Mat Kearney Acoustic Cafe

Thursday, Mat Kearney did an acoustic cafe for TIC 96.5 at Up Or On The Rocks in Hartford, CT.  Wednesday afternoon they posted up 30something pairs of tickets on their online contest page, so I traded in a few points to be able to go.

I had gotten there a little late, but things weren’t ready yet when I got there.  I was instructed to head up the stairs so Mat could do soundcheck, and he walked in the door seconds after I had passed it.  We hung out upstairs for a little bit and then we were told they were ready for us downstairs.

Usually, acoustic cafes at this venue have an opening act but for Mat there was not one.  He mentioned how he didn’t know how many songs he was supposed to sing so he just kind of kept going and going and played a 40 minute set! (Not that anyone was complaining!)  Before a few of the songs he told the stories about how they came about, which was pretty interesting.  For example – his parents met when his father got a job in Hawaii and his mom was working as a Mermaid on a glass bottom boat.  The story of his father’s life is told in the song “Rochester” and the song “Hey Mama” is about his wife, who he met at Anthropologie.

He also talked a bit about how some of his songs have been on Grey’s Anatomy and once he didn’t pay attention to the write up of what scene the song was going to be used for and the song “Crashing Down” ended up being used in a scene with a log victim and was taken very literally as crashing down.

After his set, we got to take photos with him and chat briefly.  He was really nice to everyone and I am looking forward to seeing my picture with him! (Professional photographers took it so it will not be posted for a week or so!)

Unfortunately, the lighting in the room was VERY dark so I only got a few decent photos when I finally decided to bite the bullet and use my flash for the sake of the blog and the scrapbook!

All I Have

Closer To Love

Breathe In, Breathe Out

Undeniable

Nothing Left to Lose

Rochester

Hey Mama