Shop our Big Takeover store for back issues, t-shirts & CDs
Follow The Big Takeover
Chicago’s Matthew Santos has the kind of voice that stands out immediately and exists only a few times a generation. A twice over Grammy nominee, Santos has received praise from musicians as disparate as Eddie Vedder and Jay Z, and on his newest album Into The Further, he returns for, arguably, his most artistic statement yet. The songs here are much more experimental as well, but at their core lay strong pop nuggets.
Santos’ voice and the unique tones it produces are the guiding forces behind this album, and they’re the reason songs like “It All Works Out” work so well. It’s almost like listening to a demonstrative lecture in vocal techniques. While some songs are more densely layered than others, it’s the intimate ones like “Field and Flower” in which his voice is unbridled that are the most successful.
Seemingly unsure if he wants to go for the acoustic stylings of Bon Iver (“Succumb To Gravity”) or soul-driven jazz (“Seven Years”), Santos dedicates himself fully to neither, and consequently the album occasionally feels disjointed, fractured even further by unnecessary beatboxing ramblings such as “Ojos.” Yet taken piece by piece, Into The Further remains a great collection of songs, if not completely united in concept.
