Matt Marque - Nothing Personal

  by Maarten Schiethart

published: 13 / 6 / 2004

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Review

Despite its title, this album is very* personal. Matt Marque may at first glimpses seem to be a little too modest and a little too introverted . Moreover the home made lo-fi beats of his album' Nothing Personal' appear unremarkable, but altogether Matt Marque's album does it for me on a lazy summer evening. What one might hold against Matt Marque is that he won't step out of the grey which as a matter of fact colours his home base. Absolutely nothing is exceptionally spectacular about Matt Marque, but few, however, would know, as he does, how to combine two dulls to make one thrill. Marque has stripped some hiphop beats down to the bare essentials and on top of this has added a layer of melodies, singing and narrative. These again will not seperately stun the listener, but nicely melt together into a persistent flow of post-modern blues with sparse still contemporary and slow rhythms. 'Nothing Personal' reaches such an emotive dismissal that one feels obliged to give the album a mention. File under 'great promises'. Matt Marque's onto something bigger if only we can let him do so.

Track Listing:-

1 Blowback
2 Normalized Relations
3 By The Way
4 Close As I Can
5 Makeout
6 Undertow
7 I Had Considered It
8 Nothing Personal
9 (Cheers And Applause)
10 Possibly While High
11 Your Best Guess