Eclectic Melancholia Held Sacred in Matthew Solberg’s Self-Titled EP

Matthew Solberg’s blog page, matthewsolberg.com, reads like New Testament quotations, ending each Charlie Brownish account of the so-so happenings of his musical career with “- Matthew”. Solberg’s actual belief is in a religious and delicious melancholia, humble, yet constantly self-reflecting. His work has the mesmerizing lightness of butterflies migrating in kaleidoscope above a graveyard, a layer of beauty floating above a geology of sadness.

The curiosity behind this album is in this young bohemian’s clear superiority (in some aspect or other) over his main influences. Solberg cites Elliott Smith and Paul Simon as his masters; yet, Solberg is musically smarter than Smith, and most certainly a more able guitar player than Simon. Neutral Milk Hotel and Daniel Johnston are named as secondary inspirations; yet, Solberg’s work is more mature than NMH’s, and better than Daniel Johnston’s in any regard. Perhaps Solberg gains confidence from matching the output of these his predecessors. The first track, “New Delight” features eerie, but enjoyable, vocal design above a slide guitar that chirps like birds at twilight. “The Cycle” features airy atmospherics, pursuing the listener’s approval through borrowed vocal personality (Smith’s, Cat Stevens’ voice box wired-up on technology, even Alan Parsons Project visitations). With these opening songs, Solberg toes the line on setting up, with overly-euphoric vocals and stock folk-pop chord progressions, an expectation in the listener that the tracks to follow will sound pretty much musically and vocally the same.

However, he saves himself from such condemnation with “Petrified”, which showcases Solberg’s penchant for spellbinding guitar motifs. “Petrified” introduces the listener to the reality that Solberg is indubitably first and foremost a guitarist, and that singing is a kind of necessary, but second job that serves to fill in some gap in his creative apparatus. His guitar stylings are magnetic: the listener wants to listen to his guitar work, whereas he has to adjust to Solberg’s vocals.

“Silent Wooden Memories” adds back Garfunkel to the Simon influence, but the song doesn’t compel until Solberg adopts after closing time bluesy guitar riffs, pulling the song down from wispy, elevated Parsons strata to an earthy backstreet authenticity.
Locale may be responsible for the map-traversing styles Solberg calls upon even throughout a single song, for Solberg’s birth in Kansas and boyhood in St. Louis don’t seem to provide him as much traction as perhaps does his current Nashville environs. After all, the excellent “Time Runs Out” is an instrumental with ambient finger sliding worthy of participation in the likes of a Union Station picking session at the Opry. The sound is nearly classic to the reminiscence of harpsichords with the accompaniment of charm anklet tinklings. “Whatever You Say” is an out-and-out Paul Simon homage, using Simon’s formula of granting the listener one quick major life lesson or observation per verse.

As a search for identity is the journeyed task which all indie rockers must undertake, Solberg has a niche opportunity in “Lullaby”. Here Solberg shows the potential for that perfect medium which most art rockers overshoot. Most art rock is creatively decadent, overproduced, and at least a little dorky (read King Crimson). “Lullaby” is a quantum leap window (“quantum leap”? talk about dorky!) through which, if entered, Solberg could pioneer a rootsier, more relevant art rock way that could carve out his place as an innovator in that seldom footed field of musical endeavor.

The bad news about “The Grotto” is that it should be two separate songs; the good news is that they’d both be good songs. The first part of “The Grotto” builds a tension that gives this song the best chance on the album for popular appeal. Off-note synthesized violin effects help build a cautionary sense in the listener that intrigues, with a pending punky Violent Femmes sense of aggression. Solberg seems to be crafting the first draft of a future epic with “The Grotto”, but the second half of the song mellows drastically. The careful buildup of the prepared drama is diminished, and a Pink Floydish piano-guitar exterlude comprises the song’s balance (the “2nd” song). The vocality in “The Grotto” is as though Perry Farrell of Jane’s Addiction convinced the Beach Boys of co-opting his trippy aesthetic.

“Moonlit Walk” would make for very enjoyable movie soundtrack material, rekindling Solberg’s ability to exude shooting star sounds from the plucked string. The song brings forth a recommendation that Solberg’s piano usage on the album could be at least half-replaced by supplemental percussion.

It may be Solberg’s melancholic aim to give a sense of the album’s dying with the last song “Memory”, with its petering out quality and conclusion, but the song exhibits positive lyrical cadence by rounding out thoughtful and thorough verse work. Solberg gives the song’s structure a neatly curving quality, with rolling vocal gestures tying the measures together neatly at their corners.

There’s a discipline and command in Solberg’s guitar work: it is his main voice. Growing away from impersonation and towards his own brand of eclecticism and virtuosity, Solberg’s creativity is a deep, rich reservoir that longs to be drunk of.

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