There’s a poignant sadness attached to this album as Catfish mainman, guitarist and singer Matt Long, died in October 2024, succumbing to cancer at the criminally young age of only 29, when he still had so much more music left in him. But in his short life, he and Catfish left their mark on the blues scene, and his name will be remembered for as long as blues is played in this country.
The album was put together from a tapestry of pieces retrieved from a few unexpected places, such as on Matt’s iPhone and Laptop. Only a very few had been completed; most were nowhere near ready as Matt had been unable to play because of his illness, so the remaining band members took on the challenge of helping compile a final Catfish album. But such was the skill shown by Paul Long, Matt’s father and also bandmate, you’d be hard pressed to tell which of the tracks had to be pieced together.
The eponymous title track opens proceedings, it’s a heavy keyboard-dominated number with a thumping beat and it lays out what the rest of the album will sound like, in that the album is more rock-oriented than bluesy, though the feel is there in the vocals.
‘Change My Ways’ and ‘Broken Halo,’ with backing vocals from Chloe Josephine, veer towards classic rock, as is ‘Sick Of It All,’ the nucleus of which was found on Matts phone after he died, begins with a bass line Lemmy would be proud of and the band developed it. However, the powerful ‘Don’t Turn Around’ is more proggy than bluesy and features some searing guitar work from Matt Long. Whereas by contrast, ‘Forevermore And Again’ is a slow love song to someone who’s dying “.. close your eyes one more time, I’ll give you one more long goodbye”. It’s sentimental but without being mawkish.
But the song of the album is the closing track, ‘Say The Word,’ built up from a demo left on Matt’s laptop and completed by the band. It’s a moody, ten-minute, slow, powerful piece with the last four minutes taken up by a guitar break which begins slow and soulful before gradually building up to a crescendo. As Paul Long said, “There was no other way to close the album.”
‘Time To Fly’ is a bittersweet but ultimately triumphant farewell to a guitar player taken well before his time, and the last word should go to his father Paul. “Matt wasn’t able to give his blessing to the album, but we felt his music should be heard and played, rather than just filed away and lost.” Amen to that.
