[**TRIPLE RRR**](http://triplerrr.com/) jacket and shirt..
Before the digital music age of monetizing a mixer, Michigan bred [Matthew Dear](https://www.instagram.com/matthewdear/) had only Herbie Hancock and his older brother’s catalog of classics to look to as inspiration for the revolution he would soon begin. “I can remember at eight years old watching the Herbie Rockit Hancock video, and it hit me like a ton of bricks,” the electronic music pioneer explains as he reminisces from his Portland room during the final week of his [2019 tour.](https://www.residentadvisor.net/images/events/flyer/2019/12/us-1205-1330884-0-front.jpg) “It seemed like there was a whole other world attached to this music that was very synthetic and unlike anything I had ever heard at that age. Coupled with that video- which is of this weird mannequin and Hirby Hancock on TV as the only human you see- I just remember thinking like, ‘Oh my god- I want to go there. I want to be in that crazy world.” And it was in this very crazy world that Matthew Dear created not only a career, but an imprint on the industry that stands 20 years strong.
Before Matthew Dear, a frequent Flaunt collaborator was a DJ/ producer/ bandleader/ record label founder, he was an early warehouse raver- a punk of sorts. “Yeah, (electronic music was) punk in the sense that it was so anti-popular and anti-cultural. But, I’m sure punks hated ravers if you really broke it down,” Dear explains through a laugh. “I do remember going to my first warehouse party until the sun came out and walking around in Detroit feeling like, ‘Okay… this is different.’ Everybody is in on this secret clubhouse that you can go to. It was our first little taste of rebellion.”
Since the days of sneaking out to listen to speaker-blaring-synth-driven-beats, Matthew Dear has mixed and produced hundreds of tracks while traveling the world a few times over playing show after show. I wonder if the nocturnal element of rave culture that first seduced him to the dance floor still allures him to this day, or if the exhaustion has caught up with him finally? “I’ve always said it’s the hardest easy job on the planet- being a musician,” Dear explains. “There is no easier job than getting up and doing what you love- sharing music that you like. But, the hard part obviously is the grueling hours, the late nights, the loudspeakers, and the drunk people spitting in your ear. That stuff can get tiring, but all of that goes away when you have one good night. If you have a great party, you can just feel that energy that everyone is connected to. It can be 50 people or 5,000. It’s not about size, it’s just the vibe. When you get that vibe, you’re like, ‘Okay, this is why I do this.’ But, If that energy is not there, it’s like, ‘Eh, why am I doing this? I’m too old for this.’ So it is tiring now, but I also have three kids…”
When you see a veteran of a music style that is as intense as electronic is, it is often hard to imagine them coming home in the dark of night to sleeping children who have school that very morning. Yet somehow, through stacking his discography and running the acclaimed international music and art company, Ghostly, alongside co-founder Sam Valenti IV, Dear found the time to start a family- and a beautiful one at that. In a sense, it seems, losing sleep as a performer of this unique art is not too far off from losing sleep while raising children. “Honestly, I think having children makes it easier to deal with the lack of sleep on the road because you’re just used to it,” Dear describes simply. “I’m on all timezones now. I can go to Europe and I’m like, ‘Yeah, fine, whatever the clock says is not important.’ I sleep a little bit, and then I do what I have to do. I was way more jet-lagged when I had a normal schedule at home. I’d just rather be home than staying at a hotel on Facetime with my family.”
So as Flaunt rolls out The Home Issue, what is “home” to the timezone-limitless Matthew Dear? “When it was just me and my wife, home was the place you would set your bags down and take a break. But she recalls that I was never home,” Dear laughs. “But then, with each kid, the more and more you don’t want to leave home. Home takes on a different, more warming and familial feeling. It’s my den now- it’s where my bears are hibernating. That said, it’s never been more important to me to make good music and do what I love well because of my responsibility now. In the sense that I want to be home more, I also want to be out and doing what I do more. It’s an interesting balance.”
