A.L. Harper

Everything about Matt Jenkins says country. From his traditional country voice to his honest, straight-from-the-heart lyrical style, it’s written in his easy gentle manner and polite charm. Just one look at this 6’4” 24 year old from Texas, and you’ll see “cowboy” etched over every inch of him – well you’ll want to look for it all over him anyway. It is his unforced grace, natural sly wit and a traffic stopping smile that mark Jenkins out from the crowd.

He has had a turbulent career so far. Signed to Universal South (a division of Universal Records) on a development deal, he even released the song “Bad As I Want To” which reached the top 40 in the US country charts.

But when Universal reshuffled all its labels, including Universal South, Jenkins was one of the casualties. This autumn he was scheduled to appear in Fox network’s reality soap television series Nashville — a country music version of MTV’s The Hills. However, that got cancelled after just two episodes.

So not the best start in all, but Jenkins is man born with music hard-wired into his DNA. His little brother, Josh Jenkins, is frontman for former Band of the Week Green River Ordinance.

This charming, hunky, talented Texan may be down but he isn’t out. He is currently in the studio recording and he says he will have some new music for his fans, next summer. He recently took time out to talk to me and I was a bit taken aback. I’m not sure what I expected from a country and western singer besides being down to earth; I had always had the impression that country-boys weren’t, well… the sharpest tacks in the box. Matt Jenkins, however is intelligent, articulate, amiable, distractingly good looking and a shameless flirt. After about three minutes getting to know Matt, I decided, ultimately he isn’t going to have any trouble finding success.

You were signed to Universal, what happened?

I was signed to Universal when I was 19, and moved from Texas to Tennessee, put out a song (“Bad As I Want To”) recorded some songs with a couple different producers. Went up the charts… and I got to do a lot of cool stuff like play at the Grand Ole Opry and open up for a couple of legends, you know heroes of mine.

Who?

Don Williams and Buck Owens. Buck Owens just passed away. So I did that, then the song died and the two guys who signed me left Universal, and the new president who came in let me go. So… it was really a frustrating time but, it was a great experience and I’m glad that I went through it.

You’re not signed now but you seem very undisturbed by that. You seem very positive about it.

I’m very upbeat, I felt like…you know I was on that label for three years, and I put out a song, and it was a lot of sitting around and just not knowin’ what was going to happen, and feelin’ like I was ready. At the time it was upsetting and frustrating but I’m really happy that I went through that process. And to be honest, I have never felt better about where I am musically or creatively than I am right now. There’s no pressure, I don’t feel like there’s pressure on me. There’s pressure to make great music but I feel free. There’s nothin’ binding me down and I just feel like over the last year since I’ve been dropped it’s been an amazing growth period for me. I’m really finding out who Matt Jenkins is. I’m saying what I want to say, how I want to say it.

Who is Matt Jenkins?

A genuine, real artist. I love country music but I also love the U2s and the Matchbox Twentys and the James Taylors, I love all that. My roots will always be in the country world but I would like to think that my music would span a lot of those genres, just be great music. And I hope that someone who digs U2 or Green River Ordinance (shameless plug) could listen to my music and be like “I understand that’s country but I dig it”, and go buy the record.

Your brother is in a band isn’t he?

Yeah my brother is in a band, Green River Ordinance – I taught them everything that they know. I’m totally lyin’. They are GRO which is a pop-rock band, that got together six or seven years ago and just worked it so hard, playin’ shows all over the country and have really developed their own sound. It’s not classic but it’s very, sing-along rock. I’m so proud of those guys, I couldn’t be more proud of them. I feel like I could be, Josh is my brother, but I almost feel like a big brother to all the guys. I think there are huge things in store for them.

So what are you doing?

I feel like the next year is goin’ to be huge for me. I feel like creatively I am in such a good place. I’m writing and I’m recordin’ the best music I have ever written, stuff that I am so proud of, stuff that I feel like is 100% Matt Jenkins. I can’t wait for people to hear it.

What kind of music are you writing now? You said you would like to crossover a bit, is this new stuff a bit roots-rock?

I think… you’ve heard me sing! I think I… (clears throat comically)

(laughing)Yeah, you don’t have a crossover voice.

No, no. I’m a country singer. You know that, you’ve heard me sing. I don’t think I’m going to get played on pop radio (laughing). No way, they’d be like “HA! Yeah!” Unless I do a duet with like Nelly or somethin’.

I just hope my music is timeless, and I just hope it stands on its own. I think there are certain country acts that can do that and hopefully I’m in that place. Musically, I’ve probably gotten a little more edgy, but it’s still traditional.

In ten years time Matt, where do you want to be?

I hope that I make music that makes people want to go out and buy records and pile into stadiums around the country. That’s the goal. I think that as an artist, you just want people singing your songs back to you. That’s the dream for me.

If you want to learn more about Matt Jenkins, or hear some of his music, you can visit his MySpace space.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 15th, 2007 at 10:16 pm and is filed under Interviews, Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.