If Matt's music was unconcerned with placating an increasingly image-conscious zeitgeist, his three albums for Alias Records - Tell it to Yourself (1993), Scaryarea (1995) and Killroy (1997) have proven more enduring and fresh as a result.On these records, Keating established a distinctive sound that split the difference between folk-rock and power pop, and favored words and music over angst and posture.

His wry observations about relationships still feel authentically new and funny today, while his 1995 single "McHappiness", a droning and dyspeptic assessment of the State of the Union as viewed from the highway, takes on new relevance on an almost daily basis.(The song was recently featured on Crooks & Liars, set to images of John McCain groping George W. Bush and robots having sex).

While Keating's music is often labeled Americana, it is in fact inspired by a broad range of influences; traditional country, old school punk, and the classic songwriters. His persona has always leaned decidedly more towards the vulnerable everyman than the coolly affected and often emotionally distant rock icon. Jon Pareles in the New York Times once wrote of Matt that, "His tunes are clear-cut, and his confessions and uncertainty ring true."

Matt Keating has chosen an endangered format (the long-playing record-album) to perform some much needed mouth-to-mouth on the great lost art of the album. It's exactly the kind of implausible, foolishly romantic, unabashedly retrograde quest that deserves a title like QUIXOTIC. And so it seems perfectly natural that QUIXOTIC should also be a double CD collection of 23 new songs.

Forget what you've been taught to expect from a double album:QUIXOTIC is no rock opera. There's no conceptual divide between the two discs - no electric vs. acoustic or uptempo vs. downtempo separation. Instead, like two sides of a vinyl LP, each of the 40-or-so minute discs are, essentially, two perfectly paced legs of the same destination-anywhere road trip.

After a pair of deeply intimate, largely acoustic albums recorded with producer Gary Maurer, Tiltawhirl (2002), and Summer Tonight (2006), Quixotic finds Keating reunited with longtime studio partner Adam Lasus (Clap Your Hands Say Yeah). QUIXOTIC also marks new collaborations with bassist Jason Mercer (Ron Sexsmith, Ani DiFranco), drummer Jordan Richardson, and guitarist Duane Jarvis (Lucinda Williams, Frank Black).

Clocking in at a 79 minutes, QUIXOTIC can grab a hold of even the most challenged attention span and take it on one hell of a joyride. It's a record that never stops giving the listener new sounds to savor, new insights to relate to, new jokes to laugh at, and new things to think about, and whether it's a five song EP or an ambitious double-album like this, how many records can we really say that about these days?

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