Few artists have thrown themselves into stormy, bloodletting songcraft as brazenly as Matt Jewett. With heaps of messy stories both haunted by past relationships and riddled with substance use, his repertoire thrives on a teetering balance of profound clarity and hopeless incoherency. His performances often breathe sour flames of emotional heartburn, scorching the microphone as they barrel from his soul. Despite his tattered narratives, though, Jewett channels his short fuses into sharp, quality musicianship, proving that an articulate voice and a clean acoustic guitar can sound just as powerful and fiery as a distortion laden performance, if not more so.
As late 2010s emo-punk revivalism surges towards its inevitable peak, it would seem an opportune time for one of Oklahoma City’s modern daddies of raw, angst-heavy songwriting to make a comeback. Save for one recent benefit concert, it’s been a while since Jewett fronted the eponymous Shut Up Matt Jewett, his bare-bones punk band that never quite managed to put together a proper follow-up to 2014’s defining EP, I Wish I Liked You. He cites burnout as a major reason for the hiatus, a condition from which he only recently recovered. Although his new solo record does include songs from that era, including a couple from the EP, it’s not exactly the Shut Up Matt Jewett soft reboot that some might expect.
Matt Jewett Live, released last week through Robot Saves City, is 10 tracks of live material culled from a 2019 solo performance at one of OKC’s best-kept secret nooks, 51st St. Speakeasy‘s Scotch Room. With the casual chatter of a house show and the professionalism of a venue, Matt Jewett Live captures the intimacy that can arise when a smallish audience and a smallish space zero in together on a single performer.