Matt's Mood

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Matt's Mood
Studio album by Matt Bianco
Released	2004
Genre	Pop, Jazz, Soul, Ballad
Length	44:10
Label	Emarcy, Universal Music
Producer	Danny White Mark Reilly Basia Trzetrzelewska
Professional reviews
Amazon.com link
Matt Bianco chronology
Echoes (2002) Matt's Mood (2004) /

Matt's Mood is the 2004 "temporaray comeback" album by UK Latino Pop outfit Matt Bianco, released for Universal, and distributed by the Emarcy label. The album makes heavy use of Danny White and Basia Trzetrzelewska's signature harmonies. The two get back in the band after twenty years exactly (only to leave again, shortly after the end of the big promotional world tour, and get back to their solo career as a duo, under the joint name of Basia - they are also a couple in real life, and have been such for twenty years too by now), having left the then trio - the third member is vocalist and composer Mark Reilly, whom many identify as "Matt Bianco", since he has always been the only one constant memebr of the act, the former being in fact the name of a fictional spy character - soon after the end of the promotion of the debut album entitled Whose Side Are You On?, which spanned a number of popular hit singles, one of which, "Half a Minute", was entirely sung by Trzetrzelewska herself, as is "Ordinary Day" right here.

Among the songs on the new album is "Ronnie's Samba": a collage of solo material by the late Ronnie Ross, a legendary baritone saxophonist, who also played on early Matt Bianco material, woven into a tribute to his immortal craft. The record also features the flutes and saxophones of Andrew Ross, continuing in the tradition of the more famous Ronnie. While the group's debut album was mostly written and produced by Reilly and White, with some help from Ross himself, the also late Brazilian bass player Kito Poncioni (who was the third original member of early Matt Bianco, before Basia was recruited), and Peter Collins for Loose End Productions, their new long playing work was entirely written by the three original members of Matt Bianco, that is Reilly, White and Trzetrzelewska, whereas there is no trace here of Mark Fisher, who is part of the Matt Bianco duo line-up, before and after this short-lived but intense reunion.

The 2004 work also perfectly fits in the band's tradition of inserting at least an instrumental track within their album track listings. It is the case of the semi-title track: "Matt's Mood III" not only suggests the album title itself, but follows two very popular stand-out 1984 tracks, i.e. "Matt's Mood" and "Matt's Mood II", respectively closing Side 1 and Side 2 of the original vinyl recording for Whose Side Are You On?, the former even getting a joint A-side release, on a double A-side single, along with "Sneaking Out the Back Door", in May 1984 (though going no further than Number 44, but yet staying for 7 weeks in the UK Single Charts). Needless to say, the new work seems to follow its far removed predecessor much closer in mood than it actually is in time: the original trio has not lost its peculiar Latin jazz style at all, and this is not only apparently clear in song titles, self-evidently recalling or actually using terms from the Neolatin languages, such as the mentioned "Ronnie's Samba" or "La Luna" (either Spanish or Italian for the English 'The Moon'), but throughout the album, in the also mentioned opener "Ordinary Day", for example, as well as in almost all of the other songs, such as "Golden Days", "Wrong Side of the Street", "Kaleidoscope" or "Slip & Sliding".

One final mention must go to the format of the album: made up of exactly 10 tracks and approximately lasting 45 minutes, this latest (indeed, though currently playing back together again, Fisher and Reilly haven't released any other new recording ever since as yet) Matt Bianco long-playing work also seems to issue straight out of the Eighties, one more reason closely connecting it to the gold and double platinum Whose Side Are You On? of 1984.

[edit] Tracks

• "Ordinary Day" - 4:38
• "I Never Meant to" - 4:52
• "Wrong Side of the Street" - 4:04
• "La Luna" - 4:04
• "Say the Words" - 3:42
• "Golden Days" - 4:21
• "Ronnie's Samba" - 4:11
• "Kaleidoscope" - 4:25
• "Slip & Sliding" - 4:20
• "Matt's Mood III" - 5:33

[edit] Release details

Country	Date	Label	Format	Catalog
Europe	1984	Universal/Emarcy	CD	0602498199381