What Am I Making Podcast

If you’ve been paying much attention to this space in the last few weeks, you’ll know that I spent a couple of weeks traveling in Peru with my Mother. This is the third consecutive winter we have been lucky enough to travel together internationally. It’s a tradition that we began after my Father died unexpectedly in 2020. My parents' shared love for travel was bequeathed to me and to my sister. It is largely because of my parents’ curiosity and generosity that we have both been able to see such wide swaths of the world. 

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Although my Mom had traveled to Peru with my dad twenty years ago, we chose this particular trip because it gave us the chance to visit the Amazon, and it allowed me to see Machu Picchu and the ancient city of Cusco. So much of what we saw had changed rather dramatically in the two decades since my mother’s first visit. Advancements in technology, and the shrinking of the world through mobile phones and social media have altered the country, and the whole region. 

During our chat, my Mom and I covered the ins and outs of our journey including the ups and downs of Peruvian cuisine, fishing for piranha, visiting an Amazonian village, and walking amongst the amazing stones of Cusco. We share our experiences at Machu Picchu, and relate the story of our new British friends who popped thrice during our travels. 

I feel so very grateful to get to see the world with my mom. There is also a deep sense of gratitude in just having a mother who is full of wonder, curiosity, and empathy. I’ve had a wonderful travel teacher since the moment she first took me on the road as an infant. It’s a genuine treat to still be treading that path with her.

Lastly, I am so grateful that I get to share a bit of my Mom with you through this conversation. 

So, now I present you with a chat between a boy, his mother, and the ghosts of the Incas. 

Cheers,

Matty C

Seth Werkheiser has spent the last ten years walking away from social media. If you ask him for his two cents, he’ll tell you that you should walk away as well. For more than a decade, Seth has been helping creative artists build community and teaching them how to engage more intentionally with their fans and followers. In the process, Seth has found a new way of looking at life, creativity, and connection. 

When I first reached out to Seth about being on the pod, I was primarily curious about the ways in which he was creating community solely through an email list and his terrific Substack, Social Media Escape Club; and doing it all without having to spend unending hours on the wheels of Facebook, Instagram, and the like. To be honest, I was also secretly wondering if I too might be able to kick the social media habit. 

Instead of chasing the dragon that is going viral, Seth has devoted his time to the people there right in front of him. Seth stresses one on one connections and true relationship building over the possibility of reaching a wide range of people for a split second. It’s great advice for everyday life, and not just for the creatives in the crowd. 

Seth and I dive deeply into the idea of risk versus reward and the inherent lack of vulnerability in an online persona, as opposed to the nitty gritty building of real life, three dimensional connections. Seth also talks about his musical upbringing, and touches on the idea of creative bothering - a term that I have already fallen deeply in love with. 

Perhaps the greatest lesson I learned in my chat with Seth was to, “trust my stuff” as the baseball guys would say. In leaving social media, Seth found a new respect for his own work and his own worth. Now, he is teaching other folks how to muster the courage to do the same. 

Here is my chat with my new friend and an old soul we could all learn a lot from, Seth Werkheiser. I hope you dig it.

Cheers,Matty C

Kevin Alexander is unabashed about his love for New Order. They are probably his favorite band if he’s pressed on the issue. He fell in love early and stayed deeply smitten through the intervening decades. It was with this knowledge that I asked Kevin to share his assessment of the first four albums by New Order. If there was a single person that I knew who was within my own orbit that was most qualified for this task, it was Kevin. 

The resulting essay, which was published just last week at What Am I Making, is the best sort of deep dive on the band’s early catalog. Kevin contextualizes New Order’s early releases with the weight and impact of Ian Curtis’s death and the dissolution of Joy Division, the band that would eventually become New Order. More than learning to become a new band after the death of their bandmate and friend, the remaining members of Joy Division created a new outfit, and a new sound that would help to define a musical movement.

Kevin and I weave our way through New Order’s first four records beginning with the icy cool debut Movement on through to Brotherhood, an album that Alexander has referred to as having abundant “middle child energy”. We chart the growth of the band’s sound, explore the way that drugs and the local dance scene influenced the sonic qualities of NewOrder as they evolved and the separation amongst band members that occurred as technology took precedence over songwriting. 

There is extensive discussion as well of the band’s visual appearance, especially as informed by the artist and designer Peter Saville who designed all of the band’s early cover art. We also delve into a number of the incredible singles that New Order released in this window of time as well. 

