Matthew And The Atlas / Kendall Lujan
May 16 @ 12:00 am
Tickets Release Wednesday, December 11th at 9am
Friday, May 16th, 2025
$15 Advance // $18 Day Of Show
6pm Doors / 7pm Show
All Ages
MATTHEW AND THE ATLAS
When it came time for fifth full-length ‘Many Times,’ Matt Hegarty needed to try something different. The Aldershot songwriter, better known as Matthew and The Atlas, was keen to follow up 2023’s ‘This Place We Live’ quickly, jumping straight back into the studio at the end of that same year. Tapping up Bear’s Den member and producer Kev Jones for the challenge, they approached ‘Many Times’ with a production style antithetical to its title: each song was to be recorded in as few takes as possible, stripped-back and direct-to-tape, with no overdubs.
This process, the pair explain, was intended to capture Matt’s songwriting in its purest form. Recorded over just two days at the iconic Rockfield Studios in Monmouth, Wales, “the idea was just to capture a moment in time that is very, very honest and open,” Jones says. Inspired in part by Nick Drake’s ‘Pink Moon’ (which was itself captured over just two nights).
“We said to ourselves that I shouldn’t rehearse too much,” says Matt. “It’s a balancing act – you have to write the songs, and know the melody and the lyrics, and how you’re going to perform it. But only up to a point – you’re still trying to capture something a bit truer to its original form; something you haven’t over-rehearsed or refined down.”
It’s an approach that was taken to avoid the slow gestation process and over-thinking that Matt openly admits led to the four-year gap between his previous two albums. “I definitely tend to disappear into my studio space,” he says of previous records, “There’s definitely been a lot of overthinking in my home studio, and working on things, and taking a lot longer than I thought.”
For ‘Many Times,’ then, it was a total about-face in terms of approach. “I really wanted to do the complete opposite of that,” Matt explains, “and not think about instrumentation – just think about songwriting.”
Capturing those songs in their rawest form led to some of ‘Many Times” most stunning moments coming from the most unlikely of places. From the engineer running around the studio mid-take, to re-position microphones while Matt was still ‘in the zone,’ to rhythmic thigh slaps from Kev during the recording of ‘Standing Here’ adding one of the record’s only embellishments – and taking the track to a new dimension in the process – it’s a record that thrives on its simplicity. “It’s because the elements are so simple, the minutiae is massive,” says Matt.
“There was always an element of uncertainty about it, which I think was a good thing,” he continues of the recording process. Recording to tape – an expensive method in an increasingly digital age – “gave it an element of pressure,” he admits. But despite the pressure Matt might have felt, ‘Many Times’ feels like Matthew and The Atlas’ most effortless release in a decade.
“You’ve got nowhere to hide, the songs have to speak for themselves,” says Kev of the approach, and it’s something Matt agrees with. The result is a record which houses some of Matthew and The Atlas’ most brilliant songs to date.
KENDALL LUJAN
Portland, Oregon based artist, Kendall Lujan embarks on her first full length album “Lucky Penny’ it is set to be released February 21st 2025.
After releasing her Debut self titled EP last Spring, featured on official playlist for Spotify and Apple Music. Lujan also gaining attention from NPR’s Tiny Desk,
MTV and winning the John Lennon Songwriting contest. Recently voted one of Portland’s ‘Willamette Weekly’ Best New Bands 2024. Sharing the stage with Amos Lee, Frazey Ford (of The Be Good Tanyas), Allie Crow Buckley, Early James, and The Magnetic Fields.
‘Lucky Penny’ features many genres Including Jazz, Folk,
Bosa Nova and Indie-Rock.
The natural singer and songwriter put together a studio band with Micah Hummel (drums), Colin Schmidt (bass) and Alex Milsted (piano) and recorded at the Map Room Studio in Portland, Oregon with Dominik Schmidt producing. Her forthcoming first full length album “Lucky Penny’ is set to be released February 21st.
Her writing is real, introspective and reflective. After touring the songs in Europe three times this 1.5 years, Lujan is ready to show her versatility and growth as an artist. The first single to be released late March 2024 titled ‘Goodbyes’. The song explores mourning and loss of important people in your world.
In the sense of ending romantic relationships it explores the process of knowing when someone isn’t suited for your life or growth any longer.
Lujan writes
“I wrote this song to remind myself that even though things are hard you will meet those people who stick around eventually.” Even though people come and go in your world, remembering that there will be lots of cries and laughs on your journey to finding those people who see you for who you are. The main hook stating:
‘it takes a lot of goodbyes to get to forever.
