Does Matt dislike Arrows of Desire?

[Outtahere]

Has anyone noticed that, since Chaotic Neutral came out, Matt hasn't played one song from Arrows of Desire? That made me wonder if he dislike this record given how far from it he's strayed musically since going for somewhat 80's rock.

 

Now I know he struggles to put a good mix of his best material and the most popular singles in a concert and he's got one less player now with Anthony not touring with him. But there's no room for even one song? Garden of Knives remains, IMO, one of his best songs ever. I get that there's keyboards and such on there but that doesn't stop him from playing Weapon. But even guitar oriented songs like Guns of Carolina would be great in the set or even Letters in Wartime, Arrows of Desire or Mutineering!

[hoogie]

There seems to be a trend there, for sure.  Only Matt can give true insight into it.

 

I'm surprised some of the songs from that album don't get more play from him.  Via Delorosa is one of the best recordings from the Live Road ones, IMO.  Had It Coming also got some pretty good airplay.

 

To be honest, there aren't really any standouts from that album that I really need to hear live again.  They're all solid choices, but not necessarily at the top of my favorites list.

 

Maybe there's a technical challenge or issue with playing the material live.

[Outtahere]

I didn't name Via Dolorosa because he said it was quite hard to play so I wouldn't expect him to do it even if it's a great song. :P

 

But yeah it would be great to get some insight. 

[Guest Idioteque]

Matt wrote this on his IG yesterday:

 

Listened to A Long Way Down today. It struck an enormous chord. 100x that when I wrote it.

So maybe he will be giving the album a second look, but for me 2 of his best solo tracks ever came off that album. Hey Hell Heaven & Mutineering. 

Edited August 28, 2017 by Idioteque

[uglyredhonda]

Matt wrote this on his IG yesterday:

 

So maybe he will be giving the album a second look, but for me 2 of his best solo tracks ever came off that album. Hey Hell Heaven & Mutineering. 

 

A Long Way Down is on Avalanche.  I really hope this means he'll play that song live on the next tour.

 

I still don't love the single choices from Arrows.  I suspect he doesn't think as much of "Via Dolorosa" as most of us - he didn't play it all that much on the tour, yet it was the one song from Arrows I kept hearing random people singing after the shows I saw.  (I still think "Garden of Knives" is a hell of an opener.)

Edited August 28, 2017 by uglyredhonda

[Guest Idioteque]

HAHA Holy crap I was thinking "We're Long Gone". I'm going to bed, no more staying up past my bedtime. 

[Outtahere]

A Long Way Down is on Avalanche.  I really hope this means he'll play that song live on the next tour.

 

I still don't love the single choices from Arrows.  I suspect he doesn't think as much of "Via Dolorosa" as most of us - he didn't play it all that much on the tour, yet it was the one song from Arrows I kept hearing random people singing after the shows I saw.  (I still think "Garden of Knives" is a hell of an opener.)

 

I believe I remember him saying that he loved the song but he should kick himself in the ass for writing a song that requires thumb muting. That may explain why he refrains from playing it most of the time. Garden of Knives is indeed one hell of an opener. But without a keyboard player he would probably be on playback for the sounds so he couldn't do it as insterestingly as on the AOD tour.

[emmit643]

I love Garden of Knives.

 

And Guns of Carolina makes the list of all time favourites for me. I really love that song. Also closing a show on "it's all too late, done what you paid me for" *chills*.

 

Letters in Wartime was great too. Via Dolorosa.

 

Those are the standouts for me. But Gardens and Guns especially.

[Outtahere]

It's one of my favourite albums from Matt. 

[Guest Idioteque]

Best vinyl too, marble white. If there's one good thing that came out of his short partnership with frostbyte is they know how to make some gorgeous records. 

[Sly Botts]

As far as albums as a whole go, I've only really liked 2-3 (at most) songs from any of his albums since WLR&RR. Starting with Hospital Music.  Mind you the 2-3 songs I listen too on those albums are mindblowingly awesome.  I used to love listening to his entire albums but I often skip songs now or choose to only listen to certain songs.  I really love Guns of Carolina,  it really is a beautiful song.  When I listen to his older albums though, I still listen to them in their entirety.  This is not a criticism of his work, he will always be my favourite artist.

