Biography:
Dave Matthews has chronicled his life's travels
so often that when asked, he can rattle off the details without pause. It goes
like this:
Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1967. Moves two years later with his
family to Westchester County, NY, where his dad, a physicist, goes to work for
IBM. Then, in the early `70s, to Cambridge, England, before returning to New
York — where his dad died in 1977. The family moved back to South Africa in
1980, where Matthews went to a few different schools and "got more wise
about the evils of government, there and in general." O.K.; pause for a
breath.
The key move for Dave Matthews Band fans, of course, was when he relocated in
1986 to Charlottesville, VA, where his parents had lived before he was born.
Though he also logged time back in South Africa and in Amsterdam, it was in
Charlottesville where Matthews — who took piano lessons as a child before
picking up the guitar at age nine — became part of the local music community
and hatched the idea for his own band. "I didn't really have a vision, or a
plan," says Matthews, acknowledging that some of his musical sensibility
came from spending time in so many different places as a child. "I'm sure
it gave me a little bit of an openness. The most diverse music in the world is
in America, 'cause there's so many different cultures here, but what tends to be
pushed to the top is often a narrow view of what there really is. So maybe (his
travels) just gave me a wider pool of listening."
Matthews says his principal goal with the band was to surround himself with the
best players possible. To this day he remains "amazed" that he was
able to recruit and retain the four musicians he rather modestly refers to as
his superiors. "I was just looking for people that I liked," explains
Matthews, who feels he's "gotten a bit better" over the years.
"Could I play with them was more of the question, I think. We just ended up
fitting together. The band wasn't something that I was looking for; it was very
much I loved the people I asked to play with me. There was a connection at the
beginning, and I think what we've been about is not some grand scheme but more
the spirit of everyone, which is why we ended up with this band and why it
sounds like it does."
Equipment list:
Taylor 714-C Six-String Acoustic Guitar
Taylor W65 12-String Acoustic Guitar
Jerry Jones Baritone
Modulus Genesis Six-String Guitar
Shure UHF Wireless System
Shure UHE Antenna Distro
Matchless DC30 Amplifier
