Matt Keating - Quixotic
Keating’s new album Quixotic happened to be one of a handful of promos I took to work yesterday randomly with the intention of listening to all of them straight from front to back all day. I honestly should do that more, because I truly get to hear the whole album since it just plays in the background at work, but when you’re co-workers listen to sports talk radio every waking hour, I have to wait until they go out of the shop to intall before I get any stereo-time. But yesterday was one of those rare days, so I took advantage of it.
Keating, looking all Tom Petty like in the picture up there, is one of those singer/songwriters that is good if you give his music some time, but takes some effort to get to know in the over-saturated world of singer/songwriters. With musicians like Ryan Adams, Connor Oberst, and Damien Rice making headlines, people like Keating often get lost in the mix despite being right up there in quality with their music. I tried to think of some comparisons as I listened to the album, which is a double-disc of solid mellow tunes, and the best I could come up with was a strange mix of Badly Drawn Boy and Ryan Adams. The instrumentation is unusually complicated for how mellow it is, much like Badly Drawn Boy, with strings, piano, harmonies etc. But it also has that straightforward country/rock feel that most of Ryan Adams’ music has. It’s not a best of both worlds type of thing, as Keating’s music isn’t quite up there with those two musicians, but it’s a refreshing take on a tired genre.
I’d check him out if you have a chance and I’m sure you’ll be pleasantly surprised. I was. Plus, there’s two cd’s worth of music, so that fact alone finds the effort looking into him more than worth your while.
Matt Keating
Quixotic
Perch Score: 7.237
Sorry Son live