I'll be an old man in the nursing home with dementia and I'll still hear his music in my head.

Edited August 29, 2017 by Sly Botts

[Outtahere]

As far as albums as a whole go, I've only really liked 2-3 (at most) songs from any of his albums since WLR&RR. Starting with Hospital Music.  Mind you the 2-3 songs I listen too on those albums are mindblowingly awesome.  I used to love listening to his entire albums but I often skip songs now or choose to only listen to certain songs.  I really love Guns of Carolina,  it really is a beautiful song.  When I listen to his older albums though, I still listen to them in their entirety.  This is not a criticism of his work, he will always be my favourite artist.

 

I'll be an old man in the nursing home with dementia and I'll still hear his music in my head.

 

Well given his style changes from album to album, I get that. The only two records I don't listen to from beginning to end are Vancouver and Chaotic Neutral. I love the others but I don't love each song the same obviously. 

[Moonlight_Graham]

I think when you have that many albums out over 2+ decades you have to make cuts.  He usually mixes in songs from the latest album + the live standards/hits plus a few extras to make things fun.  He didn't have a strong single from Arrows so i figure anything on there has to go under the "extras" category of which he has all those albums to choose 2-3 "extra" songs from.

 

He said this about Arrows on The Bored last year: 

 

Looking at a blank canvas after that album (LOES) all I knew to do was to funnel the influences of the alt rock I'd grown up with in the 80s into my next record, which failed to even capture the spirit of that sound.

[adam_777]

It's gotta be part logistics as well.  Two of the four band members were not on the Arrows tour.  Matt has repeatedly said his setlists are limited by the fact his band lives in Toronto and they can only afford so much rehersal time.  On the Chaotic Neutral tour (which had three of these members) so much time was obviously devoted to learning that entire album live, its highly unlikely they devoted any time at all to Arrows songs.  Then from the last tour, they had to fit in a new member and learn all of Beautiful Midnight.  Granted some of the songs were well known, but there were many that had never even been attempted in 15+ years and they came up with new versions of them.  Add to the fact they basically recorded an album plus an EP and again I really doubt they had time to rehearse any Arrows songs.  And that brings us up to today.  

I get the feeling that album was a bit rough for Matt because of issues with label and cancelling American tour and all that.  Plus as stated it really doesn't have a noticeable hit that becomes a "must play" song.  Vancouver gets largely ignored as well except for Last Parade which was a hit for Matt and is recognizeable.  Even his casual fans probably wouldn't recognize Arrows songs.  Personally I'm ok with those songs not being there, they were toured extensively in 2013, all of them were played live and we even got Live Road versions of every one of them to quench our thirst so to speak.  It's only been 4 years, there are tons more songs that have been neglected.  If Matt is going to take the time to relearn back catalog songs with his current band, I'd rather he focus on stuff that wasn't essentially just played.  

Edited August 30, 2017 by adam_777

[Guest Idioteque]

Yeah but is that Matt just constantly shooting himself in the foot with the band mates living on the other side of Canada? He's always rotating with who plays live, who plays on the album etc. He may really like the guys he works with but if it came down to finding talented musicians in Vancouver (which there's certainty plenty) that can learn his work quickly and perform them flawlessly, I think we would see alot more rare tracks live.

Even with current members he's had for years, they don't really ever get to wander far outside the typical setlist. Look at all the albums/tour cycles Stu was involved with, yet they don't dive too deep into those eras. Ian Browne played drums on the Lights of Endangered Species tour and it couldn't have been farther from a "MGB" type reunion, I'm sure he could eventually remember & play alot of the old stuff.

Maybe when you reach the age Matt is, it's better/easier to tour with friends than guys who can do their job only. I'm sure most people go to see just Matt and not his revolving door of band mates, even though they can be extremely entertaining live. 

