{"id":31513,"date":"2026-09-23T05:30:39","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T09:30:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=31513"},"modified":"2026-05-18T09:15:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T13:15:46","slug":"evolfo-the-acid-cowboys-ride-again-part-3-of-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/23\/evolfo-the-acid-cowboys-ride-again-part-3-of-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Evolfo: The Acid Cowboys Ride Again (Part 3 of 3)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Continued from Part Two<\/a>\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n

Tell me about the thinking behind making a point of not streaming the new album on Spotify. <\/b><\/p>\n

Matt:<\/b> It\u2019s pretty simple. For me, the scales just tipped; kissing their ass was hurting more and more. I don\u2019t want to even care about them. They\u2019re a tech company; they\u2019re not a music company. They don\u2019t give a shit. And the profits they\u2019re making, they\u2019re turning around and investing in artificial intelligence and items used for war.<\/p>\n

It feels good to get away from them. I know I\u2019m using all sorts of other things where the CEOs will take their profits and do things that I don\u2019t want as well. But with Spotify, it\u2019s like they\u2019re out there saying that you\u2019re endorsing them [by having] your music on their app. And I don\u2019t want to endorse them.<\/p>\n

If I\u2019m forced by the circumstances to use Amazon and Google sometimes \u2013 and I hate them, too \u2013 that is what it is. I make music; my whole life is music. And I\u2019m not gonna let Spotify misrepresent me. I don\u2019t want to be part of that any more.<\/p>\n

Maybe Rafferty can give a more concise answer\u2026<\/p>\n

Rafferty:<\/b> It just got to a point where they\u2019re actively devaluing music and art. And even though a band of our size removing our stuff might not be that large of an impact, I think that it\u2019s important to draw a line in the sand. They\u2019re the biggest<\/i> streaming service, therefore they are the worst<\/i> streaming service; I think that streaming in general is bad. If another company like Apple Music or something [displaced] them, they would probably start doing the same thing, but for right now, Spotify is the biggest target. And it\u2019s time to start talking about it more publicly.<\/p>\n

Not having our music on Spotify is also a great way to start discourse with people who might not be as aware of how evil of a company Spotify really is, and how much they don\u2019t give a shit about music. They\u2019re actively down with A.I. music; they pad playlists with music that\u2019s not made by humans. The list goes on. And at the end of the day, for the sake of music itself, anyone who can do anything should be talking about this.<\/p>\n

Like anything, it\u2019s not about having the perfect solution. It\u2019s about continuing to be critical and continuing to try to ask these questions, get the word out so that people who are more casual music consumers have a better understanding. Because the convenience factor is so strong that a lot of people are not even aware of how exploitative it really is.<\/p>\n

Speaking of the business side of music, Evolfo\u2019s first two albums were on Royal Potato Family. <\/b>Of Love<\/b><\/i> is self-released. Tell me about the circumstances and the thinking that led to you going the true indie route. <\/b><\/p>\n

Matt:<\/b> I\u2019ve been talking forever about starting this record label. I\u2019m sort of grassroots starting this label, Food of Love, and Royal Potato Family is still in the mix, helping me out. So it wasn\u2019t some sort of divide there.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m very excited by all of the music around me. And it seems like the universe is telling me that starting a label and pushing this record out is the right move. It even plays into the Spotify thing; I\u2019m gonna take a little ownership of what I like about music and I\u2019m gonna build community and events and releases around quality and good taste. Whether or not it\u2019s not some universal form of taste, it\u2019s my<\/i> taste.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s fine; that\u2019s what the label is anyway. I think it\u2019s very significant; there\u2019s something about it which is an incredibly artistic decision. It has nothing to do with business and connections and getting a leg up and getting discovered. It has everything to do with saying, \u201cI want to push whatever it is about music that I like; I don\u2019t want to have it decided by labels and algorithms and things like that.\u201d And it\u2019s time, I think.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s an important lesson that you have learned and internalized along the way in a life of music?<\/b><\/p>\n

Matt:<\/b> A lesson that I am currently vibing with in all areas of my life is how important it is being in a state of play. There\u2019s the making of music; that\u2019s the most obvious application of this lesson. It\u2019s about being in that state of play and not involving your self-critical voice too early on in the process. That\u2019s essential to me to making good music and keeping the pen to the paper. And it applies across the board.<\/p>\n

For me, this state of play thing gets me through the tours, and it helps me have patience for other people. Realizing that gives me this universal sense of playfulness which makes life seem a little lighter.<\/p>\n

Some things really are life-or-death; there\u2019s a lot of suffering in this world, and you need to acknowledge that. But then there are a lot of times in our culture \u2013 and our music scene \u2013 where we\u2019re making<\/i> things seem life-or-death. You\u2019ve been trained to see things that aren\u2019t killing you as life-or-death. Nobody wants to watch a very self-serious band. And it really helps if you\u2019re not too self-serious in other areas as well.<\/p>\n

Rafferty: <\/b>It might sound obvious or like something that people say all the time, but everything is connected; everything that you do, no matter how small. In fact, I think that the smaller gestures are maybe even more important than big gestures. And when it comes to music, everything you do in your artistic life is connected to everything else you do. It\u2019s also connected to all the people around you. And the more in tune to that energetic exchange you are with yourself, with your band, with the sound person, with the audience, with whoever, with your equipment, whatever it is, the more aware you can be that it\u2019s not just you. The more that you can be in touch with that and be at the service of something that is more unifying, the better your music will be, the better you will be, the more longevity you\u2019ll have as a creative person.<\/p>\n

And at the end of the day, I find that when you\u2019re working in the studio on a song \u2013 whether it be your song or somebody else\u2019s \u2013 it gets to a point where it\u2019s about being in service of the song. It no longer becomes about one person, or the front person or the sound of the snare drum. It becomes about, \u201cHow do we make this song the most it can be?\u201d It\u2019s funny, because it doesn\u2019t start out like that. Usually it starts out with individuals and egos. And as you\u2019re getting closer and closer, in a good working environment that all goes away. Then it\u2019s \u201cHow do we get this song to be born?\u201d And once it\u2019s born, you can celebrate and you can be yourself again. And that\u2019s a lesson that you can apply anywhere else in your life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part Two\u2026 Tell me about the thinking behind making a point of not streaming the new album on Spotify. Matt: It\u2019s pretty simple. For me, the scales just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31517,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,49,57],"tags":[3066],"class_list":["post-31513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-new-release","category-psych","tag-evolfo","cat-41-id","cat-49-id","cat-57-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31513","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=31513"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31513\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31520,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31513\/revisions\/31520"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}