Photo: Roy Rochlin / Contributor (Getty)
Matt Costa is re-sinking his teeth into his new album Santa Rosa Fangs, which came out in spring earlier this year, but this time he’s reimagining the dark concept record as a narrative release. Yes, like a book.
Playing like a mystery novel in which you watch the characters intertwine, unfold and unravel the deeper you go, the record follows the narratives of three Northern California kids in throes of young love, death and self-destruction. While maintaining a surprisingly upbeat sound for such weighty topics, the new music dips and spikes through manic moods between spritely singles like “Sharon” on down to the sad sounds of the raw acoustic, “Ritchie.”
The original album is based, in part, on Costa’s real life and lost family members, but fans’ curiosities as to the stories behind the songs have led him to release a narrative version that plays like an audiobook with a one-hour runtime. Twenty tracks behind the 12 songs, Costa breaks the album into a three-act story that literally pushes his artistry into novel territory, spinning these stories and his own life into a work of semi-autobiographical fiction.
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This, coming on the heels of scoring the LSD-inspired California documentary Orange Sunshine with spot-on ’60s grooves, marks the return of full-length Matt Costa, who we hadn’t seen in close to five years, despite his consistent EP releases in between projects. He’s been touring behind the new album by going into people’s living rooms to tell the stories intimately in person, but you can catch him live now with Tennis for the Solo in Stereo Tour.
The novella edition of Santa Rosa Fangs is available now for purchase (and streaming, we suppose).
