The original color theme I was going to do for the Picayune would’ve been based on his 40th birthday, but I goofed up on the dates (just like I did with Lazz, I sense a pattern developing). Turns out Matthew Sweet is 42 today. Fortunately I discovered this back in September during my research, good ol’ AllMusic.com.
Here’s to the only great person I personally feel ever came out of Nebraska after Johnny Carson and Fred Astaire.
I never miss a chance to attend one of his concerts when he comes to Austin. If it’s SXSW, depends. This Spring, I toughed it out with the crowd, lousy weather and the stench of out-of-town hipsters and poseurs, just for a half-hour set of him and Susanna Hoffs. Past performances have been much more memorable such as the first time I actually saw him play at SXSW in 1995 followed by his return in the Fall at Liberty Lunch. I then caught him both times in 1997 (pre-album release in January, and the official tour in June). His last real concert in Austin was 2000 at La Zona Rosa which will always be my favorite. Somara scored a guitar pick which he yelled at some kid to let her have and I got to talk to him for a few minutes on his tour bus. The autographed poster has been in my personal office ever since we moved in.
Although his first album debuted 20 years ago on Columbia, it went unnoticed by everyone, including me. Same for his second on A&M but I did have the single “Vertigo” from it thanks to my internship at WQFM (a defunct rock station in Milwaukee). A very unusual song too because it has members of Trip Shakespeare (the band Dan Wilson and John Munson were in before Semisonic). Like everyone else, I really got into Matthew thanks to his third and very personal album Girlfriend in 1992 (released in 1991). It remains one of the best Power Pop albums of the Nineties to this day. More followed yet his short-lived popularity waned with the masses as they pursued less intelligent fare as the Nineties gave way to the rather bleak 2000s; could someone still explain to me why Jessica and Ashlee Simpson have careers, let alone the dorks from American Idol? Despite his lack of airplay, Sweet still manages to be tapped for tributes to Ray Davies (Kinks), Big Star, Paul McCartney and even the high-school movies of the Eighties. Throw in all the originals he has done for soundtracks and one day, he is going to have one helluva’ boxed set.
I know this plug for his birthday is rather late in the day yet humor me and him. This weekend, check out the other tracks on his “popular” albums Girlfriend, Altered Beast and 100% Fun. If they’re heard on XM’s Fred, Lucy, Ethel or the Nineties and every other lameass “Alternative” station’s lunchtime flashback show, they don’t count. I recommend these “Holy War,” “Evangeline,” “Looking at the Sun,” “Someone to Pull the Trigger,” Reaching Out,” “Knowing People,” “We’re the Same,” “Get Older,” and “Come to Love.” Should you have the opportunity to listen to his earlier two albums or the later six (including being a member of the Thorns and this year’s duo tribute with Susanna Hoffs), give them a try, I think you’ll be impressed.
