>There’s more to great songs than verse-chorus-verse-chorus-chorus, you know, but not much more. That thin line that separates a drab band and a great band is usually located not in the construction, but the execution.

Good songwriters don’t simply know how to move a dull pub-rock song to thrilling innovation – their songs would end up there whether they liked it or not. It’s in their blood. Perhaps Mat Riviere is one of this lucky few.

From his name, you’d think Mat Riviere ought to be crooning from a small, glittery stage, in a shiny suit, on a cruiseboat, in the Mediterranean. He doesn’t though. He’s a singer/songwriter form Norwich; and yes, that is underselling him.

He writes songs like FYH, that seem almost too simple and slender to contain such a wonderful refrain and a chorus which swells uncontrollably with a sad exuberance. Godless Girl slumps dejectedly, sweetly. Castroreale drones urgently, throbbing with opaque white noise before inching into another brilliant, sombre chorus. Most bands can’t do choruses. Mat doesn’t seem to have enough songs to fit them all in. Maybe he can sell them.

And if every Tom, Dick and Harry had Mat Riviere‘s crystal-clear comprehension of what makes a great song, would the world be a better place, or would the standard simply be reset, albeit with a higher threshold? While you’re thinking, listen here, and be happy that this music exists at all.

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