Copper Press

The Mattoid calls his special brand of insanity “Sango music.” Don’t know what exactly that means but it sure do sound good. Some folks say that you’ll like him if you like the likes of Donovan, Nico and Moldy Peaches and maybe that fits just right. Dunno. What does become obvious while listening to Hello, however, is how utterly fun he makes it all sound, how vibrant (and concomitantly) sleepily easy his brand of banding comes across, whether the live “Funeral Party,” the Velvet Underground-on-Eastern European folk of “Juri Gagarin” (the Russian who first escaped Earth’s gravity), or the sexy-creepy murder ballad “Rat Poison.”
While it’s hard to say that you should have so much fun listening to some of the songs on Hello, given the subject matter, when The Mattoid drops into his lower registers or makes funny little noises with his mouth - which he does not less than twice a song, truly using his voice as an instrument and not just a way to dish dirt - you can’t help but smile and feel waves of happiness rushing down all over, cloaking you in a brilliant light of joy that does not fade, not even after the last note has sounded.
Hello is the sound of the Velvet Underground with a deep sense of humor and Moldy Peaches with some sense of coherence. Thank you Mr. Mattoid, thank you wherever on this earth (or above it) you are. – Jedd Beaudoin

Baltimore City Paper

Review by Bret McCabe

Big ups to a bald man in a robe willing to rock the mic like David Johansen unleashing his inner Sunshine Superman. The Mattoid, a Nashville, Tenn.-based folk singer from Finland, knows that the best way to work the fey-simple guitar and hand-clap beat is to possess a third-eye-opening baritone and sing things such as "doink, doink, doink/ doink, doink, doink, doink/ doink, doink, doink, yeah/ let's dance" like you really mean it, man. It also helps when your backing musicians are named Loney Hutchins, Sunflower,à and Poppy Fields. The Mattoid's debut, Hello, is but some nudie pics and love beads shy of redeeming latter-day hippies.
Hello's 12 tracks run amok through zany religious-revival rockers ("Funeral Party": "Now the priest is talking/ and the casket starts to move/ everybody's crying/ we've all got the groove"), go-go girl skirt shaking ("Shiny Woman"), summery strum-und-harangue surrealism ("Juri Gagarin"), maudlin gossamer that bubbles and purrs like a cheesy spy flick sexy interlude ("Happiness"), and one jaunty little ditty about a woman trying to off her man ("Rat Poison," bucolically voiced by the aforementioned Ms. Poppy Fields). But it's the Mattoid's irrepressible vocal presence--the breakdown in "Shiny Woman" is a Australopithecine growl of "Om om ommmmmmmmmmm, yeah"--that latches onto the brain like an aneurysm clip.

Cent.com

There's a somewhat undefinable charm about a guy who enunciates clearly while crooning and then grunts for no particular reason. The Mattoid (a man and a band) sounds a lot like Leonard Cohen's younger, slightly brain damaged brother. My guess would be that the damage came from listening to too many Doors records at high volume, but that's pure speculation on my part. (more-à) Equally at home in the worlds of Burt Bacharach and Screamin' Jay Hawkins (or Roxy Music and Chuck Berry, if you like), the Mattoid doesn't really try to actually fit into any particular sound. The lyrics are insightful, though it does take some effort to parse the stream of consciousness pabulum. In other words, there seems to be a method to the dorkiness. The sound is straight studio project. Think early Brian Jonestown Massacre (well, not real early, but pre-TVT, anyway). These songs don't sound real. I'm not even referring to the lyrics. The late 60s/early 70s pop/blues feel sound like it was whipped up in a test tube and swallowed without regard to the consequences. This ultra-contrived conceit is impossibly charming. I would imagine that a lot of people would listen to about four bars of "Funeral Party" (the first track) and run away screaming. I figure that's cool with the Mattoid (man and band). If the folks really cared what people thought about their music, they'd never make an album like this. And I wouldn't like it nearly as much.

Citizenrobot.com

The Mattoid - Hello (Cleft Music) This shit is so fucked, but fucked in a good way. The kind of fucked feeling you get when you watch a David Lynch film. You like it, but you're not necessarily understanding what the hell just happened. The press release I got with the cd says, "The Mattoid is Scandanavian gothic meets post-folk gruel." They hit it right on the nose with that description. It definately has that whole "anit-folk" kind of feel to it, but there's a whole sixties psychadelic rock vibe to it. Then there's the Mattoid himself who can go from singing with a classic brit-pop sixties kind of rock voice to sounding like satan himself. Take for instance the destined to be a rock hit, "Shiny Woman." He starts singing in this nice inviting kinda of Edwards Collins kind of voice and all of the sudden he turns into an orc from the Lord of the Rings. "Hoilala hoila hoila hoila/ Hoila hoi lah lah/ Hoilala hoila hoila hoila yeah/ Om om ommmmmmm yeah." Jibberish? Perhaps. Genius? Definately. The best song on the CD appears smack dab in the middle, "Happiness" is the best example of what I was meaning when I said the Mattoid is fucked up. It's supposed to be uplifting, but this song at best is twisted and creepy, and I get scared when I hear the Mattoid's melodramatic voice singing "happy happy happy." He's able to accomplish what Death By Chocolate couldn't and catch that sixties sound without sounding so utterly pretentious and banal. Grade: A (Gary Mecija)

Popmatters.com (Jason Thompson)

The Mattoid. To be taken seriously or not? This is the puzzling question that springs forth when listening to Hello. Described as originally being from Helsinki, Finland, and playing a sort of rhythmic music called "sango", the Mattoid blazes out of the Nashville area with this album of strange pop that's neither here nor there. And whatever the hell sango may actually be is anybody's guess, but to me it sounds like a standard bouncy, rhythmic sort of music.

Hello is one of those albums that dares music critics to come up with some kind of reference point. Well, I have mine. To me the Mattoid at his most energetic sounds like Cookie Monster. All of a sudden things will be normal, the song playing will be going at a nice leisurely pop pace, and then all of a sudden, the Mattoid starts singing in this gurgly voice, making freakish guttural noises that sounds just like Cookie Monster when he's going bonkers for a pack of Lorna Doones. So there you have it. Sesame Street mixed with a touch of gothic chamber rock.

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