Matt Warren returns with instrumental masterpiece album ‘Music Is My Life’

It’s not your traditional story of the Phoenix rising from its ashes, yet it follows the narrative of a Phoenix spreading its wings to soar in a new direction. That’s exactly what platinum award-winning producer Matt Warren is doing as the musical engineer delivers the first slice of his own music in over 10 years. Warren is a veteran of the music industry and his career spans near four decades worth. But perhaps in more recent times, his name has not commanded the attention it deserves, for Warren has spent the last decade producing and remixing music for others, thus lacking the focus to his own music. Now, spurred by the very-inner feelings of his love with music, the Chicago-based artist and mastermind behind Mortal Kombat’s classic movie soundtrack has returned with his newly fresh sounds which accumulate to one jaw-dropping album titled ‘Music Is My Life‘.

Continuously creating as far as one can push his production abilities, Matt Warren rewinds to the mid-late 1980s as his album delivers the iconic sounds of Chicago House – noted for its history surrounding the birth of house music productions by Chicago-based artists. But Matt’s album is far from just another run-of-the-mill release. Instead, ‘Music Is My Life’ calls for an intense listening of instrumental arrangments that represent the birth of Nu-house and the transformation of house music in the 21st century. Exhilarating the senses, Warren’s album renews the listener’s love of music that will bring you to your feet no matter where you are in the world. Talking about his album, Matt Warren shared:

“This is my first release of my own music in ten years. I’ve been producing, engineering and remixing for others, but have not focused on my creative needs for a long time. I felt like I wanted to do a record that reflects my journey as both a musician and DJ. I really wanted to give that old school feel to the songs…I guess what I mean is to record “real music” with live instruments and arrangements…which are kind of a homage of all the music I grew up listening to.”

‘Music Is My Life’ features 11 tracks, each individual production unique, but together they discharge an extraordinary collection of sounds that can easily be considered ‘real music’ – as Warren states himself. Surprisingly, even the album’s track titles grab your attention making the decision of which track to listen to first an almost impossible task. Picking highlights from ‘Music Is My Life’, we get started with the brass-driven production of ‘How Do I Love Thee‘. The track bears an empowering character of the downtown smokey club scene where one can picture a young Matt Warren spinning the decks in his early music days.

Leave it to ‘Catch Me If You Can‘, a track that instantly flirts with your heartbeat and eardrums while you succumb to its smooth vocals of legendary house diva Pepper Gomez, simultaneously backed by irresistible chimes. ‘Catch Me If You Can‘ asks the question, can you catch this track(?) because, no doubt, you will be hitting the replay button to catch these vocals over and over again. Next, we turn our attention to ‘Music Is My Life‘, a subtle production that continually displays its soothing melodic charm coupled with more brass-flavoured instrumental sounds. Picture this, electronic beats meet bustling jazz bar – that’s what this track portrays.

Steering the Chicago-house mood from the latter end of the album, ‘Bang The Box‘ is arguably one of Warren’s more electronically dominant productions from his album ‘Music Is My Life’. With a driving bassline complimenting choppy looped vocals of “bang the box“, the track gets to work with its carefully-crafted and exciting synth design. This production has further room to accommodate a flurry of ticks, claps, and sees its final arrangement layered with a healthy serving of percussive beats.

The album is a breath of fresh air for both Matt Warren and the electronic dance music community. Just as he helped the Chicago sounds of the 80s where Warren was, in fact, an originator of the infamous ‘Chicago House Music‘ sound, he could seamlessly do it again as Warren takes and fronts Nu-house in the next era of electronic music. Catch the full album below because trust me, this is ‘real music’ you will want to listen to.