So I am building the new Yer Bird Records website (hey, did you know I am mid-way through a transition to take over my own record label? Well now you do…) and when building a page for the great Matt Arbogast, The Gunshy, I found the above photo. Its a great photo in general (from Mr. Ryan Hendrix) but really look at it…it turns out it is absolutely fantastic. Just the negative space (is that what it is?) all around him and with just the surfaces reflecting a lone spotlight. Wow.

I start to absorb the photo and then I have to listen to some Gunshy. Have to. Arbogast’s “early morning after a late, late, late night” voice is (to many) his signature – but don’t let it distract you from the songs themselves, there is soo much there. So I start playing a couple of tracks and one of the tracks that hit me was the title track to his 2004 EP “What Will They Speak of You When You’re Gone?”. The song has everything and also gives you everything. It literally “leaves it all out there” – it is hushed, it is angry, it is pensive and it is gut wrenching. I know I tend to be a bit wishy-washy as some say about liking “singer-songwriters” but Matt Arbogast bleeds for you. The song is tragic, and so incredibly encompassing that it must be heard. You must listen. Even when the monitor turns on and you hear the hum at 3:20 of the track, it still fits – like everything else in the song, it is just supposed to be there and fits what I needed today.

Just thought you needed to hear it.

“What Will They Speak of You When You’re Gone?” – The Gunshy

Visit The Gunshy and Pick up a copy:

~Smansmith