[**TRIPLE RRR**](http://triplerrr.com/) coat, shirt, and pants.
With that responsibility came the 2018 album, [Bunny](https://open.spotify.com/album/6sYancU3Jr0hmO7zqyTiWr), and yet another U.S. tour underway as we speak. For that, we are all thankful. I wondered if his family was thankful as well. I asked dear if his kids and wife like the music he makes too (as if the thousands of fans across the globe were not enough for him). “Yeah, my wife has always been a really big supporter of mine, and she’ll be my most acute critic when necessary,” Dear explained. “There’s a few songs, like Echo on my last album, that she never liked. I was like, ‘No, this one is good trust me! It’ll be on the album!’ I don’t think she’s come around to it still. But, I need that. The kids though, the kids always love the music. We would play some of my songs to calm them down in the car. I don’t know if it’s the simplicity of the melody or the rhythm, but kids like it. My kids have been drawn to making music and coming into the studio and messing around with things. It’s an open door for them, and I love to see where they take it.”
The rise of social media plays an interesting role in this fatherhood to industry dinger stretching as well. Upon a quick stalk of Matthew Dear’s instagram account, you quickly notice a plethora of posts about a specific earthly organism that has always been closely linked with underground rave culture. Although his fascination with mushrooms may not be in the sphere of psychedelics as many of his fans, Matthew Dear’s love for mushroom harvesting seems to be the nature-break he needs, having been a slave to the computer screen all throughout his career. “I go through phases where I- almost in a manic sense- pick a subject and really obsess about it. I’ve just been really enamored with the scientific world of mycology. There is just so much going on in the health sector in terms of what each and every type of mushroom can do for you as well as in terms of cancer research and neurogenic properties. It’s not even all the psychedelic stuff, even though that’s also being heavily researched at John Hopkins, Harvard and MIT. I think on instagram, you’re just seeing my current obsession. I think when I was painting two years ago, all I would post is random portraits of my oil paintings. And then, I was into rocks and into looking the geology of rocks last year. My six year old daughter one day was like, ‘So, you’re into mushrooms right now, and you were into rocks last year, but I think you should get back into paintings.’ I guess it’s obvious that she’s calling me out. So yeah, mushrooms are my thing right now.”
Scrolling past this fungi fascination, Matthew Dear’s social media is obviously, also stacked with his U.S. travels for his tour that is soon to wrap up. “This one’s good,” Dear declares directly when I ask how this round of touring is different from his other tours throughout the last 20 years. “I think, going back to social media, I’ve gotten more and more personal and public and comfortable with myself. I’m able to talk to the camera now more directly than I’ve ever been, and that translates really well onstage. I’m doing a solo tour now as a opposed to where I used to play with a band. My solo shows have been about me getting more and more familiar with a microphone and a crowd as opposed to just being the performance, so everything has really become this natural thing that feels good. I’m the same guy on the couch at home as I am in front of people on stage, and I think people get that. I like that you can go places and people know who you are- there’s no front or artist face that I have to put on.
There’s only two day’s left of the U.S. Matthew Dear x Tourist tour, of course ending with a bang in [Los Angeles](https://www.residentadvisor.net/events/1330910) at [Catch One](https://catch.one/). As we close in on 2020, Dear leaves us with a few more thoughts on where this culture has taken him and the realizations he’s made on his winding road around this whimsical world. “I started realizing, I’ve got 30,000 people that have clicked a button being like, ‘I want to know what this guy is up to.’ I looked at it more as non-invasive. They signed up, so I can give them whatever they get. If they don’t like it, they can unfollow me. You basically have a TV show in everyones pocket. They all have your channel, and they’ve put your channel in their favorites. It’s up to you to decide what you want to give them. So… I’m giving them me.”
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Photography by [Jonathon Duncan](https://www.instagram.com/isthistight/).
Styled by [Morgan Vickery](https://www.instagram.com/morganvickery/).
Grooming by [Yuko Mizuno](https://www.instagram.com/yuko_mizuno_makeup/?hl=en).
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