[adam_777]

Well there is truth to that, but clearly Matt enjoys playing with these guys alot.  And for the record Im a huge fan of how the band has come together cohesively over the last two tours.  Some Really great playing by all and they grew tighter as a unit as the tour progressed.  Its the age old debate though.  Most shows have about 15 songs give or take.  Its clear Matt isn't willing to abandon his warhorses so to speak ( and really lets face it, theres what two dozen of us active on this site asking for rarities, so what we represent 2-3% of any audience?)  and go to any show, the biggest cheers are still Apparitions, Born Losers, Time Bomb.  Load Me Up and Weapon are there almost every show, so thats 1/3rd of your set right there.  

Usually Matt has leaned heavily on his current album (The Victoria show in 2015 had 10/11 Chaotic Neutral songs in one show!) meaning it wasn't unusual to have 6-8 songs from the new album in a set.  So that leaves only a few others songs in any given set and they were usually filled with predictable rarities like Automatic, Alert Status and so forth.  That structure leaves a very minimal amount of material to be changed up in the first place.  

Matt has recently expressed a desire to play less new tracks and more older deep tracks at future shows.  So if he dropped it to 4-5 new songs a show, that may free up space for 5 odd balls tracks.  But it depends on what he wants to play.  If I were to guess I'd think a couple Beautiful Midnight deep tracks, Automatic, Alert Status, Single Explosion and Police Cars will be rotated in and out because the band knows them.  In addition things like Champions and I'm a Window and maybe another track or two might find their way in.  But other than that, I doubt we'll see much more.  

Im someone who tried to go to as many shows on a tour as I can.  Last tour was 11, usually I average about 5 so of course I'd love to see more variation in the setlist.  But I think its unrealistic to think Matt and band would tour with an arsenal of 40+ songs to pull out at will.  I think 25 is far more realistic and I think still gives a good amount of variety.  I do wish some of the rarities would switch up, like drop Automatic and Alert and play say Indestructable or A Long Way Down or something that hasn't been played in awhile, but I won't complain to much.  Years ago I never thought I'd see most of the Beautiful Midnight tracks live, now I've seen them all.  It's not like he's not trying to switch things up and pay homage to his career, its just with every new album it gets harder to pay proper respects to all of it and still stick to a 100 minute show.  

[Guest Idioteque]

As a hardcore fan im always satisfied with what's played every tour, I can honestly say ive never groaned over Born Losers or Alert Status Red coming on (even after hearing them live so many times).

 

So it's not so much of a complaint when we discuss potential rare songs to be played, because if it's a straight up new album tour then that's what we want to hear, the new album. So on top of that Matt can squeeze in rarely played songs inevitably making them feel that much special.

 

Can't remember if he mentioned this during a VIP question or in the middle of a show, but he said something along the lines of he wouldn't mind playing 3 hour shows if he got paid for it aka expensive tickets. Which I personally say yes! I would happily pay around $100-$200 for a once in a lifetime show. From a flash in the past MGB setlist to something like Hospital Music & Vancouver being played in its entirety.

 

There's a proud aspect when it comes to Canadian artists constantly creating music which I love, bands like The Tragically Hip, Our Lady Peace, MG etc could have rolled over years ago and cashed in on the nostalgic album tour cycles but they didn't, we always got new music and they were never embarrassed to hold it front & center during shows. I love that.

[andydanger85]

As a hardcore fan im always satisfied with what's played every tour, I can honestly say ive never groaned over Born Losers or Alert Status Red coming on (even after hearing them live so many times).

 

So it's not so much of a complaint when we discuss potential rare songs to be played, because if it's a straight up new album tour then that's what we want to hear, the new album. So on top of that Matt can squeeze in rarely played songs inevitably making them feel that much special.

 

Can't remember if he mentioned this during a VIP question or in the middle of a show, but he said something along the lines of he wouldn't mind playing 3 hour shows if he got paid for it aka expensive tickets. Which I personally say yes! I would happily pay around $100-$200 for a once in a lifetime show. From a flash in the past MGB setlist to something like Hospital Music & Vancouver being played in its entirety.

