Album Notes

"Matt Bauer is one of the revelations of 2004"
- 4 out of 5 stars, altcountry.nl

"Nandina' showcases eleven songs of understated beauty that will give Justin Rutledge & Iron & Wine a real run for their money...'Nandina' has taken the traditional American music of country, folk & bluegrass and given it a contemporary makeover that has set Matt Bauer up to be like, say, Gillian Welch; part of a thriving movement that allows these styles of music to endure through a constant eye on revision."
- Americana UK

"Spare yet vivid, the songs of Nandina pair Matt Bauer's rich vocal with drifting antique banjo lines from another time...Matt Bauer drifts down his own inlet. He gently plucks and sings in an intriguing, signature style, melding a bit of Iron & Wine and Richard Buckner to traditional bluegrass and folk." - Miles of Music

"Less often proves to be more. A more beautiful illustration of that proposition than Matt Bauer"s 'Nandina' is hardly conceivable...one of the best album's of 2004"
-4 1/2 stars out of 5, ctrl.alt.country

With an intimate vocal delivery, and musical accompaniment ranging from high-speed banjo, to open, sleepy electric guitar, Matt Bauer draws heavily on country and bluegrass traditions to make a distinctly contemporary music: Soldiers at Fort Campbell, Kentucky train to fight fires in the American west. A black deer slips through the floodlights on a suburban lawn. A teenage couple aborts a robbery at a gas station convenience store. Crushed glass sparkles in asphalt. Snowflakes slide between vinyl car seats like loose change.

" The music I'm most drawn to tends to be older, but the south I grew up in is the south of the 1970's and 80's, not the 1870's and 80's. So when I write about it, I write about my own experiences...if people listen to my songs and they can tell I love the Stanley Brothers or Texas Gladden, that's great. But I want to make something new."

Originally from Kentucky, Matt Bauer now lives in San Francisco.