Matt Harlan crafts sociopolitical narratives with an artist’s eye and a poet’s elegance. Evidence: Best Beasts. The seamless new collection due out July 12 on Austin-based Eight 30 Records spotlights a rapidly rising songwriter growing exponentially with each track. Political unrest maps the landscape.
Harlan frequently delivers keen insight with an everyman’s grace, and his vivid vignettes frequently feature blue collar everymen struggling for purchase on their own hard-won happiness and they occasionally find glimpses. High watermarks simply pose for reflection.
Harlan’s fifth album continues his early hot streak – including his Brotherton-produced debut Tips and Compliments in 2010 and 2014’s excellent Raven Hotel – as one of the Lone Star state’s most promising singer-songwriters. In fact, the 2011 documentary For the Sake of the Song: The Story of Anderson Fair prominently features Harlan among A-listers Guy Clark, Nanci Griffith, Robert Earl Keen, Lyle Lovett and Lucinda Williams. Best Beasts producer and guitarist Rich Brotherton (Robert Earl Keen), guitarist Jon Dee Graham, banjo ace Danny Barnes and standout vocalists Kellie Mickwee (Shinyribs) and BettySoo (Charlie Faye and the Fayettes) clearly second the notion.
Today Glide is excited to premiere the title track off the new album. Featuring none other than Americana rocker and Austin legend Jon Dee Graham slinging his guitar, the tune carries a heavy beat with jagged flourishes of electrifying shredding. Like much of the album, the lyrics focus on our current social and political landscape, tattered to say the least, but also takes on a tone of optimism. Harmonies shine with the help of Kellie Mickwee and BettySoo, adding an extra emotional poignancy to one powerful verse after another and hitting you straight in the heart. Harlan writes from an honest place and carries that kind of humble sincerity mixed with a troubadour’s confidence that seems to be a common trait among the great Texas songwriters.
Harlan shares the inspiration behind the tune:
“I saw First Lady Melania Trump’s Be Best campaign and felt like it was the epitome of being inauthentic,” Harlan says. “It’s a three-part campaign about opioid abuse, being nice to people online, and overall well-being, but it’s being promoted through the current White House, which is known for explosive online behavior and is not exactly the picture of ‘well-being.’ The whole thing felt fake. And the opioid abuse part feels out of place because it should really stand on its own as an issue. So, ‘Best Beasts’ started as a sarcastic take on Be Best.’”
“The song’s more generally about all of us being beasts,” Harlan says. “We’re all flawed, but we only tend to show the world some airbrushed picture of ourselves and our ideals. Just under the surface, though, where we should be having dialogs at the human level rather than political, we’re all beasts just trying to deal with the world. Maybe we’re all trying to make it better, but what’s a beast’s idea of better? That’s kinda the question, I guess.”
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