Matthew Dear – “Muscle Beach” & “Supper Times”

Matthew Dear – “Muscle Beach” & “Supper Times”

About a decade ago, the extremely slick Michigan dance producer Matthew Dear released his album Black City. That LP might’ve been Dear’s breakout. Dear had been building momentum for years before then, but Black City established Dear as a master of thoughtfully sleazy nightclub thump, and as a band frontman as well as a producer. But Dear’s career could’ve gone very differently, and a new album will show up exactly how.

This summer, Dear will follow up his very solid 2018 album Bunny with the new release Preacher’s Sigh & Potion: Lost Album. As the title implies, the songs on Preacher’s Sigh & Potion aren’t new. Instead, Dear recorded and shelved an entire album a decade ago. He’d been touring with Hot Chip and remixing bigger artists, and he decided not to release the left-turn LP he’d been making. Soon, though, we’ll get to hear it.

Preacher’s Sigh & Potion is a record inspired by Emmylou Harris and by Dear’s own father, a fingerpicking guitarist. On the album, Dear runs country-folk influences and guitar loops through his own dance-music background. He’s just shared two early tracks, “Muscle Beach” and “Supper Times,” that show us how that might sound. “Muscle Beach” is a bluesy, blissed-out reverie, and “Supper Times” is tingly and spaced-out. Both songs are cool, but I really like “Muscle Beach.” Listen to both below.

Preacher’s Sigh & Potion: Lost Album is out 6/25 on Ghostly International.

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