Boasting raw talent so precocious that you find yourself wondering why in the hell you didn’t do anything like this when you were 20, Matt Jaffe sounds like he’s already hit full stride on his debut EP Blast Off. Like a cross between Stiff Records post-punk (think Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe) with modern rockers the Gaslight Anthem, the Bay Area prodigy’s music is not only relentlessly hooky, but wickedly clever too, as you hear on his song “Stoned on Easter”, the video of which can be seen below.
“My goal with ‘Stoned on Easter’ and the Blast Off EP was to explore absurdism in everyday life,” Jaffe tells PopMatters. “When Easter and 420 coincided on my birthday in 2014, I wanted to write about how behavior that surrounds those holidays has become familiar and commonplace, while grounded in underlying superstition. I also attempted to balance humor and gravity. Some of the lyrics have severe implications, but some simply make me laugh, and I hope that those sides complement, rather than detract from one another. Additionally, I wanted the song to reconcile personal and universal visions of the world. A lot of the best art uses specific examples to broach broader truths, and I thought my upbringing in the Bay Area gave me a unique perspective on the collision of the religious and marijuana worlds.”
Blast Off is out now. Purchase it via iTunes.