 

There's a proud aspect when it comes to Canadian artists constantly creating music which I love, bands like The Tragically Hip, Our Lady Peace, MG etc could have rolled over years ago and cashed in on the nostalgic album tour cycles but they didn't, we always got new music and they were never embarrassed to hold it front & center during shows. I love that.

 

 

Hear, hear! I agree. OLP has dropped off in quality as of recently but I am still glad they're making new music. I'd like to see more Raine Maida solo stuff -- have you heard any of the Moon vs. Sun stuff he's doing with his wife? (Chantal Kreviazuk) -- it's AMAZING. They need to record more of it.

[Gomo]

Matt hates the early MGB stuff, but I doubt he hates stuff like Arrows. I think the reason why some of those songs haven't made it into recent setlists is for reasons other people have mentioned, that the band members rotate and they would need to learn the songs, and that some of the songs were harder to play live. I'm sure one or two of them will resurface eventually.

[hoogie]

As a solo artist it doesn't matter if players are in Vancouver or Toronto, they still have to be paid for rehearsal.

 

As for those players, Blake Manning is easily the best drummer and percussionist I've ever worked with. Stu remains the best guitarist I've worked with and his pallet of styles is enormous. Pete is new, but has been playing with Blake for almost 3 decades. I've never worked with anyone that intuitive or fast in the studio, nor anyone that can play songs they've never performed as if they'd played them 100 times before. But more importantly, they're excellent people, and ones I consider to be among my most trusted and closest friends.

 

There are tons of songs on Arrows that I love. I don't know where this whole Via D hatred thing is coming from, I utterly adore that song. Garden is also awesome and could easily be played without a fifth member. Even when Anthony was present most of the background synths still were tracks. If you write a song that layered you simply can't not use tracks. Just like the strings in Weapon live. But on that album I absolutely adore So Close, Mutineering, Hey Hell Heaven, etc. Letters in wartime remains a huge fav.

 

The reality is I have an immense catalogue. To learn even 50% of it would require weeks of rehearsals.

 

That said, if anyone is guilty of anything it's me. My primary problem is when I release a new record I end up playing 7 or 8 new songs from it in a show, leaving the rest being past singles etc. If I reduced the number of new songs to say 4, older album tracks could be added. In a two hour show it's always a daily cluster fuck to decide what to do. You're tired, you're not entirely in to spending an hour at soundcheck singing and doing refreshers on things. There are dozens of variables.

 

For years I've wanted to have a solid block of songs in the bag to perform. We sat down after the last tour and talked about the tour for this new record and the shows including more obscure album tracks. So that's something we're going to try and accomplish. It means people doing a lot of rehearsing at home before actual rehearsals begin. But you also have to remember my guys also play with other people and have their songs in their heads. Blake for example plays with Rodriguez, the guys do loads of session work, etc.

 

In the end it all comes down to money. If I could block out rehearsals for a month I'd be ecstatic. But that would also cost me tens of thousands of dollars.

 

No one is faulting you for that.  It makes the most sense, in terms of logistics.  When you have a catalog the size of yours, there's always going to be songs that don't get played.  Can't do much about it, other than play three hour shows, which isn't possible in most cases.  

 

I totally agree with you that your band is amazing.  I don't think a group of musicians that you've used have ever been this cohesive, even with a new member in the mix.  

[Outtahere]

As a solo artist it doesn't matter if players are in Vancouver or Toronto, they still have to be paid for rehearsal.

 

As for those players, Blake Manning is easily the best drummer and percussionist I've ever worked with. Stu remains the best guitarist I've worked with and his pallet of styles is enormous. Pete is new, but has been playing with Blake for almost 3 decades. I've never worked with anyone that intuitive or fast in the studio, nor anyone that can play songs they've never performed as if they'd played them 100 times before. But more importantly, they're excellent people, and ones I consider to be among my most trusted and closest friends.