It’s a critical appraisal of one band being formed from the ashes of another. It is a story of resilience, innovation, and even some bad luck. It’s a New Order story filled with a shade or two of unabashed love. Hope ya dig it. 

Cheers,

Matty C

If you have been paying any attention to this space, any at attention at all for the last year or so, you’ll know that I spent much of 2024 on the road. Over two legs of touring, I covered more than 17,000 and saw huge swaths of America and its denizens. A full year after walking away from a career to begin a life as an independent artist, I set off on a pair of tours that would mark the largest leap of my artistic career, as well as a huge leap of faith for me and my family. 

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The tours were a true mixed bag of results. On the eastern half of the journey, I had a largely successful run of gigs that ended with me well in the black and feeling pretty great about life on the road. On the west coast however, I was met with myriad setbacks including a trio of cancelled gigs and a rash of mounting expenses that left me bleeding money as I rolled back home into Michigan. 

Over the course of the 10 weeks that I was on the road this year, I was truly changed. I saw my nation and my fellow countrymen in a new way. I travelled this land in a way that most Americans will never get to. I spent time with people in their homes as they welcomed me into their lives in a shared pursuit of art, music, and community.

Looking back on this travel and these two tours, my keyword is gratitude. 

My dear friends Abigail and Barry Hummel of the Pops on Hops podcast were kind enough to invite me on their show to talk about my time on the road. We chatted about what I got right, what I miscalculated, and where I might go from here.

There is talk of National Parks and the stunning beauty that this country has to offer. We cover some of my favorite meals and favorite moments. I talk about the most magical nights on stages and in living rooms, and we hit upon so many of the wonderful people that dotted each and every stop.

I am so grateful that I was able to make these tours and this experience a reality. I’m also incredibly humbled and grateful to the Hummels for inviting me to relive this experience with them just a bit. I sure hope you dig it.  

Cheers,Matty C

P.S. Here’s a photo strip of me and Barry Hummel from the barcade in Gainesville where we played skee-ball and got a little bit drunk. We even included duck lips pose at Barry’s insistence because I had been complaining earlier in the day about how dumb it looks.

Michael Gilbride spent several years in the financial trenches as a bond trader. Armed with a finance degree and a penchant for capitalism, Michael saw trading as a way to build a life of prosperity and financial security. However, during the entirety of his schooling and his early career his passion for music was always there, calling out. After several years in the bond game, Michael took his amassed savings and poured it into his musical career. Very quickly, he learned what a steep hill it was that he was trying to climb.

As Michael learned more and more about the machinations of the music business in the streaming era he found himself throwing good money after bad to promote himself to playlist curators and tastemakers. Michael invested heavily in social media ads to drive plays. While he found some success with these ads, he was only able to sustain a high level of streams by doling out large amounts of cash for these ad buys. Any money that he made from streaming income was then diverted right back to more ad buys to maintain these streams. Eventually, Michael realized that the whole system was what he refers to as “a scam”.

Instead of throwing his hands up in defeat, Michael set out to build something new to help fight against this system. Thus, MAD Records was born.

MAD is a record label that takes none of the revenue away from artists. Nor does MAD own any of the rights of the music that they distribute. Instead of earning revenue off of the music itself, MAD is set up as an educational institution as well as a record label. This business plan affords MAD the chance to work with a variety of artists that represent a wide range of genres, backgrounds, and ages. Thus far, the breakout star from MAD’s early efforts is a 67 year old woman from the UK who has been making music with her sister for nearly half a century. 

Michael and I dive through a few of the ins and outs of today’s music business but we manage to keep it from getting too inside baseball. We discuss how the current musical landscape has nothing to do with artistic merit, and you’ll learn firsthand just how lonely the life of an independent creator can be in an age when we can, and often have, to do it all on our own. 

This is a fascinating conversation with an ambitious and interesting dude doing his very best to improve our musical ecosystem. It’s a helluva task, but Michael Gilbride seems ready for the job. 

Cheers,

Matty C

After a lengthy hiatus from the podcast, I am back in the captain’s chair. Season 3 is sure to be packed with in-depth interviews, special guests, and more forays into the hidden corners of our culture.

