Matt Rai Music

SILENCE AS BOMBS FALL DOWN (DELUXE EDITION)
December 4, 2026 🎸

Earlier this year I released Silence As Bombs Fall Down.

On December 4, the story gets a little bigger.

The Deluxe Edition expands the original EP to 7 tracks, bringing together the original songs with three additions:

🌹 Yeah Rose
🍇 I Heard It Through the Grapevine
🌃 Cities Dance (Bonus Track)

It’s still a little way off, but the pre-save is now live.

If you’d like to support the release early, you can pre-save it here:

https://show.co/C7tOdHB

Thank you to everyone who has listened, come to a show, shared a song or followed along this year. ❤️

Plenty more about this record when we get a little closer to December.

Matt x

MelbourneMusic IndieFolk AlternativeFolk

CAN YOU BE A COMPELLING ARTIST WITHOUT BEING AN EXTROVERT?

Something I’ve been thinking about as an emerging artist.

There seems to be an expectation in music that you need to be visible.

Confident. Social. Charismatic. Good at networking. Comfortable putting yourself out there.

But what if that’s not naturally who you are?

I’m autistic and fairly introverted. My social battery can disappear remarkably quickly.

And there’s a strange contradiction in that.

I can stand onstage in front of a room full of people with a 12-string guitar and sing something incredibly personal.

Then sometimes feel painfully awkward talking to people afterwards.

So where does stage presence end and masking begin?

Maybe we’ve also confused charisma with extroversion.

Some of the artists I find most compelling aren’t particularly loud or bombastic. There’s something powerful about vulnerability, awkwardness and even stillness.

I’m still figuring out how those two sides of myself fit together.

Maybe the challenge isn’t learning how to become more extroverted.

Maybe it’s learning how to be compelling without pretending to be somebody else.

Curious how other musicians, particularly neurodivergent ones, navigate this?

EMERGING MUSICIANS AND AN ALTERNATIVE DEFINITION OF SUCCESS

Something small happened recently that got me thinking about success.

My kids asked if we could listen to one of my songs in the car.

No new listeners. No streams. No tickets sold.

But sitting there listening to something I’d written, with my kids actually asking to hear it, felt strangely significant.

It made me think about how emerging musicians define success.

There seems to be an established measure:

More listeners. More followers. More streams. More ticket sales.

And ultimately, becoming financially sustainable through music.

Nothing wrong with aspiring to any of that. But if popularity and financial viability are our primary measures, most emerging musicians eventually have to consider themselves unsuccessful. Or worse, accept that dreaded label: “failed musician.”

But only if we accept those measures in the first place.

Perhaps there’s an alternative view.

One more in tune with our inner values than external expectations.

It’s easy to spend months writing, performing and recording a song, then judge its worth by streams, views and likes.

Something that existed only as an idea has become real.

Surely there is value in that alone?

There’s an idea in the Bhagavad Gita that I come back to: we have a right to our actions, but not to the fruits of those actions.

What if writing the song has value before anyone hears it?

What if becoming a better songwriter, musician or performer is itself success?

What if creating something authentically yours matters more than creating something designed to become popular?

Perhaps emerging musicians need to define success for themselves before the world defines it for them.

Popularity and financial sustainability can be part of that.

But so can expression. Growth. Connection. Curiosity. Courage.

And simply continuing to create.

Perhaps a simpler question is:

Am I better today than I was yesterday?

And success can occasionally be something much smaller.

Like hearing your kids ask:

“Can we listen to one of your songs?”

Some things are difficult to measure precisely because they matter more than the things we can.

renee_alison_music The Quietest Voice in the Room, The Hardest to Ignore…

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Renée Alison perform three times over the past six months, including sharing the stage with her at an RSOM | Songwriting Community ⭐️ Supporting Emerging Artists showcase. During that time I’ve been fortunate to experience a wide range of Melbourne’s local music scene, and Renée remains the artist who has left the strongest impression on me.

As someone with a deep appreciation for Nick Drake, I was drawn to Renée almost immediately. There’s a similar sense of restraint and intimacy in her music, although she has a voice and identity entirely her own.

What first caught my attention was her guitar work. Rather than relying on familiar chord shapes and standard tuning, Renée retunes her nylon-string guitar to create harmonies that feel quietly sophisticated and unmistakably hers. Nothing feels forced or overly technical. The playing simply serves the songs.

Her vocals follow the same philosophy. In an era where many artists seem to chase bigger choruses, wider vocal ranges and louder performances, Renée takes the opposite approach. She never sounds as though she’s trying to command your attention. Instead, she sings with a quiet confidence that invites you to lean in and listen.

It raises an interesting question about Melbourne’s music scene. Are audiences, particularly younger listeners, ready to embrace artists whose strength lies not in spectacle but in subtlety? In a culture that often rewards volume and immediacy, can patience still be rewarded?

Only time will tell.

What Renée has already demonstrated is that there is another path. One built on vulnerability, understated musicianship and complete authenticity. Hers is a calm presence that cuts through the noise, not by competing with it, but by refusing to.

I’m genuinely interested to see whether Melbourne is ready for that shift.