Songwriter’s songs inspired by environment issues

Chicago-based Singer/songwriter Matthew Santos Is touring in support of his recently released album, "Quickly Disappearing," which was inspired by environmental issues

“A lot of the material was inspired by my trip to Alaska to see Denali National Park,” he says during a recent phone interview from Chicago. “We went to see a glacier and when I got there, it wasn’t a great scene. It was melting and put into perspective what’s happening in the world.”

Santos is no stranger to the music scene. In 2007, he was featured on Lupe Fiasco’s hit “Superstar,” which earned the pair a Grammy nomination. Santos says being thrust into the spotlight was intimidating but taught him a lot about the music business.

“I really wasn’t ready for all of this attention, but I dealt with it the best way I knew how,” he says. “After the song blew up, everyone was waiting for more music from me and that put me under a lot of pressure.”

Flash forward to 2012, and Santos is still an artist on the rise – and he’s just fine with that.

“I was constantly being pushed in directions that I didn’t want to go,” he says. “With this album, it’s a creative expression of who I am as an artist right now. It represents me to the fullest and I’m proud of that.”

Santos says the album came together rather quickly. Many of the songs were already written and those that weren’t had a lot of inspiration behind them.

“I was very driven in this process and I ended up fiddling with the process a lot,” he explains. “I wanted my message to come out clearly without being preachy. That’s a difficult thing to accomplish especially when you are dealing with environment issues.”

Santos kept the collaborations on “Quickly Disappearing” to a minimum, but says he would like to throw in more collaborations in the future.

“I do have a short list,” he explains. “I’d love to work with Kimbra, who is blowing up right now. I’ve also had a little musical crush on Feist, and working with DJ Shadow would be amazing. But that’s just the beginning of the list. There are plenty more names. That’s just a beginning point.”

On his current tour, Santos will be performing solo, which will be quite a change for the musician.

“I won’t have my talented band behind me,” he explains. “But I’ll also be able to strip the songs down and make them more personal. “Sometimes with a band, the songs tend to get overshadowed by all of the music. With this tour, I’m going to showcase all of my talents. I’ll beat box on some songs, rock out on others and then get sensitive on others. It’ll be a great show.”

Matthew Santos
With Ewan Dobson, Gareth Pearson, Craig D’Andrea
WHEN: 8 p.m. Wednesday, March 28
WHERE: Cooperage, 7220 Lomas NE
HOW MUCH: $16 in advance, $19 day of show at www.holdmyticket.com or 886-1251