Mathew V Takes on Great American Songbook with New Album

Vancouver-based queer singer Mathew V (Matthew van Vooght) is shaking up the Great American Songbook with his upcoming album Anything Goes.

Due out April 14 on 604 Records, the album seeks to reframe the assumed heteronormative narratives in tracks by legendary artists such as Cole Porter, George Gershwin, and Henry Mancini and draws out queer perspectives from the elegant imprecision of their timeless lyrics.

Overall, this record allows V to confidently share his stance on love, romantic trials, and tribulations with other men. He released the album’s first single on February 10, a take on Gershwin’s “The Man I Love.” Other songs included on the track list include covers of Mark Gordon and Harry Warren’s “At Last,” Jule Styne and Bob Merrill’s “Don’t Rain on My Parade,” and an original Marilyn Monroe-inspired song by V titled “My Boy.”

A seasoned performer, V has received critical acclaim for his work and was nominated last year for Adult Contemporary Album of the Year at the Juno Awards for his EP The Outer Circle. He has performed all over North America, and his catalog now has over 85 million streams.

V sat down with OFM to talk more about Anything Goes and his artistry.

Can you begin by telling us more about your upcoming album, Anything Goes?

The album comes out April 14, and I am very excited about it. It’s a bit of a new endeavor for me, taking on some of the great jazz standards. I’m an artist who has built my career in pop music, but I trained in jazz, musical theater, and opera growing up. It just felt like the right time in my career to dive into this very vocally led music. I love all these songs, and it was super fun taking my spin on music that I grew up with.

We also have an original song on the record called “My Boy,” so trying to write something that fit in with this project was super exciting as well. It feels nice to be able to deliver these standards from a perspective that someone like me back in the day may not have been able to safely deliver in a way I’m able to now. It’s been a super powerful and wonderful experience.

So, you’ve always been drawn to the jazz genre?

Yes. I grew up singing and training in jazz, and it was music that was around the house that I associated with. I remember as a kid, I would always hear jazz music and think it sounded like Judy Garland. I always thought that any female jazz singer was Dorothy. So, I associated it with this fantasy dream world and artists like Marilyn Monroe and Frank Sinatra. I leaned into this glitz and glamor, diamonds and New York, and it was this fantasy escape that I couldn’t even imagine myself being in.

It was always a nice escape for me, and as I got older and built my career in pop music, whenever I sang in the shower, I would always go back to singing in this big, over the top way. I’m very excited that we’re taking this direction with this album and that I’m able to lean into that.

And you’re giving a queer perspective to these songs.

Absolutely. I’m taking on a lot of songs that were traditionally female standards because they were singing about men. When I was picking songs, I was like, well, I have always been drawn to feminine energy and always loved strong females, strong female singers, and strong female characters in movies, so I connected more with some of the campy or romantic, traditionally female standards. Like “The Man I Love,” “Big Spender,” and there are moments in my career where, whether I was told or received feedback, that I couldn’t sing love songs towards anything that could result in me outing myself.

I think I’m now at a point in my career and my life where I’m like, no, I’m going to sing music that’s authentic to the life that I live. Music that’s authentic to the experiences that I have as a gay man. I love being a gay man. I’m so proud to be a gay man. I love loving men. I think it’s awesome, so I was very excited to lean into those authentic experiences and sing some of these songs from the 30s, 40s, 50s. Queer people have been around forever, but would they have been able to sing these songs? I don’t know.

So, for me, I’m doing this for them. I’m doing this for all the little kids that are going to listen and want to see someone like themselves. I wish I would have had this record growing up. It was a super powerful thing to be able to sing these songs from my honest perspective.

There are thousands of jazz hits. How did you specifically pick and choose which ones you wanted to include for this record?

It started with a big master list, and I went through all the songs I grew up listening to and all the songs I would sing in the shower. I’m trained in musical theater as well; I think musical theater and jazz go hand in hand, and I wanted a big showstopper at the end. So, we chose “Don’t Rain on My Parade.” When I chose it, I was like, I love that song, but when we started getting into it and I had to start singing it, I was then like, wow, that was a big choice (laughs). It was a wonderful challenge, though! It was super exciting to take that on.

