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The Wishful Thinkers' Hall of Fame

by The Matchsellers

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  • Book/Magazine + Digital Album

    16-page chapbook telling the stories of each Wishful Thinker in the Hall of Fame. QR-codes take you to mysterious corners of the internet. Illustrations by various Matchsellers friends and fans.

    You'll also get a physical CD and the digital album. If you come to either live CD Release Show, booklets will be discounted so plan on getting them there.

    Includes unlimited streaming of The Wishful Thinkers' Hall of Fame via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 7 days

      $20 USD or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $9 USD  or more

     

1.
Well there's a castle in Switzerland it's called the Munot, it's on the Rhein in Schaffhausen it's got a big old bell that rings every night and if you listen closely it might wreck your life the Rhein rolls the bell tolls I never shoulda left my hometown Now I climbed the Munot just twice in my life once in the summer, but now there's snow and ice first time I was up here I was your man now it seems baby, you got another plan There's a farm in Indiana it's my grandparents place where there's a lot of love and always a smiling face but I left it all to come out here just to hear this big bell toll and to have you dump me baby and to watch the Rhein roll
2.
Badlands 02:51
I was born in the badlands in a nuclear waste pit my pappy whipped me with a belt buckle and I learned to like it you see gettin whipped and gettin kicked is how it's gotta go might as well take the beating and enjoy the feeling low now I left that waste pit when I was 17 I roamed around but the badlands never did quite leave me now I've drank in most every bar and I fought every man named Jack did a little too much whippin and kickin so I had to come on back And now I guess I'll never more leave this place that's the way it's gotta be it's not that I don't like all the folks in other places it's the folks in other places don't like me now sweet Wanda Lou I can't believe I did find you showin out at the barn dance til 2 well you came with johnny mullins but another heart was stolen when you smiled at me and I smiled back at you Well you knew that I was rotten wanted to stuff my mouth with cotton even slapped me in the face that very night but you followed this man out to the badlands now you're trying to turn a left boy right
3.
Downtown 03:19
Don't have a care in the world when the clock strikes 5 time to leave all my worries from the week behind cause when the neon's glowing and the sun sinks down my baby and I are gonna paint the town I'm going downtown in a hurry gonna see my baby in the city tonight going downtown round 730 gonna swing my baby round the city tonight Well the band is playin when the clock strikes 9 and the people are swaying to the rhythm and rhyme got a glass in my hand and my man at my side i'm a good time charlie on a downtown ride every rose has its thorns every wrong has a right every dog has his day and every week has a friday night!
4.
named after Dalton Foundry in Warsaw, Indiana
5.
Shaky Motor 04:24
don't know which road I'm on anymore don't know what this trip is for the radio plays a mix of static and hank and sometimes gives the weather report there's a wobbling coming from the rear that matches a sound in my mind it goes wa-wa-wa-wa-wa-wa I hear it almost all of the time Roll on Shaky Motor keep pushing me down the line I don't wanna break down I wanna make it on time and I don't know where to go from here and I don't know how to stop the storm clouds are up ahead there's lightning, thunder and raindrops the temperature gauge is rising fast the check engine light starts to glow everything's telling me I ought to stop but I still have got so far to go
6.
Fall 03:39
if a bird wants to fly around up to the sky and down it just has to fly if you want to fall in love maddeningly in love you just have to fall you know how to it's easy to do fall do not ask why when you're heart decides fall if you want to fall in love maddeningly in love you just have to fall
7.
It might be time to get a straight job and move off of pappy's farm quit my bumming, stop strumming sell the old flat-top guitar but at night when I sleep the sandman he creeps right up to my bed and he kills me dead and them i'm walking towards that little white light i see a nasty look in old st. peter's eye he says, "you lived your sorry excuse of a life bummin round like a beggin stray dog always looking for a place to hang your head and a meal to get you along boy you ain't welcome behind these pearly gates this ain't your pappy's farm you'd best get away!" he fired a shotgun at my feet and i ran down to the old river sticks where I jumped in it was there I started drowning so after I'd already died, I died again when I woke up, I was a frog hopping round on a lilly pad pickin on an old flattop box and living with my dad!
8.
I went to the parking lot of my mind to pay my ticket on time and you were there with your sandy blonde hair and a teardrop in your eye I hate seeing you that way I hate being in that place can't we meet somewhere else i hear there's a nice bar at the hotel i don't like being in the parking lot of my mind there's something about this place that always makes that always makes you cry I went to the parking lot of my mind to pay my ticket on time and you were there with your sandy blonde hair and a teardrop in your eye I hate seeing you that way I hate being in that place
9.
i was going down the road gonna play me a show at a little bar in el reno when out popped a man thumbbing his hand saying "please help me amigo!" well he jumped in we started cruisin listening to the radio when we got passed by a texan haulin ass he said "friend there's something you should know! All the Okie's say it and I swear it's a fact the Texans stole Oklahoma music and they don't want to give it back! now Bob Wills sang 'Take me back to Tulsa' and he played the 'Oklahoma Rag' and Wayon sang about the Okie Sunshine and that ain't the half of it man you see every Texan loves Merle Haggard and of course Woody Guthrie but they're both about as Oklahoman as Red Dirt can be!
10.
The Hot Mess 03:48
I got a pile of dirty clothes my wash machine's been broke since last month there's crumbs on the floor and my old sweeper cord is a piece of junk I got a parking violation from each state in the nation in my glovebox and my door's made of rubber so it don't matter brother how many times you knock! There's a dish at the Brick in the Crossroads it's a pile of tater tots with some nacho cheese chili beans, sour cream and tomatoes they call it the Hot Mess, just like me! I'm tired of hanging round naked frying up bacon gettin burnt by the grease I'm tired of always getting screwed by you know who when the coolant leaks I need to get myself together or else I'll be untethered by my birthday I think I'll go to the brick, chew a toothpick and order up my namesake! I got rocks in my pocket a picture of davy crockett hanging on the wall my sister says we're related she read it on some pages online last fall i wear a coonskin cap everytime I take a nap it's my lucky charm but I think it quit workin cause buddy i've been hurtin since I left my pappy's farm
11.
Roann 04:00
i could blame it on the leaky roof on a bad excuse on the rain i could blame it on the shaky motor on the old warped rotors on the frame Roann my dear old friend I'm so sorry this is the way it ends i could blame it on the changing times on unwritten lines on the snow I could blame it on a diamond ring on most anything on how it goes but the truth is I let you down I turned around and walked away
12.
well I tell you boys I'm Victory Bound I tell you boys I'm Victory Bound No cold shackle can keep me down I tell you boys I'm Victory Bound I tell you boys I'm on my way I tell you boys i'm on my way no cold shackle can make me stay i tell you boys i'm on my way i tell you boys i'm rising up i tell you boys i'm rising up on the wings of a snowwhite dove i tell you boys i'm rising up!

