Rob Thomas ahead of Wednesday’s Starlight show talks his new album, the enduring legacy of ‘Smooth’
Rob Thomas. // photo credit Randall Slavin
Singer Rob Thomas is best known for his work as the frontman for long-running ’90s rockers Matchbox Twenty, but his work as a solo artist offers up a different approach to his instantly recognizable voice. His forthcoming album, All Night Days–out Friday, September 5, via Republic Records–offers such singles as “Hard to Be Happy” and “Thrill Me,” both of which offer up introspective lyrical content. However, it’s the danceable vibes of the first track contrasted with the stripped-down acoustic work of the second that make for such an intriguing and involving listen.
Thomas brings his solo tour to Starlight Theater on Wednesday, August 27, and we hopped on Zoom with the singer about the differences between working solo and with Matchbox Twenty, how he’s much more silly than you might expect, and how “Man, it’s a hot one …” has affected his life.
The Pitch: The new tracks swing between introspective and dancey and “Hard to Be Happy” is both. What was sort of the balance you were going for on All Night Days?
Rob Thomas: I wish that I were a good enough writer that I could be like, “Well, this was my plan and I followed that plan,” but I mean, everything is always happenstance, right? You just write a bunch. The unfortunate thing is, you have to follow it all the way. You have to write full songs to realize you don’t like them. I’ll write like a whole record and by the time I make a record, I’ve written three records of just shit that I don’t like.
For “Hard to Be Happy,” it was literally born out of–I started making a solo record during the pandemic before everything shut down, and then, three years later, when Matchbox went on tour, finally, because we had postponed it for three years, we decided to make a record. So, some of the songs got put on the back burner and some of them wound up in the Matchbox record.
In this one particular session, we realized how everything we were writing was so sad. And I said, “Well, it’s hard to be happy,” then it started a conversation about this expectation that, anytime someone asks you, “How are you doing?”, you’re supposed to just say, “Fine,” no matter how you’re doing. It’s an unbelievable expectation to put on someone that you’re gonna feel good all the time. And so then we were like, “Can we write a really happy song about not being happy?” and then that was kind of born outta that.
The video for it is just delightful. It’s so silly. How is it to have someone choreograph an aerobics routine to one of your songs?
In my real life. I am mostly silly. We’re on the road right now. I’m on the bus. We have a day off. I tell my team every day, our mantra is like, “Huys, the stakes are fucking low out here. We’re just making music. We’re having fun. There’s nothing here to take too seriously,” but if you followed me over the last 30 years and you met me, you would think that I was some sort of brooding, dark guy.
It was fun to just be silly. It was fun to just know that you could be as silly as you want to be. There were no reins on it.
The album doesn’t come out until September 5. How are folks responding to these new songs as they’re hearing them for the first time?
It seems like they’re doing well. I think we have them well placed. We have the two songs that people have heard, “Thrill Me” and “Hard to Be Happy,” that are out there in the world, and we open the show with the song, “I Believe It,” that’s on the record. Nobody knows it, but we ride the wave of the excitement that it’s the first song. The best part is we only have two songs in the set that nobody knows, except for a few hardcore fans who go to a lot of shows. They’ve started to tape it. There are certain fans, during the show, I look at them and they’re kind of mouthing, but they don’t know the words, and I wanna stop the show and be like, “It’s okay. You’re not supposed to know this one. You’re off the hook for this one.”
But I think we picked the ones that I knew would be the most fun to perform live during All Night Days.
Is it hard being Rob Thomas in the summer? Are you familiar with the concept of smoothposting at all?
Man, every night I start “Smooth,” I think that right now, I will guarantee you everywhere in the world, this song is being played at some sort of a cabana or some pool bar or a wedding or even a fucking funeral. I believe that there are only two people who should play it, and I’m one of them.
I think “Smooth” took on its own life. It was a hot summer song that became the height of cheese that then just became canon of pop music.
I feel like you have fans who have come to you from so many different ways and I’m wondering how that reflects a solo tour versus a Matchbox tour.
I mean the demographic is the same, in that if you were my age when our first record came out and you’re still coming to shows, you’re pushing 80 now, and those people are there, but also their grandkids are there. There are 13-year-old kids who just grew up listening to Matchbox Twenty. Then there’s so many people that are in their 20s that are literally posting stuff like, “I just realized that Rob Thomas is the lead singer of Matchbox Twenty,” which is funny because it means that there’s another demographic that that’s yet to unlock.
I’m not name dropping, but I’m name dropping–I was in Rio and we were doing Rock and Rio and I spent the afternoon with Bruce Springsteen by the pool, ’cause you know, he didn’t play till like midnight or something that night, and he was. Way more hip to my career than I thought he would be.
He knew how many solo records I had and how many Matchbox records I had. And he is like, “You know, there’s gonna be a period in your career where it feels like it’s a little fallow, but all that is, is a gestation period where you’re growing new fans. If you keep them around, they’ll show back up.”
I always say Matchbox Twenty is the bigger bear. I played Chicago last night, and it was a nice showing in the smaller amphitheater. I played there two years ago with Matchbox Twenty, and it was 26,000, all filled out. Matchbox is, I think, always–culturally, it means something to people, in a way.
It’s got a decade on me solo, but a lot of those people spill over, and some of them may be there in absence of Matchbox Twenty being available, and then some of them just because, when people come to Matchbox sometimes they go, “I want to hear ‘Little Wonders,’” or “I wanna hear ‘This Is How A Heart Breaks,’” and I’m like, “You gotta wait for solo for that.”
I’m not Sting, but if you wanna go hear all the greatest hits, you go see the Police. But if you want to hear some of the greatest hits and “Englishman in New York” and “Fields of Gold,” then you’re gonna have to go see Sting solo.
Are there other things that you manage to slot in that aren’t musically related or is this just how your brain works?
No, I mean, it’s my hobby, right? It feeds into to what I do. Matchbox has made six records, but I’ve made six records, so I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t either on the road in a studio or actively writing all the time but right now, my outside hobby is I’m trying to talk to a couple different people about a couple different properties to write a musical, so it’s still the same kind of thing.
While I’m here, I’m still fielding stuff with Matchbox about next year’s 30th anniversary and how we’re gonna roll it out and all the stuff that we are gonna do. I’m lucky to be 53 and have my first record come out 30 years ago, and having a conversation with you about how busy I am. It’s a fucking gift, so I’m never gonna complain about it.
Is there anything I haven’t asked you about that you wanna make sure I mention?
Are you asking me if there’s anything about myself that I find interesting that you haven’t pointed out? So many things, Nick, but we have so little time. [laughs] I don’t know if I think it’s relevant that I’d been on Atlantic Records for 30 years, and when I announced this tour, I had a meeting with Atlantic Records about the video and all this stuff. I left Atlantic Records, and then I was only in the ether for three days, and I reached out to Monte Lipman, the head of Republic, and told him, and then he said, “Welcome to Republic.”
Now I’m putting this first record on Universal/Republic, and I have a whole new team, a whole new group. It’s another like level of excitement, this kind of newness after all this time, and it feels a little dangerous–which is kind of fun–instead of feeling safe.
Rob Thomas plays Starlight Theater on Wednesday, August 27, with openers A Great Big World. Details on that show here.