I also wanted to make sure that there was a scope. That there weren’t two songs that sounded exactly alike: a mix of love songs, songs that leaned a bit more jazz, and songs that leaned more into musical theater. I wanted there to be glam, glitz, and camp, but also some nice, honest, subtle moments.  Also, songs that people were familiar with if they only knew jazz through the greatest hits, something for those listeners, and I wanted there to be something for jazz traditionalists that are a bit more avantgarde. Out of left field choices. I tried to hit all aspects.

You recently released the record’s first single, a take on George Gershwin’s “The Man I Love.” How has it been received?

It’s been great! I was very nervous going into this release because I’m obviously changing genres. It was a bit of a switch. I think a lot of my listeners and supporters have followed along with me because of my voice, but I only know that in hypotheticals, so putting out this song was definitely nerve wracking. It’s nerve wracking to try anything new, but this song went number one on jazz and iTunes here in Canada, and we’ve had a lot of great support and feedback thus far out of the gates, which has been very exciting. We have a lot of great shows coming up this spring and summer, so it’s nice to receive this.

We also had good radio play here in Canada right out of the gate, so it was wonderful to see that the jazz community welcomed me into it. It was wonderful to see my listeners enjoying this new road that I’m walking down. I’ve been working on this record for so long now that it feels strange because the record starting to roll out was always this thing on my dashboard, but it wasn’t approaching. Now that it’s here and I’m in the middle of it, it feels like a bit of a whirlwind. It’s been super, super exciting.

Let’s circle back for a moment to your original track on the record, “My Boy.” How did that song come to fruition?

The album originally started as a tribute to the Great American Songbook. Seven songs that were all covers. I was like, OK, I’m going to do all these standards and put my own spin on them. My manager then called me one day after I sent him the demos and my vision for the project, and he said, you should really do an original song on the record. I was like, you want an original song on the Great American Songbook tribute project? He said, write something that will fit in. Sure, great. No problem (laughs).

It was a bit daunting not only for that reason, but I spent my career primarily writing pop music. I think I understand all the inner workings of jazz, but until I prove it to myself, I don’t know for a fact. So, I called my co-producer, collaborator, and musical director, Ben Dunnill, who was in Europe at the time. He was in Paris, and I said, we have to do an original song on the record, and I would love to do something that’s campy and glamorous. Something I think Marilyn Monroe would have sung.

He sends over a voice note the day after that, with a chorus idea that he tracked at a train station. He didn’t have a piano at the hotel, so he went into a train station, and a lot of train stations in Paris have public pianos. He started writing this idea, and this voice note had train ding dongs and everything happening in the background, but I felt so inspired by this chorus. For the next two days, we went back and forth over voice notes, and the song was written with us not in the same room.

It felt so natural, and I think it hit both of our instincts. I’m still really excited about it, and I’d say it’s one of my favorite songs on the record. It was also a bit of a bold choice for me leaning into the fact that it’s a song called “My Boy.” It’s just a fun, campy love song about a boy that I love, and I think it’s very special for me to be able to give that nod to myself and be like, yes, I am telling my authentic story at this point.

What are some future goals you hope to accomplish with your career?

I think this record has been a powerful step in the direction that I have wanted to see my career going for a long time. I’ve wanted to focus on singing, and I feel like that’s what I’m bringing to the table as an artist. Some people have visual brands like dancing and all these other things, but I really think right at my bull’s eye of an artist is my voice. So, I’ve wanted to really lean into vocally led music. I think this record is the start of that for me.

We’re already working on some festive stuff for next year, which is exciting, and I’d love to see these shows get bigger and better. I’d love to go to more cities that I haven’t been to. Some of the cities that I have been to, playing this music, I think there’s a lot of showmanship that can come from this style of music, so I’m excited to get out there and play it live. This genre also leads to a lot of fun opportunities for collaboration and duets, so I think the sky’s the limit. I’m looking forward to pushing it further.

Stay up-to-date and connect with V by following him on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @mathewvmusic.

Photos Courtesy of Shore Fire Media