Rapid City, SD | June 10, 2005

Gospel album insightful, distinctive

I met Matt Arthur at the open mike night at Durty Nelly’s during Ski for Light in 2004.

This year, the open mike was gone, but Les Roselles invited me to come up and play a set with “Lars and the Lounge Lizards” during Ski for Light. Matt was there again. He gave me a copy of his CD, “The Way I See It,” and told me he would like to come out and try his music in the Hills during the summer.

“The Way I See It” is pure gospel with Matt’s individual stamp on it. “I was born a blind, stubborn man,” he sings in the title cut, “I’ll always be a blind stubborn man ... I’ll sing my songs, right or wrong, until I’m gone.”

He hangs with both the “do-good” people and the so-called “troubled” crowd. His songs are honest. They express his love of life and a deep belief that God has provided a world in which we are responsible for making a loving place or “a kind of Hell.” He is Christian. He is an activist for people helping each other. He doesn’t mince words.

Matt’s gospel roots go back to The Louvin Brothers and Tennessee Ernie Ford. When he writes he keeps in mind songwriters like Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan and the early blues singers. The identity he feels with these people is clear: “I haven’t got a dollar in my pocket/I may not have a penny to my name/but I’ve got a song to sing for Jesus/Lord I thank you for showing me the way ... Just find the time to sing a song for Jesus/and He’ll find the time to help you...”

Much of the Christian music I hear on the radio leaves me a bit cool. The songs are what I think of as “praise songs.” They’re the result of a process, but the process is absent. “The Way I See It” gives insight into Matt’s process that makes even his praise songs interesting. “I’ve walked through the slums of the city/I spoke to people who were down on their luck/hung out with others who were just society’s rejects ... the ones they say you just shouldn’t love.”

Matt’s voice is rich and distinctive. I can hear a strong Johnny Cash influence. He has also been compared to Nick Cave and Jim Morrison. His guitar is solid, and it ranges from sweet to hard-driving. I have lived with “The Way I See It,” in my pickup for three weeks. It wears well.

At home in Ellendale, Minn. (population 590) where he once served on the town council, Matt is known as a rabble-rouser. In the Twin Cities, he is known as the front man for Prest Asbestus, an alt-country-folk-rock group from the early ’90s.

You can hear Matt’s Music Show on www.dishnuts.net every Monday from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. MDT. He is a ham radio operator and a volunteer for Courage Center’s Handi-Hams program as an instructor for online audio courses.

Go to www.mattarthur.net for more information.

Matt also sings traditional country, folk and gospel. He and I will be sharing gigs at The Sage Creek Grill in Custer, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. today and from 9 p.m. to midnight Saturday at Knight’s Cellar in Spearfish.

Come on out. It’ll be fun.

-- Steve Thorpe

[Follow-up article from July, 2005]

Young musician reignites passion

Hanging out with Matt Arthur in early June was the best thing I’ve done for myself in years. Matt came to play. With that in mind, I set a little harder pace than I’d normally try to keep. We played seven of the eight days, mostly on the street in Hill City. The two days we had gigs, we played the street first.

Popular wisdom holds that the tourist season doesn’t really get under way until the third week in June. In the four years that Hill City has provided a place for buskers in the Hills, I have learned that the key to busking is traffic. My experience reinforced what people who busk have been telling me for years. Consequently, I had never played the street that early. After Matt went back to Minnesota, I was telling a friend about our week singing together. His response was, “You have your enthusiasm back.”

I hadn’t realized I’d lost any enthusiasm, but upon reflection, my friend was right. Among other things, Matt taught me the folly of trying to keep up with a man who has an equal passion for music and who happens to be 20-plus years younger than I am. The key thing that he reminded me is that music is its own reward. Forget traffic. Sometimes, the mind is slow to grasp what the heart already knows. There’s poetry in the fact that I only relearned that by seeing myself through a blind man’s eyes. Thanks, Matt.

-- Steve Thorpe

Owatonna, MN | August 11, 2004

Four Bands, No Bucks take stage tonight

Though the weather may be cold for a Minnesota August evening, four bands are set to heat up Central Park tonight. Music lovers of all ages are sure to find something they like in the wide variety of musical entertainment sponsored by Mark Woodrich, Realtor with ERA-Gillespie Real Estate.

