Matt Hillyer

By Mary Jane Farmer, First printed in Buddy Magazine, September issue.

Would Matt the Cat by any other name sound just as sweet?

Breaking into a new career phase is old hat to singer/songwriter Matt Hillyer. Old cowboy hat, as Hillyer is seldom seen without his classic western head gear.

It’s Phase 5, if you’re counting, that Hillyer has embarked upon, and this time out the chute, he’s gone solo.

Phase 1 began when Hillyer was a young teenager, the child of a poet and the grandchild of a supportive and encouraging grandmother, with a guitar and a voice. His first band, those teen years, and was the original Matt The Cat, a rock group out of Austin. “It wasn’t much to speak of, but we played a few shows now and then,” Hillyer said.

A few years into it, he met Steve Berg, and they started the Lone Star trio. Phase 2 began, and they found themselves taking their music around the country — a lot, Hillyer said.

That trio disbanded a couple of years later, but Hillyer and Berg, still eager to work together, put together what became the regional award-winning, western-swing style band, Eleven Hundred Springs. Aha — the beginning of Phase 3.

“It was something fun to do on week nights. Everybody in the band was playing in other bands, and we all thought it would be fun to play some country. We found out people dug it,” Hiller smiled.

Eleven Hundred Springs, led by Hillyer on unique rich voice, songwriting, guitar, and personality, has been a mainstay at Texas venues and festivals since its 1998 inception. Holding it together with Hillyer are fiddler Jordan Hendrix and steel player Joe Butcher, plus Arjuna Contreras on drums and Berg on bass.

Then, up jumped Matt the Cat again, this time a rockabilly trio. Phase 4. And built around Eleven Hundred Springs’ never-slowing-down schedule.

Now, with the release of his new CD, Hillyer launched his 5^th phase, a solo career that, he said will only add personal dimension but will not replace Eleven Hundred Springs.

If These Old Bones Could Talk, billed as a solo album, actually is jam-packed with instrumentation, some by Berg on bass and Contreras on drums. Adding to the recorded sounds were producer Lloyd Maines on pedal steel, mandolin, and guitars; Riley Osbourn on keyboards; and Dave Perez (of The Tejas Brothers) on accordion and some harmony vocals. A knocked-out musical group, for sure.

The difference, then, is?. —“It was time to start branching out and producing some different stuff,” said the prolific songwriter. Berg, who was busy in the background setting up for his and Hillyer’s regular Wednesday night KHYI radio show “Country Jam,” added, when he heard how the band members in Hillyer’s groups felt about this new project, “Everybody (In 1100 Springs) is busy enough, we’re all good with it. We just want the best for our buddy.”

Hillyer said more about the solo project If These Old Bones Could Talk, “I wanted to do it for my purposes and the timing was right.” Few musicians stick to a single path as they grow and progress in their vocation. Their perspectives change; and songwriters, as they add life experiences and their dimensions deepen, are able to put those perspectives into lyrics and melody, maybe better than many non-artists might. And a really good songwriter, such as Matt Hillyer, are able to make their listeners understand and feel what they are saying, to identify with the emotions and energies.

Hillyer’s mother’s influence comes out strong in the poetic “Dancing With The Moon,” a romantic, realistic review of love beneath a shining moon. A combination of poetry spoken and poetry sung with only minimal, acoustic accompaniment.

And then there’s a song written most probably from stories his mother told him about her childhood. “The Run Up Tree” talks about not only the tree blown sideways as it grew, her use of a transistor radio (something the younger generations of today won’t even identify with, sort of like 8-track players), but also of Mom’s solitude as she gets away from it all when she’s “down the run up tree.”

Hillyer’s voice exceeds what one would ever expect, emotion-wise, on “That Crying Time of Night,” delivered with the punch of an aching heart. The production on “Home Is Where The Heartache Is” is more remindful of Eleven Hundred Springs, with the soulful sounds of fiddle and steel, very western swing.

