Crisp Giant snare hits echoed alone after something went wrong; Put Out Your Lights chords retracted and replayed, tinkering with notes nearly sussed out; Vocal destinations for Avalanche not fully attempted- no need to strain it now. I was invited out by Matt to take a peek at the rehearsal process for the upcoming full band tour, and to offer some insight about its progress. I was also there to do a little documenting, taking some photos. I would have taken more but I definitely got lost in the music most of the time, a good sign I guess.

Art Is A State Of Being

I met up with Matt around 1pm at his pit-stop, the place where he’s holing up, fueling, and creating. He ordered up some coffee for the both of us, and though I didn’t admit it to his face I was happy to see him, and thought of giving him a hug. The reality was that he was consumed in thought and buzzing around, talking with his musical director (Dean) about the epiphanies he’d had last night about how things were going with rehearsals.

I was then reminded of the creative vortex I experienced when with him on the last acoustic tour: Matt creates a sense of organic growth & evolution when he’s working with his music, which often inspires and elevates those around him. Though I’m venturing into the cliche, as someone who has worked in the arts since I was a young teenager, it’s a beautiful thing to watch. I hadn’t even heard a song yet, and I was already feeling the energy of the upcoming tour. It was like being cranked up a roller coaster ride, hearing and feeling each upward notch to the top.

We were picked up by Tim shortly afterwards to head down to the rehearsal studio, and arriving there I saw Lance making notes, not noticing we pulled up and not noticing me as we walked towards him. When he did, a very cordial hello followed, and Matt filled him in on the ideas developed the night previous about where they needed to take things with the show- what was missing, what didn’t fit. Lance seemed receptive, as if he had been bothered by the same issue, and was relieved Matt has articulated it. The band was going over some tracks when we arrived. While they worked out Weapon, Matt drew my attention to the nuances that the boys had generated, in particular Stew’s magic pedal work.

It Ain’t Gonna Be No ‘99 Reprise

When you have the body of work as an artist that Matt does, there’s two forms of death you need to avoid: the first is the death that happens when you stop growing and repeat your past work, regurgitating it, sometimes unknowingly (that’s the worst kind). The second is the death that happens when you think you might revive your career by ripping off the latest music trends…“Ladies and Gentlemen, The MattyGoods and their hit single Mr. Feelbad.”

Thankfully Matt is artistically gifted enough not have to worry about that shit, and has integrity enough to never allow it to happens anyways. That said, there’s always the danger in performing live that you work to play the songs the way they were played live before, and Matt was not about to let that happen, even with the limited time in rehearsals. The songs needed to sound fresh and belong with each other, with the older tracks fitting within the context of newer music, not the other way around.

Though they’ve only been rehearsing for a few days, there was already the sense that as a group they have a sound of their own, they have identity. And with Matt discovering the night previous that they needed to make some different guitar choices to clean up the sound a bit and give the whole show a better throughline, it was clearly making a big difference in sonic space and helping everyone stay tight.

Hearing Champions Of Nothing, 99% Of Us Is Failure, and Born Losers for the first time with the band was pretty exciting. It was great to hear Hospital Music’s gems come to life, from the epic and dynamic Champions Of Nothing to the seductive and infectious rocking of Born Losers, complete with pedal steel guitar work from Stewart.

If you’re attending shows on this tour and are anything like me in what you like hearing Matt perform, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Older songs have new life breathed into them, while the newer stuff from Hospital Music gets a chance to come to life and be really big. I remember last spring hearing some demos for Hospital Music and thinking that this album is one that needs to be cranked up loud to be truly appreciated. While hearing Matt and the boys crank it today it felt like some of these songs were unchained, and damn did they sound good.

If I’m lucky and Lance will spare some space for me in his bunk I’ll be able to join along for a few stops around Ontario in a couple weeks, and have the privilege to again catch a few shows, write from the road, and take some photos & illicit video footage.