Perhaps the senior member of tonight’s line up is Matt Arthur, gospel, blues, folk singer from Ellendale. Arthur, formerly of the Twin Cities grunge rock band Prest Asbestus, has already received critical acclaim for the work he did with the band in the early 1990s. A “City Pages” review of a 1991 concert said, “Singer Matt Arthur has a whacked-out growl like something grown in a petri dish swabbed with cells stolen from the esophagus of Jim Morrison and Boxcar Willie.”

Arthur’s music has tamed a bit since then, and he has recorded exclusively gospel music on his latest CD titled ‘The Way I See It.”

“I’ve been doing this folk, gospel, traditional music thing for just a few years,” Arthur said. Though he added, “I’ve been singing and playing something for most of my life.”

Arthur said that about six years ago, he started writing folk and gospel songs.

He was prompted to write the songs because, “after (Prest Asbestus broke up), I moved back to Ellendale. I became interested in reading the Bible. A preacher asked me if I had ever written a gospel song. I said I hadn't, and I woke up that night with a song in my head. I plugged in a tape recorder, picked up a banjo, and in the morning it didn't sound too bad."

Arthur went on to write more gospel songs, and in a 14-hour session in a Mankato studio, recorded the 16 songs that appear on “The Way I See It.”

Arthur said that the recording of the CD came easy to him.

“When I went to record, I didn’t have titles for the songs. I don’t write anything down. If I’m ambitious, I use a tape. Everything just kind of came into place on the CD.”

“I was raised on gospel music,” Arthur added. “I learned to sing by listening to Tennessee Ernie Ford.”

Born blind, Arthur’s lyrics often talk of struggle, but not his struggle to get through life without sight

“I’m a blind man,” Arthur said “But it don’t bother me. It isn’t a big deal to me. I just write about what I like to write about . . . I get along fine with a cane, so I write songs about heading down the road, or wherever I may be.”

The road tonight takes Arthur to Owatonna, where he and his band The Bratlanders will perform with bands Minor Attributes, Sideview, and Ugly in Pink.

Ugly in Pink, a Christian punk-rock trio, is headed by Owatonna native Angela Kyper.

Kyper and bandmate Tami Miller went to college together and perform along with Miller’s younger sister Jill.

“All three of us are really devout Christians. That’s what we’re most passionate about, so that’s what we think about,’’ Kyper said.

Kyper said that she hopes her band’s blend of up-beat, fast music will offer girls a more positive influence than they may get from current popular musicians.

“In a world of Britney Spears, girls need to have good Christian role models. We like to preach modesty,” she said.

As far as the differences in musical styles between Arthur and bands like Ugly in Pink, Arthur said, “I think it’s OK for some older people to be exposed to punk rock as well.”

-- James Anderson

Matt Arthur to perform at JavaLive

Matt Arthur grew up on a farm where the 13,000 chickens vastly outnumbered the people in the nearby town of Ellendale, Minn. (pop. 590). As a child, playing the accordion and singing along to the gospel recordings of Tennessee Ernie Ford and Johnny Cash, Matt had no idea that he would be singing his own gospel songs one day. But one night in 1999, Matt woke with a song in his head and got up to record it on a cassette. More songs followed. Soon Matt was performing his music locally, accompanying himself on his acoustic guitar, and he was surprised to find that people liked his songs. He received encouragement from audiences and decided to record an entire CD of his tunes. In October 2002, after 14 hours in a Mankato recording studio, Matt emerged with the 16 tracks that appear on his debut album "The Way I See It."

No stranger to performing, Matt formed his first band, Prest Asbestus, in 1986 with a high school classmate. During its eight-year existence, the rock band achieved some notoriety for their original sound, as well as for Matt's distinctive voice and charismatic stage presence. "Vocalist Matt Arthur howls like Roy Clark meets Tom Jones," one critic penned of Matt's contributions to the group's 1994 seven-inch vinyl single, while other Twin Cities music writers described his voice as "breathtaking," "amazing" and "haunting."

