Matt Dusk goes shopping

Matt Dusk
Sam’s Club, Hodgkins
Friday, July 20, 2007

We’ve heard about artists like Garth Brooks signing deals with Wal-Mart, making their albums available exclusively through that chain of stores. But promoting your new album by touring Sam’s Clubs?

Somehow, some way, someone convinced Canadian crooner Matt Dusk this would be a good way to get the word out about Back In Town, released via Decca last summer. Doing “exclusive” performances at warehouses filled with vats of Cheetos seems a little below Dusk, who sounds like a talented chap on Back In Town. At the very least he sounds like young man with a firm grip on the jazz and big band standards he performs on this, his second major label album. Dusk sounds right at home in Frank Sinatra territory on “The Way You Look Tonight” and “The Best Is Yet To Come” and brings a youthful exuberance to My Fair Lady‘s “On The Street Where You Live.”

So why spend 10 days touring Sam’s Clubs instead of music clubs? Well, it is one of the nation’s largest warehouse clubs with more than 47 million U.S. members. What do we know anyway? After all, we’ve never heard “As Time Goes By” performed live while browsing the produce section.

If you plan on seeing Dusk at the Hodgkins Sam’s Club (store #6384, baby!) and you aren’t a SC member, you can print a free “One Day Club Pass” from www.mattdusk.com.

– Trevor Fisher

Click here to listen to streaming samples of Back In Town.

Category: Stage Buzz, Weekly