As with any music blog, we receive a tremendous amount of unsolicited emails and submissions. However, perhaps none have been so adorably strange or earnest as those we sometimes receive from Matthew Squires. Squires just released a new album earlier this month under the moniker Matthew Squires and the Learning Disorders, and now he’s sharing the first video to emerge from that collection of songs.
The strange, nighttime, fireside video for “Song for a Future Phoenix” features eerie make-up and burning skulls. However, it works conjointly with a song that encourages forward progress and rebirth. As we have seen with Squires before, the songwriter has a penchant for embracing both the joy and misery of life. “To be a phoenix you first must become ash,” he sings, “and that fire has been lit so stop trying to clutch the past, my friend.” With his rocked up folk and nasally vocals, Squires shares a musical kinship with artists such as Jason Anderson, Kimya Dawson, or Paul Baribeau. Watch “Song for a Future Phoenix” below.
