Music |
Regret Over the Wires
Matthew Ryan
By
Published: Jan 01, 2008
Category:
Rock
It was the summer we were living in Paris. The early evening was sunny and warm, and I had a business dinner a mile down the Seine, so I walked. For company, I had my iPod. I plugged in my professional-grade headphones, dialed up Matthew Ryan’s most recent CD, Regret Over the Wires, and started walking.
It wasn’t long before I was weeping for joy. All the planets were aligned. I was off to meet a prestigious client at a chic restaurant, and then I’d go home — in Paris! — to my wife and child. Work, money, love. All present. And, linking them, was beauty: Matthew Ryan’s music, which was wise about the struggle for happiness and wiser still about tunes and lyrics you just can’t shake.
And you probably have never heard of Matthew Ryan.
This is a good time to discover him — Matthew Ryan Vs. The Silver State may be his best effort yet. The lyrics range from the merely gorgeous (“And in pulling off her scarf/ I let go/ It floated like a wounded bird/ Her mouth the shape of Spanish words”) to ordinary self-loathing (“I’m living on Jupiter/ I couldn’t feel stupider”). And the music can be so anthemic and ebullient that, when the Irish-sounding violin kicks in, our little girl dances a gig.
Think: Leonard Cohen meets The Clash, Bruce Springsteen meets Nick Drake.
I could bang on at length about Matthew Ryan as a life-enhancer whose hand-carved music will do wonders for your disposition, but you’ll do better to sample his work and read my conversation with him. He’s a man with ideas, and determination, and a real set of values, and that comes out in his talk as surely as it does in his music.
Videos
Jane, I Still Feel the Same
Guilty
The Little Things
Return to Me
Matthew Ryan Interview
Prepare to be challenged. And rewarded. And, if you’re lucky, moved to tears with the pleasure of discovering a great talent.
You’re 36, but you’ve had your share of blows. Before your last CD, From A Late Night High Rise, your brother was sentenced to 30 years in jail. I think of that Sly Stone verse: "One child grows up to be/ Somebody that just loves to learn/ Another child grows up to be/ Somebody you’d just love to burn." Is that the story here?
A strange invisible hand led to different attractions. My brother’s trouble started when he was 12. I loved songs and fumbled with chords. I couldn’t learn to play other’s songs. So I started writing my own.
Around the same time as your brother went inside, you lost a close friend to cancer.
She was great, so smart, so funny, and she died so young. She was a real emotional champion for me, so her loss was huge to me. And her family, of course.
Two losses. And now this CD. "Brighter" is too simple — your singing still suggests a whispered confessional and your words still invite thought. Let’s start with the title: Matthew Ryan Vs The Silver State. Of course you mean Nevada.
Yes.
And, I suspect, more.
I’m like a collector of weather. I only care about how a song or idea makes me feel. "Vs. The Silver State" felt like it meant something to me before I intellectualized it.
Take me through the steps.
Las Vegas is in Nevada…and the desolation of the desert…all that beauty and the starkness, the opportunity and the risk. There it is, it rises up in the middle of nowhere. And people go there to gain or lose everything. There’s a greater metaphor in that. We’re doing it with our country right now.
And how about individuals as gamblers — as singer-songwriters, for example, who gamble with their careers?
Yeah, and as individuals. I’m gambling with my life. Art is a risky occupation, but so is pretending to be someone else. Every song I write brings some new sense of electricity. I feel connected to a greater story when I write.
How do you write?
Seamus Heaney described how, for Wordsworth, writing was a physical thing, with a pace and rhythm — Wordsworth walking up and down a path. When I read that, I was relieved. I didn’t feel so strange. I write when my mind, heart or soul is determined to communicate something. Some days, language just runs like streetlights, and they come with a melody.
"Your mascara was born to run" — funny.
That line feels brave to me. In my own sense of how I’m perceived, Springsteen is a monument. When I first wrote it, I didn’t want to use it. I am relentlessly compared to Bruce. It’s daunting and not really fair. I’m writing my own stories in a different time. That line rings true to me. Clearly it’s a nod. But more importantly, I know that girl, I kissed her a long time ago. And I guess I wanted to offer my own peace with the constant Springsteen comparisons. I love his work, but I have no desire to be him.
Your singing has been compared to passionate whispering. Did you always sing that way?
No. I started out imitating Richard Butler from the Psychedelic Furs. I wanted that raw sexuality. He just sounded cool to me. Like a likeable devil.
The day your singing changed?
I remember it, because I felt it. When you sing like I do, you get a rumble in your lower midsection. It’s a whisper, but a loud whisper. Kind of like when a jet rumbles in the distance — it’s like a come on.
A come on for smart adults. Maybe that’s why you seem too sharp for the room. So spell it out for the lip-readers among us: What are you trying to do in these songs?
Art is the wisdom we’re not handed. I’m trying to collect it. I’m trying to offer comfort and hope to anyone in need. Living, being human, it can get dark. I’m always trying to encourage the good fight and a sense of connection. I hope that the "I" in my songs becomes "we."
Is that glass half-full or half-empty?
That depends on the weather!
Wait a minute: We’re talking about 4-minute rock songs!
In my mind, there’s enough entertainment out there. I wanna save somebody.
Have you considered just enjoying yourself?
No….. I’m kidding. But I grew up loving important music, big music. I mean, music that made you want to sack the government or protest or jump out of an airplane. Bands like The Clash or U2 — this was music full of idealism versus struggle and hard realities. But I couldn’t help but sense it was useful because it pushed you to imagine things more equal, more humane, more possible.
You’re making me nervous. Underneath this, I don’t hear any sense of: I’ve made 11 records, I’m on my 6th label, dammit, I want a hit!
First off, I want to offer something useful. I think London Calling made a contribution.
"London Calling" was a hit!
Look, I’d love a hit. But to me it’s meaningless if it’s playing silly or vapid music. To me, a great song is like when you walk through fog, you get a mist on the skin. You may not even fully understand what a song is going on about. But that mist sticks with you, maybe it moves you along.
Mist is ghostly, spectral. Is your ambition is to be the secret influence, the most important person no one knows: Zorro, Superman?
You’re nailing me. I always felt that fame was a decision. And I decided that fame isn’t worth the risk of losing creativity or humanity. I like the idea of Zorro.
Dude, take the risk!
Hey, I was raised Protestant Irish, the unromantic part of being Irish. It’s a mess.
To buy “Matthew Ryan Vs. Silver State” from Amazon.com, click here.
To buy “From A Late Night High Rise” from Amazon.com, click here.
To read more about “Regret Over the Wires” on HeadButler.com, click here.
To buy “Regret Over the Wires” from Amazon.com, click here.
To buy “May Day” from Amazon.com, click here.
To visit Matthew Ryan’s page on MySpace.com, click here.