Matt moved back to his hometown in 1996 after the group disbanded and began writing songs a few years later. Since the release of "The Way I See It," Matt has returned to the studio to record a few tracks for his next CD and performs live whenever possible. Matt splits his live performances between solo shows and a full-band treatment backed by three siblings known as The Bratland Family Players. When the band is involved, the set list spans from Matt's originals to a trove of traditional folk and country offerings from Bob Dylan, Gram Parsons, the Louvin Brothers and some of the 30 or more Johnny Cash tunes in their repertoire.

Matt and The Bratland Family Players will return to JavaLive in Faribault on Friday, May 21, at 7:30pm. They performed there previously in March 2004.

Static Magazine - Mankato, MN | Sept. 2003

CD Review

The Way I See It is the first solo album from Matt Arthur, known by his neighbors in tiny rural Ellendale, Minnesota (pop. 590) as a rabble-rousing member of the town council, and amongst Twin Cities music fans of a certain (dare we say "advanced?") age as the voice of Prest Asbestus, a brooding, alt-country-folk-rock group of the late eighties and early nineties.

The album's sixteen original songs of hope, faith and friendship conjure up a pre-cynical era of unapologetic gospel offerings from the likes of the Louvin Brothers and Tennessee Ernie Ford, while their odd turns of phrase and chord suggest the more recent influence of indie/country troubadors such as Will Oldham and Vic Chesnutt.

The Way I See It was recorded this past Fall at Two Fish Studios, which is housed (appropriately) in a renovated turn-of-the-century church in Mankato, Minnesota. The record reveals a deliberate less-is-more aesthetic, stripping things down to the basics of Matt's distinctive voice joined by nothing but his own self-taught strummings on an acoustic guitar.

Matt's vocals have been compared to Nick Cave, Jim Morrison, and--frequently-- to Johnny Cash. His songwriting has been praised for its optimism, even as it relates the hardships of traveling through a world that few others see the way he does. "In my life I've walked many a hard road," Matt sings. "I've had some people ask me: "How do you do it without your sight?" His answer? "You don't see with your eyes, friend. You see in your mind."

The contrast between Matt's hard-lived, world-weary voice and his thoughtful observations on beauty and thankfulness and God make this album a fascinating introduction to the music of a true American original. But whether or not The Way I See It impresses or alienates the "do-good people and the so-called trouble crowd" isn't of much concern to Matt. He has a way of doing--and saying--what he feels strongly about, regardless of anyone else's opinion.

It's easy to believe the conviction in his voice when Matt sings: "I'm not backing down, I won't be spun around, I stand for all that I believe is right." And it's our good fortune that he finishes that thought with: "I'll sing my songs, right or wrong, until I'm gone."

Don’t miss Matt at the Coffee Hag in Mankato, Sept. 19th.

-- Doug Bratland

Ellendale, MN | April 10, 2003

Matt Arthur - "The Way I See It" CD

An artist is someone who says "Here I am," not "I will do what you want me to do." This is a good description of Matt Arthur, who recently produced his first CD, "The Way I See It."

The title "The Way I See It" would give the impression to anyone that does not know Matt Arthur that he is looking at the world and this is how he sees it with his eyes. Matt Arthur, who has been blind from birth, sees things with his mind and his senses.

Matt has always enjoyed singing since he was a little kid in his home church, Zion Lutheran Church of rural Ellendale. He played accordion when he was young and he enjoyed listening to a lot of gospel music, with singers such as Tennessee Ernie Ford and Johnny Cash.

After high school Matt went to Arkansas for a college prep program for the blind. He then went to college at Southwest State in Marshall for a couple of years and then on to the cities in 1986-87.

He met up with a high school friend, Guy Brua of Owatonna, and they started playing together in the band Prest Asbestus for about 8 years. Matt did mostly vocals and some accordion in the band.

In 1991 & 1992 he started to learn how to play guitar. He had an old guitar that was broke in two and he mended that and he started to teach himself the basic chords. Eventually he purchased a guitar for $100.

In 1996 he moved to his present home in Ellendale. A few years ago he met a preacher, Pastor Engel, who asked him if he had ever written a gospel song. Matt told Pastor Engel that he had never written any, but he had sung a lot of them.

