{"id":31129,"date":"2026-06-11T05:30:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T09:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=31129"},"modified":"2026-03-24T09:42:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T13:42:24","slug":"album-review-mike-mattison-trash-magic-turn-a-midnight-corner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/11\/album-review-mike-mattison-trash-magic-turn-a-midnight-corner\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Mike Mattison & Trash Magic \u2013 Turn a Midnight Corner"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Singer and guitarist Mike Mattison is best known as a key member of Tedeschi Trucks Band; he\u2019s been with Susan and Derek for more than two decades. And during that time, Mattison has done much more than provide second-guitar textures; his songwriting credits are peppered throughout releases from 2011\u2019s Revelator<\/em> through 2022\u2019s expansive I am the Moon<\/em>, and there\u2019s every reason to expect the same when TTB\u2019s Future Soul<\/em> is released in \u201826. It\u2019s impossible to imagine Tedeschi Trucks Band sounding quite like it does without Mattison\u2019s involvement.<\/p>\n

Yet the context of that band isn\u2019t enough to fully express Mike Mattison\u2019s artistry, so in 2014 he launched a concurrent solo career with You Can\u2019t Fight Love<\/em>. Afterglow<\/em> followed in 2020, and now in 2026 Mattison returns with his third solo album, Turn a Midnight Corner<\/em>.<\/p>\n

A distracted listen renders the first few tracks on the album as standard-issue blues; nothing at all substandard, but nothing remarkable. The songs deserve closer attention, however, and affording them that courtesy reveals that Turn a Midnight Corner<\/em> is a rarity within the blues idiom: a concept album. Or at least it\u2019s a collection of thematically-linked songs, chronicling the story of a fictional blues duo of the 1930s who get a second bite at the apple when they\u2019re rediscovered in the \u201870s.<\/p>\n

Perhaps loosely based on the career intersection of Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee (who teamed up in the \u201850s and 1960), Turn a Midnight Corner<\/em> is a narrative set of songs that touch upon race relations, artist exploitation, age-old creative differences and other universal themes. It\u2019s all done with a deft mix of humor, seriousness and lived-in experience that can only come from decades on the road.<\/p>\n

The band \u2013 Mattison plus Tyler Greenwell (drums), guitarists Dave Yoke and Greg Spradlin and bassist\/keyboardist Wesley Flowers \u2013 strikes the right balance of loose and tight; the album\u2019s live-in-the-studio production aesthetic emphasizes the former to good effect. The songs are musically unfussy, which lines up with the kind of music that would fit such a story. Mattison seems to under-write some of the lyrical content; “When I Was Loaded” is lyrically minimalist and repetitive, but again, that approach is well-suited to the overall narrative construct.<\/p>\n

The country blues of “Traveler” provide one of Turn a Midnight Corner<\/em>\u2019s highlights. The music is unambitious, but the playing is first-rate and the lyrics move the story along. Mattison\u2019s warm, ragged-but-right vocal texture is superbly suited for this material. “Homesick Lullaby” moves a tiny step beyond the blues for a sound and character that recall Kris Kristofferson. “Be Like a Train” showcases good-time, upbeat country blues, and it features some tasty guitar licks between the vocal phrases.<\/p>\n

Somewhat unexpectedly, “Lookee Here” rocks out; it\u2019s the most mainstream blues\/rock-leaning cut on the set, and one of its best. The three songs that close out the album offer up a nice mix of Americana-, rock- and country-flavored takes on a blues sensibility. Word has it that Mattison is writing a novella counterpart to Turn a Midnight Corner<\/em>, one that will flesh out the narrative. Stay tuned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Singer and guitarist Mike Mattison is best known as a key member of Tedeschi Trucks Band; he\u2019s been with Susan and Derek for more than two decades. And during that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31130,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,49,65],"tags":[5830],"class_list":["post-31129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blues","category-new-release","category-review","tag-mike-mattison","cat-9-id","cat-49-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31129"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31131,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31129\/revisions\/31131"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}