Mathieu Santos is best known as the bassist and co-founding member of Indie-Pop band Ra Ra Riot and is set to release his second solo album, Fan Fiction, on November 11, 2024. It will be Santos’s first release under his own name since 2011’s Massachusetts 2010.
The album, comprised of ten original songs, was first conceived of over a decade ago, with basic tracking beginning in 2015. Over the course of the next ten years, the process was continually delayed by matters logistical, a global pandemic, and the birth of Santos’s first child.
He says:
There were a lot of times when it felt pretty frustrating; I had all this energy to get it all done, but I also didn’t want to force anything and just wanted to let it develop on its own, however long that took. In retrospect, having lots of time away from the songs, being able to keep coming back to them with new perspectives, was really a special part of the whole thing and, in a weird way, kept it feeling fresh.
He continues:
On [my] first record, I intentionally wanted things to feel a little rough and amateurish — kind of lo-fi and idiosyncratic, like a lot of my personal favorite records. But this time around, I really wanted to emphasize the playfulness and innocence, the silliness, while combining it with better and more adventurous musicianship and production. Make it all a bit more maximal. And mostly, I just wanted to be able to work on some fun, low-stakes stuff with some of my favorite people.
Personnel on the album includes ex-Ra Ra Riot drummer Gabriel Duquette, ex-Ra Ra Riot front-of-house engineer Andrew Maury, Ra Ra Riot bandmates Wes Miles and Milo Bonacci, and Young & Sick’s Nick Van Hofwegen.
Fan Fiction’s first single, “Cutting Up an Ox,” is out now. The song, according to Santos, is “about a simple insight shattering hardened modes of thinking”. The title is borrowed from his favorite parable attributed to the Taoist sage Chuang Tzu.
Santos explains:
A theme that runs through the record — and a lot of what I make and think about — is this idea of escaping dualistic modes of thinking, or of reconsidering our mental or emotional priorities. Sometimes, the most profound insight can come from the simplest observation — in this case, watching a butcher who’s humbly mastered his craft.