That night in 1999, Matt Arthur woke up with a song in his head and went downstairs to put it on a tape, not knowing where this project would lead him. That song was "Rocky Road of Life."

He now has over 30 songs on tape.

This has been Matt's life long dream to do gospel songs. "I didn't think that people would like my songs," said Arthur. He started to play at Semcac [Senior Dining Center] and people started to tell him that his songs were good.

Arthur didn't always put his songs on a tape recorder. Sometimes the songs just seemed to appear in his head. "Song writing for me is putting them together in such a way they won't be dated, but stand the test of time," said Matt. "I wrote songs that were happy, sad, mad and thankful."

"I decided to do an album of folk gospel songs, a couple serious songs, and a reality check - not like a 'praise' album. I'm not afraid to push gospel music to the limit," said Arthur.

In the year 2000, Matt started working with a friend in the cities, but it just didn't seem right. He decided he needed to go to a professional studio and do a recording. He knew he would need a loan to produce the album, but he was afraid to approach the banker. One day, feeling bold, he decided to ask the loan officer for a loan for the production cost of the CD. He was surprised to hear that yes, the bank would give him a chance. He eventually took out the loan and he went to the Two Fish Recording Studio in Mankato.

In one day, Matt did 16 songs on all separate tracks. He spent 14 hours in the recording studio. Matt took along a song list to remember which ones to record. He had played the songs enough that he knew everything by heart. He even put one song together on the way to the studio that morning. "I'm Sorry Jesus" came about at the last moment.

Matt explained that he would sing the songs in a way that people would understand the message he was giving. He wanted to make sure the song was complete.

The song "The Way I See It" is maybe not a song done in a traditional manner but, as Matt explained, "I like to end the song when the song ends."

Matt does not spend time on structuring as some songwriters do who spend years on a song.

Half of the 16 songs that he recorded did not have titles until after the recording was done.

Matt talked about his blindness and how he sees through his mind, not his eyes. "Your eyes are just a tool, just like a screwdriver," said Arthur. Matt has learned to use his other senses as his tool. "This is my way, as I see it. No nonsense. I was born a blind stubborn man. I'm a free man and I believe in God's plan," said Arthur.

Matt said that he had learned to pull himself up by his own bootstraps and handle life. He explained that 70% of the blind are unemployed, which is a serious problem. Matt also feels that many blind people can hold down jobs, and that they can do a great job.

Matt said at the Two Fish Studio, he worked with Wes Schuck and Luke Harper, who were great to work with. They gave him a few pointers along the way.

"I just sat down and tuned up my guitar, and with two microphones I did the guitar part, and then the vocal part separate from the music," said Arthur.

The album was made in Mankato and Matt intends to see where this will lead him. He intends to promote as best as he can, and he said that he does not know what to expect.

"I know some will like my music and some will not, and that is good, because I know that I did my job as a songwriter," said Arthur.

Matt plays at Semcac and he will be performing in Plainview at Rebecca's Little Restaurant on April 11th. He has his albums at the First National Bank in Ellendale, The Added Touch, Lerbergs and Tones in Owatonna and he hopes to get them into other area stores and in the Christian Bookstore.

The graphics on his album were done by Doug Bratland of Northfield. The church pictured is his old home church, Zion Lutheran, before it burnt years ago.

As Matt was being interviewed for this article, he broke into one of his songs and he told of an experience that inspired him to write that song.

Songs of inspiration came to Arthur in moments of sadness, happy times and mad times. He even wrote one song walking in Ellendale at 2 a.m. in the morning.

Arthur felt that if he had a good song that he felt was good, he would make it and not worry what people might think. He knew that he might offend some people, but the stubborn part in him just kept on going.

The song "I Will Follow You Jesus" came from an inspiration of the days that he had walked through slums and he pointed out that he was glad to have had that education. "It is the kind that you won't find in a textbook," said Arthur.

"There is only so much to be said in a three minute song, and you better have something to say," said Arthur.

Matt Arthur will be at the Spring Jubilee to be held in Ellendale on Saturday, May 3. You can hear Matt play some of his songs in the community building and he will have his CDs for sale. Stop by and enjoy some gospel music.