Culture Music Live music

Matthew and the Atlas at Dingwalls

Matthew and the Atlas at Dingwalls | Live review

What do Phil Collins, Foals and Bon Iver have in common? Matthew and the Atlas.

At Dingwalls in Camden they seem to mix a full array of different influences: Matthew Hegarty’s voice is sometimes surprisingly similar to Collins’ vocals while the guitarist every now and then bursts out in strands reminiscent of Foals’ early sound. Some songs are layered in Bon Iver style and some songs are plain rock songs. While it is fun to combine, the different influences confuse and make the performance incoherent at times. On record you barely notice these influences, but live it is far more apparent and damages the overall concept of the gig.

In the recently released album Other Rivers, Matthew and the Atlas take a big step away from the folky sound that pervades their earlier work. Onstage the folk influence and banjo have completely vanished, and any fan that found the band while they were opening shows for Mumford & Sons a while back might be in for a surprise. The band sounds like nothing you have heard on earlier releases, which is to their advantage. With their new sound they are searching for their own identity in music and make their own space on the scene rather than copying an already successful concept. Even if they are not completely there yet, they are heading in the right direction.

Matthew and the Atlas have some quite good songs – some beautiful, some catchy – and the band deliver them with pride to the Camden venue. Their new album is promising with the updated sound and the decision to put the banjo on a rest on most of the songs, but they need to work on a coherent live show in order to become as big as their influences.

Johanna Eliasson

For further information and future events visit Matthew and the Atlas’s website here

Watch the video for Pale Sun Rose here:

More in Live music

Tom Grennan at the O2 Arena

Gem Hurley

Hot Chip at Troxy

Mark Worgan

Gorillaz at Copper Box Arena

Selina Begum

Matt Berninger at Troxy

Benedetta Mancusi

All Points East 2025: The Maccabees

Bev Lung

Victorious Festival 2025 Day Three: Kings of Leon

Taryn Crowley

Rally Festival 2025: Floating Points, Porridge Radio, Speaker’s Corner Quartet and more

Ben Browning

Coldplay at Wembley Arena: “Nobody does stadiums like them”

Filippo L'Astorina, the Editor

Victorious Festival 2025 Day One: Queens of the Stone Age, Kaiser Chiefs, Wunderhorse and more

Taryn Crowley