johnny Depp. I said, ‘Come along and we’ll sit around and jam with these blues guys.’ He said, ‘Yeah, OK, count me in, man.’ I knew it was an offer he couldn’t refuse.”
Paul McCartney
Outside of appearing in the video, McCartney sealed the deal for him by offering to have a jam session with true bluesmen, saying, “I happened to ring Johnny Depp. I said, ‘Come along and we’ll sit around and jam with these blues guys.’ He said, ‘Yeah, OK, count me in, man.’ I knew it was an offer he couldn’t refuse. It’s getting to be a running gag. He’s like the Alfred Hitchcock of my videos. And he’s good!”
And despite having a slew of celebrities in the video for ‘Queenie Eye’, this was by far the bigger thrill for Depp. Coming from the world of cinema, there was always a certain hesitancy whenever someone tried to pick up an instrument, but going through this jam and holding his own with McCartney and other seasoned professionals must have been the equivalent of getting knighted by a musician.
Depp’s career will forever have a greater focus on acting, but his status as a guitar player never needs to be questioned by anyone. There’s no limit on where true artists can go once they have their first hits under their belts, but looking at his performance here, Depp could have easily been a rock and roll god had things gone differently.
