9. Matt BaldwinNight in the Triangle
I love his music, and I don’t this want to sound disrespectful at all, but it made me think I should lighten up and loosen up a bit about my guitar playing. It made me want to try and write without being too heavy, without a big finale and stuff. It made me want to try less hard to make an impressive song. I wanted to sit back. But I couldn’t quite do that. It was like when I started doing Human Don’t Be Angry. It was all supposed to be on these loop pedals, but then I started doing chorus bits, and working with Paul [Savage of The Delgados/Chemikal Underground] and Paul took the drums, and it all kind of changed.
But Matt Baldwin was the initial impetus behind me wanting to just sit down with a guitar and do something a bit more obtuse. That definitely woke me up a bit. When I played stuff, I wouldn’t go to my normal chord shapes or resolve melodies the same way. I would try and make it discordant. I’m not a great guitar player, I still don’t know what all the notes are going to do when my finger goes to them, but it made me loosen up a bit, almost in a jazz way – which I don’t know anything about. It was that idea that I couldn’t go to a wrong note. Because that note will lead to the next one. And it might sound amazing.