about

Over the course of the last decade, the Matchsellers have proven themselves to be one of the most creative and note-worthy Bluegrass groups to emerge from the Midwest. On their ambitious new record "The Wishful Thinker's Hall of Fame" (due out Oct 28, 2022), the group masterfully shows that “art for art's sake” has a place in the folk multiverse. The core musical partnership of Andrew Morris (Guitar/Vocals) and Julie Bates (Fiddle/Vocals) began when the two met in Leipzig, Germany. They were two lost American Midwesterners on Fulbright Scholarships working as Cultural Ambassadors to Germany. Now, nearly 10 years later, they are still lost. Unsure of anything in the real world, the duo creates elaborate musical universes that are even more absurd and tragic than our own. Or are they?

The Wishful Thinker's Hall of Fame introduces the listener to a cast of characters, all of whom are inductees into an imaginary “Wishful Thinker's Hall of Fame”. There are Texans and Hoosiers, idiots and poor souls who are down-on-their-luck, lovers and leavers and a pile of tater tot nachos (see “The Hot Mess”). As a companion piece to the music, Andrew has created a pamphlet for the Hall of Fame class of 2022 induction ceremony. Each song is attached to a character, a Wishful Thinker, who is being inducted into the Hall of Fame. With a dream-like surrealism, the fantastic characters have sometimes mundane sometimes bizarre stories. Portraits of the characters were crowd sourced by Matchsellers fans and friends. There are QR-codes that take the listener to bizarre corners of the internet all related to the Wishful Thinkers. It's another wild musical journey the likes of which only the Matchsellers could dream up.

Morris and Bates are joined on Mandolin by Brian McCarty (Greg Blake Band, the Bluegrass Missourians) and on Bass by Brandon Day (Kansas City Jazz Bassist). Recorded in just 2 days by engineer and musical powerhouse Clarke Wyatt, the quartet's newest album sounds as free, joyful and powerful as ever. The band is at the apex of its songwriting and musicianship.

Willi Carlisle is a fan of The Wishful Thinker's Hall of Fame. He proclaims, “Morris' plaintive bawl and humor accentuates some of the best flatpicking in the biz (and it gets experimental here, too) while Bates gets a lot of good work done on the fiddle and folksy, mellow vocals on this new record. With vaudeville and virtuosity (and able production by Clarke Wyatt), this new offering pipes along with genre-hopping energy."

The Matchsellers are a rare breed that is truly in it for the sake of the art and that's it. In a recent interview frontman Andrew Morris explained, “Sometimes, I feel like music is a kind of disease. It infects you and you can’t get rid of it. I really wish that something else had taken over me. Something where I could make a bit more money. Something that wasn’t so difficult. But I don’t really have a choice. You got to eat what the lunch lady gives you.”

credits

released October 28, 2022

Guitar / Vocals - Andrew Morris
Fiddle / Vocals - Julie Bates
Mandolin / Vocals - Brian McCarty
Bass / Vocals - Brandon Day

All songs written by Morris
except 3 (Downtown) by Bates

Recording & Mixing - Clarke Wyatt
Mastering - Collin Jordan of Boiler Room Mastering

Album Art & Title - Hank Tilbury
Booklet Art by (in order of appearance):
Jordan Murphy, Matthew Hawkins, Lily Frances Dooman, Elizabeth Sontheimer, Elizabeth Loring, Jason Beers, Bill Edwards, TJ Ring, Brad Fielder, Martin Farrell Jr., Mikal Shapiro, Alex Myers and Mark Franzke

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about

The Matchsellers Kansas City, Kansas

Clever and fearless, The Matchsellers boldly go where Bluegrass has previously feared to tread. Hailing from the heartland of America, they infuse traditional roots music with a modern, irreverent, wild, art-house twist that could only come out of Kansas City. ... more

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