As you know if you follow this site at all, I am a Matt Nathanson fan.  I think he is a fantastic songwriter/singer and an all around marvelous person. I have seen him live only three times and each time he keeps getting better.  His live shows are something you have to see as his banter with the crowd is A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.!!  He is witty, funny and damn, the man can sing.  Matt is also a lyrical painter. He pays so much attention to the lyrical phrasing that it paints such a vivid picture or touches you in ways that only music can do.

Matt Nathanson, the studio musician, is broken down in two categories for me.  The 90’s Matt is is an indie rocker that is still trying to find his voice both lyrically and vocally.  But the shades of what is to come is in dimly shining in there.  Then there is the Matt of 2000’s that has seen his songwriting and singing grow by leaps and bound.  He has a confidence that shows in his music and definitely shows when he is on stage.   There are those that find his early stuff more raw and pure and it is that, but as you will see with the list, I find his 2000’s self to be the better half.

So, you now have my overall reasoning behind my picks and with that, we need to dive in and rank Matt Nathanson’s albums from The Worst to the one I think is First!  And sorry I don’t have all his albums in the Header photo as the site I use only offers 8 frames otherwise I would have had all 10 included.

THE WORST – PLEASE (1993):

Now here is the good news, there really isn’t a bad choice among all the albums, this is all about preference.  I have this as the Worst mainly because it is an album with a rough production and Matt’s vocals aren’t quite what they become.  And yes I do know that these are mostly demos thus the explaining the quality.  The cool thing about it is that the songs were all written while he was in high school or during his freshman year at Pitzer College in California.  There are hints of the Matt I grew to love, but it is the one album I go to the least.

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