Articles 

SOURCE: HAZELEWOOD "THE HOMEPAGE"

July 2018

Multi-instrumentalist's 'Revv-olution' Making Noise in Lincoln Place

By Anne Pamphile

We caught up with Matt Simak of Lincoln Place for a conversation about his journey as an artist and his current music projects.

Who do you consider to be your biggest musical influence?

Chris Cornell. Chris Cornell has been a influence to me for a long time. I feel like his music has been a soundtrack to my life because he does acoustic, he does heavy rock, he does a lot of stuff himself. But I'm also into stuff like Led Zepplin, and Stone Temple Pilots. And I like the blues, I like rock, but I like a straightforward rock because on the radio now, it doesn't really exist the same. But I actually wrote a song for Chris Cornell as a tribute to him on my album. It says a lot to me to be able to do that because he's had so much influence on how I want to write, where I want to go with my life because he was one person and he's done it all alone a lot of times.

It's quite impressive that you play a variety of instruments. Tell us a little bit about that

It depends, I mean, I play bass, guitar, I play drums, I do vocals, I play the mandolin, I play harmonica. If it comes up that I want to write an album, I want new things, like when I wrote this album. I want it to be completely different than my live music. I want a lot of blues and rock, so I learned to play all of the instruments that I thought would sound best. I never played harmonica in my life. I never played the mandolin in my life, but I thought I heard Chris Cornell using mandolins. I heard harmonica in a lot of different artists like Alice in Chains and different people that just influenced me so much that I thought it would be great in there. Nothing scares me to learn. I just love instruments because they are so spontaneous. And even if it's a mediocre sound or I just learned it, most instruments kind of connect to each other.

With that being said is there an instrument that you like the most or that you like the least?

I love drums. I've always loved drums.

I started off playing drums and it's just fun because I don't have to sit there and learn a song. I can throw anything on. If I heard something on the radio, I can sit down and play with it. I can make it my own sound.

It takes my stress away and helps me forget about everything. I like writing music because I spent that time on guitar which, unlike drums, was not one of my strong points. I tried to get lessons and it didn't work out and I kept going back and forth.

Finally, I decided that it does not matter, at some point I'm going to figure it all out and I'm going to keep doing it. And I did and I'm still figuring it out. I'm willing to try anything that will work, so I wanted to put the banjo actually into it. I think the banjo would have been a hard one. But drums are definitely the best.

Would you say learning the guitar,

for example, would be the one of the challenges you faced as a multi-instru-mentalist?

When I learned to play guitar, everything seemed to be repetitive. I put my fingers down to practice the patterns that they usually make chords out of. I don't look at the chords but if I could go back I would have liked to learn more. Whatever I hear, whatever I feel becomes something.

I play around until I find a sound that I like and then I try my best to build on that. I'll make a few three or four rips that sound really cool, then I'll record them on a video. I've thrown a lot of songs away just through trial and error, but right now I'm actually starting already on new music.

I'm not a mastering engineer and I've had feedback trom people that have helped me improve in many ways.

Since we're talking about challenges, what are some of the challenges you face as an aspiring artist?

As someone that does it all: promoting. Promotion is a very hard thing to do because I don't play out. I can't play out because I have to do all the instruments.

I've spent a lot of time doing everything old school. I actually have printed signs on the side of my car and a decal on the back of my car. The people that own the mechanic shop that I work at even have a big poster in the window. I went around Munhall, where a couple of people put my poster up and I have it up in Guitar Center and I try to put my music on the "X". They had my commercial up for a month, so I had that promotion. Why did I give up on it? It just came back and I started writing

"Start A Revv-olution." My wife didn't expect things to happen as fast as they did.

I just want to do it. I really do.

And you said you're a mechanic by day and you also have a family. So how do you balance those obligations with your music?

I'm a mechanic by day and I do my music at night. I try to do it all. My daughter really likes music and she sings all the time. I encourage her to try learning the guitar just as a means for her to try it.

July 2018

 She's like my number one fan, she's like "Dad-dy's my rockstar and I'm like "You're my little rockstar and we'll do it together. So I get the time with my kids to do what I love and I have that time but I work during the day. So when the weekend comes up, I go out with the family for most of the day. Come home, head in at night and my wife's like "We're all going out. You're going to get in the studio to make a song. I appreciate her encouragement. It means a lot. I can do most of my work at night but I think its not too loud when I'm playing drums?

When did you realize, though, that music was your passion? 

I remember you were talking about your childhood and how music was your escape almost?

