Schlam

Matt Schlam is an entity in his own right. Vocals, Piano, Guitar, Drums, Bass, Harmonica. Songwriting, programming, audio engineering and production. Other than 2 years of piano lessons, he is self-educated too. I managed to catch a show of his recently, and I was left speechless. His current solo show begins with him playing his new Resonator acoustic guitar, and stomping his feet, singing songs like “One more time” from Diesel, “Red Sand” from Ian Moss, “Human” from Rag N Bone Man. Then he’ll move to the stage piano and play some of the most beautiful love songs and cherished pub songs that you rarely get to hear. The acoustic set ends with a low octave injected version of The Beatles classic, “Come Together” , and Billy Joels “Piano Man” complete with harmonica. A complete showman in his own right. Then he changes the stage. The piano has disappeared, there are more guitars on stage now. The lights change. It’s party time. Standing up, this time, you realise why this man has been a guitarist all his life. He can punch out some of your most treasured pub classics, with so much energy. Whilst belting out the vocals, he’s simultaneously playing the rhythm guitar parts with what has to be a 2nd brain. When playing a guitar solo, Matt seems to bend the guitar strings on nearly every note, and literally hits the strings, adding a powerful voice to his guitar, and a very distinctive style of playing, FULL on. Matt tells me that the accompaniment that he uses is completely unique to his show. Every backing has been carefully pre recorded and customized by himself to ensure consistency to his “Virtual Band” throughout the show. A lot of people forgot that there wasn’t a band behind him once they had a few. :-) The light show, isn’t just flashing like crazy all night, he has actually taken the time to completely program a very believable light show. I was convinced he had a lighting guy hiding somewhere behind the bar. he didn’t. This man can sing, and he has stamina to boot. The night ended with what would have to have been some of my most favourite Australian rock classics ever, and with full steam ahead. As I was talking to him after the show, I couldn’t help but notice the amount of STEAM coming off his shoulders. He is a power plant.