There’s one song on the CD that Hillyer had absolutely nothing to do with writing, but absolutely makes it his through his voice and with his and Maines’ the production. “The Price Of Love” is a Don and Phil Everly song released 49 years prior to its inclusion on this project. Hillyer said that The Everly Brothers were always a favorite of his. He also attributes Buddy Holly, Tommy Alverson, and Hank Williams as having the strongest influences on his mixed style and interests. “

The final song on this 11-song CD, “Try Not To Take It So Hard,” comes with a note “Explicit” when uploaded, and has a little suggestive innuendo in it, maybe a bit more than Josh Grider’s “One Night Taco Stand” and probably too much to let it get much airplay, but still a cleverly penned song, especially for those late-night bar gigs.

And speaking of radio airplay, “A Little Less Whiskey” is getting quite a bit on regional radios. He’s just released it, and will be watching several charts as it

One can just visualize, even without the album cover, Hillyer sitting over a domino table with  “If These Old Bones Could Talk”. This is a tribute song, tribute in that it honors another of his forefathers who relied on a set of dominoes when he went to war and when he returned, and who gave the family heirloom set to Hillyer — or at least that’s how the story line goes.

Hillyer said he started writing this collection of songs about a year and a half ago. “The subject matter in them is more personal (than those he writes with Eleven Hundred Springs), and that’s another reason it felt just right to do this.” He said that, so far, the full band isn’t performing any of the songs on this project. “At least, we haven’t yet,” he added. The songs he writes for that band are not as personal, although he’s had several charted hits and fan favorites on the CDs the full band was recorded, such as “This Ain’t the First Time,” and perhaps the song that over bands cover, “We’re From Texas.”

Matt Hillyer

“I keep my horizon as wide open as I can,” said this full-time musician who also serves as his family’s ‘Mr. Mom.’ “Whatever avenue is or becomes open I am anxious to explore.”

And about the differences between recording with his own full band, as opposed to recording this last offering as a solo artist, Hillyer explained, “I have learned to trust my own instincts. It’s different. With the band, the recording is by group, or committee. This way, as solo, is cool, too, and because these tunes are very close to me, I can have them the way I want them.

“I prefer it both ways. I like having the extra input and being part of something (when recording with the band) and I like having my expression coming out come out with only my own input (as solo). These tunes are very close to me, and I like having them the way I want them.”

Eleven Hundred Springs has a bevy of super fans, and some who began returning with their parents when they were as young as eight years old, he’s watched grow up, and smiled through the years at them as they sang along with the band.  “There’s a degree of wild-party scheme that goes on at some shows, but a lot of the stuff we do is good for all the fans, 8-80,” Hillyer said. “The band is now, for the most part, as being accessible, one people can hang out and talk with.”

Back to talking about the new If These Bones Could Talk, and his new solo career, Hillyer hasn’t hired a professional agency to promote the release or to book and promote him.

Hillyer explained that it is like starting over again, like those high school days, with something fresh. “People know what I’ve been up to and know who I am, and there’s a long list of people ready to help me out. I want to keep it personal between these people who have booked for me for years, some for 15 years. We have been around together for a long time.”

He said he hasn’t quite figured out yet how to pitch his songs to the superstars or their agents. “I’m out of those loops,” he laughed, adding that he, like so many, spent a few years of ambition living in Nashville, but then, “we (the family) just moved back to Texas for good.” But, he added, “I write songs. Maybe I should get to know all these people everybody knows in Nashville, but right now it’s a labor of love.

Matt Hillyer solo/full band, will be at: Sept. 14, Love & War in Texas, Plano; Sept. 25 at Rockin’ Rodeo in Denton; and Oct. 17 at Hank’s Texas Grill in McKinney. Eleven Hundred Springs has several gigs in September, including Sept. 12 at Tupelo Honey in Denison and Sept. 13, the Balloon Festival in Celina. Matt the Cat is playing at Rally Round Greenville on Sept. 20. And, of course, he, Berg, and a different weekly guest are every Wednesday 7-9 at Love & War in Texas (Plano) with the Country Jam Radio Show.

For more, there’s two Websites to visit:  1100springs.com; and MattHillyerMusic.com.