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Jeff Gower and Jason Lantrip are two of my favorite people in the world. I won’t pretend to be objective about it, even in the guise of an interview. More than 15 years ago, the pair invited me to join The Stick Arounds, a new power pop band that they were forming. For the last decade and half we have been cranking out songs together, playing shows across the midwest, and we’ve built a true musical family along the way. That musical partnership is a foundational bedrock in my work as a singer, songwriter and guitar player. Jason and Jeff are also two of my nearest and dearest friends apart from our band activities. 

Over the last year and a half as I have focused my attention on touring as a solo artist, activity within the Sticks has slowed to a trickle. Gradually, we wound up getting together less often and found ourselves on a sort of hiatus. While each of us has found ways to fill that time away from a full-time pursuit of the band, Jeff and Jason have poured themselves into a new two man outfit they’ve christened Deer & Elk. 

Jason best described the sound of Deer & Elk as “The stuff we heard in the backseat of the car in the 70s and 80s.”

Deer & Elk have channeled a very specific brand of acoustic/electric songs that evoke a period of American songwriting that is often unfairly derided. With a bevy of cover tunes and a slate of excellent original material, the duo have carved out a repertoire that is equal parts classic country, AM Gold, and soft power pop. Part of the impetus to push in this musical direction was led by work that Jason had done in the Stick Arounds incorporating more country style playing into his parts. Now, in Deer & Elk those chops can come to the fore.  

Jeff’s massive songbook of covers and original material made for the perfect platform for Deer & Elk to stand tall. By incorporating a slew of classic country covers, trucker songs, forgotten folk rock hits, and the chewy sweetness of AM Gold, the pair have quickly developed an impressive catalog of sonic offerings. Their original songs, like the brand new trucker single ‘Big Penny’, feel refreshingly new, yet achingly familiar. 

Taking the songwriting ethos, and a pack of tunes from a maligned era might seem like a bad business move for a pair of performers in middle age, but Deer & Elk seem to have hit a nerve. While they have primarily kept their shows in the Lansing area, Jeff and Jason are playing regularly to good crowds nearly every weekend.

‘Big Penny’, an original tune about Lansing’s legendary truck eating bridge has become something of a local phenomenon. There has been coverage in MLive, Lansing City Pulse, and there is a forthcoming feature on the Behind The Mitten pod as well. Apparently Lansing has fallen head over heels for a trucker tune. 

The three of us also talk about the economic conditions of the present day that seem to echo the original trucker era as well. We find ourselves at a time when workers are feeling especially devalued and frustrated in their work. The wealth gap is steadily increasing between the haves and have nots, and the working man and woman rightly feel squeezed. It’s hard to know how much of that sentiment is behind what drives Deer & Elk or in the way they are being received, but it feels like part of the puzzle.

Be sure to check out the full video for ‘Big Penny’ below, and you can even snag your own copy of the single now on the Phonophore Records Bandcamp page. And look for more releases in 2025 from the boys in Deer & Elk.

Here now is my conversation with my dearest of friends, Deer & Elk.

Cheers,Matty C

This week on the podcast, there is no guest. It’s just me, Matty C. That doesn't mean it’s a clunker of an episode though. To the contrary, I cover quite a bit of ground on this one.

The solo episode provides me with a chance to reckon with the fact that for a couple of weeks, there have been no new episodes of the pod. As I have prepped for my massive west coast tour, work on the pod has taken a back burner position. Over the last several weeks I have had to spend the majority of my time booking shows, prepping my gear, working on promo for the shows and more. This flurry of activity centered around the tour has led to an inconsistent pod. It also means that the work that I am doing at the blog is largely built around the machinations of the tour, at least right now.

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I am incredibly proud of my touring history and the work that I am putting into it, but I do not want this space to simply be a repository for my touring activity. In an effort to refocus the pod, I have decided to wait until January of 2025 to launch a new season of the podcast. This will give me the chance in the coming weeks to focus on the tour, the diary recaps from the road, and other written work about music, film, and culture.

Between now and January, I am likely to post intermittent episodes of the pod featuring more stories of the greatest nights of music of our lives. These conversations are simpler to produce than a typical episode and usually much easier to book as well. These fun, fascinating episodes should be a great way to keep the home fires burning until we resume the pod in full force early next year.

In the episode I cover some of the natural highlights I am hoping to see on my six week sojourn to the west. I even got a little emotional thinking about this journey and how much it is akin to a trip my grandfather took nearly eighty years ago that shaped his life forever. I cover myriad ways for you to get involved in the show, and we run down what still needs to happen before the tour begins in less than three weeks.