A lot of kids go to school and school is very stressful. I got made fun of. It is very hard. Growing up in North Braddock and trying to go to Woodland Hills with kids being how they are, the first album I ever listened to was Joe Satriani. I sat in front of the speaker and it just blew me away and I just kept listening to it. I played his songs in my head to keep myself motivated in school. People were like "Why are you smilingạ I would just tell them that I'm just in a good mood. I'm good.

When I would take a test, teachers would look at me like "Why are you smirking?" I'm like "I'm good. I'm taking a test." It brought the best out of me. I didn't know one hundred percent that I was going to do something with my life. And, actually, I believe it was last year, for the first time ever. I got to see loe Satriani over at the signed the back of one of my guitars. I told him "You do not know how much this means to me. You're my original inspiration just to start music." Then from that, I just listened to Led Zeppelin and all kinds of different music like that. But you also have to have somebody that is actually going to help you. Somebody needs to take you by the hand and say "You're good and you keep working at it." If you don't have that it is very hard to keep your morale up.

I always say "I will support you". I don't care. You put a song out tomorrow and its not mastered to quality just like mine and you want support, I'll spend that dollar on a digital download and if that download helps you buy a new guitar, then I've done my part. It's the little stuff that helps people out. That's what I want.

We took a listen to "Start a Revv-olution." And there's the sound of the motorcycle revving in the beginning. So how exactly do motorcycles play into your music?

This album more than anything, I love motorcycles so the motorcycle you hear in the album is actually my motorcycle. I sat there and I wrote it for a while and then I put a new set of pipes and I put it on video and I'm like "How am I going to get this sound all the way from down there into my studio? So I actually put the microphone in front of that just like recording guitar and I adjusted it I kept doing it and doing it and I'm like "Oh my God. It's shaking the room. This is how a song should start.

. I used it on Start A Revv-olution, when I'm doing the slides on the guitar, it sounds like the bike taking off. It happens twice and every time I hear it I'm like

"Yeah if you're on a bike, and if you heard this, you'd really want to take off. That's another reason why I write about motorcycles because it gives me that same kind of joy that music brings me. I feel free, I feel relaxed, I'm not worried about anything here on my motorcycle when I'm shifting one through five. Music is just calming, its great. My entire album was about I want to be able to get on my bike and take a drive and turn up and make you want to just keep driving. That's what the album was really about. I just want to turn up like I hear an old song and I want to go driving I want to hear that. I want it to make me want to drive and just relax and have a good time and sing with the radio.

Do you have any final thoughts or any advice you would give to any up and coming musicians who create and write their own music?

Honestly, I just don't think people should ever stop. You have to believe in yourself first. If somebody else believes in you, it makes it ten times better. Don't give up, don't give up. Don't stop for any-thing, no matter what anybody says. If they say they hate your music, just take that as "I need to improve and I could make something better and next time it's going to be greater." I made my first dollar on my first album. I didn't even care about the second album. I knew I did it all myself. I have a 25 dollar check. this is my royalty. You know if it's the only royalty I ever get and people just like my music I don't care. I like my music and there are people out there that do. Cause I've had 26 000 neonle view mv site I've had all these people cause I'm on Reverb Nation too. They reviewed it, they listened to it and I've had 20,000 people listen to it on there. They like it there so it's like if the right person hears it, maybe I make it some day or maybe it's the next album or the next song I don't know but I'm having fun doing it. It's relaxing. It gets exciting sometimes. I get so excited about having a new song. I'm working on one right now and I listen to it everyday. I got a minute and 40 seconds in my car. So I have to pick the lyrics so it plays through the car and I drive to work for about five minutes and I listen to it twice and I sing words with it and try to think of the next parts of the song. So I kind of get pumped up for work sometimes

And the last question actually, you kind of already answered it but are there any projects that are coming out soon that you're just excited to share with us?

Oh yeah. This song is definitely different that I'm working on right now. Its different and I guess it's different because I'm more excited this time cause I really worked hard for the album to do it myself and now I'm going back and I'm going

"How can I write it better? How can the drums sound more professional?" It says this, it says that. I do it. I talk to the people at Guitar Center. I set it all up. I played the drums like this. If I would have just did this at the beginning of my album, it would have sounded awesome. So now it sounds really cool, guitar sounds better.

The drums sound better. Just having that clearer and more mastered sound is exciting. Plus it's a new song. I'm really looking forward to releasing this new song.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE IS AT BOTTOM OF MY MEDIA PAGE FROM HAZELWOOD THE HOMEPAGE SITE