 

There are tons of songs on Arrows that I love. I don't know where this whole Via D hatred thing is coming from, I utterly adore that song. Garden is also awesome and could easily be played without a fifth member. Even when Anthony was present most of the background synths still were tracks. If you write a song that layered you simply can't not use tracks. Just like the strings in Weapon live. But on that album I absolutely adore So Close, Mutineering, Hey Hell Heaven, etc. Letters in wartime remains a huge fav.

 

The reality is I have an immense catalogue. To learn even 50% of it would require weeks of rehearsals.

 

That said, if anyone is guilty of anything it's me. My primary problem is when I release a new record I end up playing 7 or 8 new songs from it in a show, leaving the rest being past singles etc. If I reduced the number of new songs to say 4, older album tracks could be added. In a two hour show it's always a daily cluster fuck to decide what to do. You're tired, you're not entirely in to spending an hour at soundcheck singing and doing refreshers on things. There are dozens of variables.

 

For years I've wanted to have a solid block of songs in the bag to perform. We sat down after the last tour and talked about the tour for this new record and the shows including more obscure album tracks. So that's something we're going to try and accomplish. It means people doing a lot of rehearsing at home before actual rehearsals begin. But you also have to remember my guys also play with other people and have their songs in their heads. Blake for example plays with Rodriguez, the guys do loads of session work, etc.

 

In the end it all comes down to money. If I could block out rehearsals for a month I'd be ecstatic. But that would also cost me tens of thousands of dollars.

 

Makes sense and completely fits with what you've said in the past! I just wondered if, because you changed style a lot with Chaotic Neutral and onwards (BM Revisited and what we've heard from your next record) and because you haven't played any AOD songs since 2013/2014, maybe you were trying to get away from the AOD sound or it was more a question of time, money and logistic like you just explained. Thanks for your input as always.

 

I also love that you're trying to play more obscure songs too! I get you're playing Load Me Up, Hello Time Bomb and such. But there are definitely gems on your records. That's actually one thing I love about the BM reissue. That version of Let's Get It On is amazing.

 

As far as your current players, they are indeed amazing. I saw the short interview you guys did about your Big Wreck cover and you guys are really connected. That's really cool!

[Guest Idioteque]

I remember in Vancouver you mentioned Via D was a bitch to play, that's probably the hatred people are referring to. Regards to your troops, Stu will always be my favorite because he's not just a band mate but a fan of yours. He also spent a good 5 minutes throwing me picks & a setlist so he will always have a soft spot in my heart. 

Blake Manning looks identical to my father, which is scary in itself. 

[Gomo]

Great insight, Matt. Thanks!

 

In terms of obscure tracks, do you plan on just throwing darts at songs pinned up on a bulletin board? How does Matt Good sit down and pick the obscure songs he wants to play?

[Sly Botts]

If you're going to play more obscure tracks that's a great marketing tool. It makes sense anyways since many people who regularly see your shows probably wouldn't miss staples like Load Me Up if they were being replaced with something like... The Inescapable Us or Primetime Deliverance (old tracks), 99% of us if failure or Shallows Low (newer tracks).  It would give people more reason to see your show, almost like a marketing plan for the fans who regularly attend your shows.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Sly Botts

[Moonlight_Graham]

Metallica has virtually unlimited rehearsal time, but a really neat idea they had on a tour a few years ago was that for every single gig on the tour, they let the fans in each city vote online to select every song on the setlist from their entire catalog.  Oddly enough fans selected a lot of the staple hits, but also some oldies that aren't played often or haven't been in decades years.  The interesting thing is that it was a world tour, & every country seemed to have it's own favorite obscure songs.

 

For Matt a neat idea could be for the band to slot out say 5-10 (or whatever the #) obscure songs to rehearse for the tour to be able to select amongst for each show setlist where he might play 3-4 per night or whatever.  But before the tour/rehearsals Matt could have fans choose from amongst his entire catalog (or at least those songs that would be workable live) and vote online for which songs they would want selected for ie: 5 out of the 10 total obscure/wildcard songs that the band would rehearse & cycle through the tour.