Plus, I reveal a possible special guest who may join me for part of the trip!

I hope you dig this PG rated little peak inside my noggin as I get ready for the biggest trip of my entire life. Be sure to listen to the full episode and get involved in one way or another. Thanks for your patience, support, and friendship. It means the world to me.

Cheers,Matty C

Barry Hummel has become something of a regular fixture here at What Am I Making. Along with his daughter, Abigail, Barry is half of the Pops On Hops podcast, a father-daughter exploration of music, beer, and family. The Hummels have become frequent guests here on the show, and they have even hosted me twice on my house concert tours. They have also become true friends.

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Barry had a tough time narrowing his selection down to a single pick. He wanted to choose a night that had an emotional attachment entwined with a great night of music. Despite a myriad of live shows under his belt, Barry eventually settled on a Crosby, Stills & Nash show from the early 90’s. The evening coincided with his first wedding anniversary, and Barry and his wife Darby went to the show to celebrate. Little did they know they would receive a wonderful surprise gift in the form of a cover song via CSN. You’ll have to listen to the whole show to hear that little secret. 

What begins as a discussion about one great night of live music quickly veers in a dozen different directions. Barry and I are famous for our long winded conversations about music, politics, culture, and film. This chat covers that magical night at Walnut Creek with Crosby, Stills & Nash, but also hits on the culture of college towns and looking for the magical moment of a live performance. As is always the case when Barry joins me, it is funny, insightful, fluid, and fascinating. 

Cheers,Matty C

Abigail Hummel has become something of a regular fixture here at What Am I Making. Along with her Dad, Barry, Abigail is half of the Pops On Hops podcast, a father daughter exploration of music, beer, and family. The Hummels have become frequent guests here on the show, they’ve even hosted me twice on my house concert tours, and they have become true friends.

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When I asked Abigail to sit down for this chat, I was unsure where she might land with her choice. Being twenty years younger than I am, Abigail of course has different tastes and experiences in the musical realm. While she loves many of the same legacy artists that I adore, R.E.M. most notably, I figured she was likely to select an artist I was not familiar with. One of the true joys of Pops on Hops is the generational gap between father and daughter and the ways in which they continually attempt to bridge that gap. 

This week, Abigail shares her story of seeing the singer/songwriter Brett Dennen at a listening room show in Gainesville, Florida all alone. We cover the joy of experiencing a concert by yourself. Abigail also discusses what she looks for in a live musical performance, including the likelihood that a good show will result in tears before the end of the night. And we cover why that is a good thing. 

Enjoy this chat about live music, personal exploration, storytelling, emotional reactions, and why regular people should know more musicians. 

Cheers,Matty C

What was the greatest musical night of your life?

Eddie White is the sort of man who never stops. By day, he is a dentist in the Charleston, SC area. Every Wednesday night is the impresario of the Awendaw Green, a spacious outdoor compound hosting live music every week unless there is a holiday or a hurricane. Eddie describes the Green as “arrogantly shabby”. It’s a perfect descriptor. 

Old instruments, broken bicycles, reclaimed lawn decorations and more hang from the trees overhead at Awendaw Green. There is a ramshackle splendor to the large open space under the trees and their massive ornaments. The green is littered with picnic tables, vendor booths, a wood fired pizza oven, a series of dire pits, and a huge stage fitted with yet more shabbily arrogant accoutrement. 

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The Green began as a series of house shows and through Eddie’s ambition and never ending drive has become a weekly series of live music that draws well more than a hundred people each and every Wednesday. Of course, Eddie did not build this alone, nor does he manage it all himself. He has a crew of terrific volunteers that show up week in and week out to make the Green a reality. He also has had some help from a few famous friends in a little outfit you may have heard of called Hootie & The Blowfish. 

Ultimately, Awendaw Green is a space built around community. It might be forged on music, but the people are what keep Eddie so hard at work. We talk about the privilege of being able to give someone a transformational experience with a night of music and community. Eddie also shares how his Dad gave him a love for throwing a party and showed him the weird world of Renaissance fairies as a kid. 

Even during our conversation Eddie White is on the go. As we chatted, he headed off to Costco to snag more fixings for the pizza kitchen at the Green. You’ll hear a bit of digital dropout at a couple of spots during our interview, but don’t fret, we recover quickly. 

Here now is the whirlwind that is Eddie White, the man behind the amazing Awendaw Green. Enjoy.

Cheers,Matty C