Based in Baltimore, Matmos is Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt. The two have been making music as Matmos since 1997, first in San Francisco, and then relocating to Baltimore in 2007 when Daniel began to teach at Johns Hopkins University. They are respected, innovative auteurs in the world of electronic music and sampling culture whose very first album was hailed as “entering electronics Valhalla” by the WIRE magazine for sampling highly unusual sound sources such as the amplified nerve tissue of crayfish. Ever since, they have made music out a wildly heterogeneous set of objects and sources, including the sound of the pages of bibles turning, water hitting copper plates, liposuction surgery, cameras and VCRs, chin implant surgery, contact microphones on human hair, rat cages, tanks of helium, a cow uterus, human skulls, snails, cigarettes, cards shuffling, laser eye surgery, whoopee cushions, balloons, latex fetish clothing, rhinestones, Polish trains, insects, life support systems, inflatable blankets, rock salt, solid gold coins, the sound of a frozen stream thawing in the sun, a five gallon bucket of oatmeal, snails interrupting the path of a laser and altering the pitch of a light sensitive theremin, a PVC police riot shield, silicon breast implants, and their own washing machine. These raw materials are manipulated into surprisingly accessible forms, and often supplemented by traditional musical instruments played by internationally celebrated guest musicians from their circle of friends and collaborators. The result is a model of electronic composition as a relational network that connects sources and outcomes together; information about the process of creation activates the listening experience, providing the listener with entry points into sometimes densely allusive, baroque recordings that have the direct sensory immediacy of pop music.

Matmos have collaborated with a wide array of artists across media and distinct disciplines. A partial list of musical collaborators includes: Bjork, The Kronos Quartet, Terry Riley, Marshall Allan (Sun Ra Arkestra), So Percussion, Anohni, Yo La Tengo, The Rachel’s, Oneohtrix Point Never, Jefferson Friedman, Zeena Parkins, J.G. Thirlwell, Jeff Carey, Wobbly, David Tibet, and Mouse On Mars. The diversity of this list, comprising internationally celebrated pop stars, minimalist composers, giants of jazz and indie rock and innovative improvisers and electronic musicians, indicates the range across genres and musical scenes that has been the hallmark of Matmos’ varied and mercurial career. Matmos have made musical soundtracks to films by acclaimed filmmakers such as Daria Martin and John Cameron Mitchell (on “How to Talk to Girls at Parties”, written by Neil Gaiman and starring Nicole Kidman and Elle Fanning). Matmos has collaborated with theatrical directors such as Young Jean Lee (on “The Appeal” and “We’re All Gonna Die”) and Robert Wilson (on “The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic”, starring Willem Dafoe, Anohni, and Marina Abramovic). The band has released over twelve albums, and numerous EPs for the labels Matador and Thrill Jockey. Matmos have been electronic music tutors at the distinguished and highly selective Darmstadt Ferienkurse, guest artists at the Ruskin School of Art at Oxford University, visiting faculty at Harvard University in the “Learning from Performers” series and presented our work at music departments such as Princeton, U.C. Berkeley, UVA, SciArc, Indiana University, and the San Francisco Art Institute. Matmos have performed all over the world, including key performances at Carnegie Hall, Zankel Hall, Walt Disney Hall, Orchard Hall in Tokyo, Santa Cecilia in Rome, MUTEK in Mexico City, Radio City Music Hall, the Sydney Festival in Sydney, Australia, and the Centres Georges Pompidou in Paris, and have had residencies at the INA/GRM in Paris, and at the Civitella Ranieri Foundation in Tuscany.

Matmos’ singular compositional approach resembles the creation of sculpture. The incredibly detailed pieces that make up each album are created with carefully selected sounds that adhere to a specific conceptual framework. The duo makes music that defies both category and expectation, shattering notions of what electronic music is by questioning what else it could be. In the case of their latest release, Metallic Life Review (2025 Thrill Jockey), what may be possible with the sound that metal objects make? By ignoring the categorical genre constraints associated with terms like found sound, musique concrète, techno, glitch and, yes, “metal,” and pushing into new territory, Matmos’s approach answers this question with gleeful abandon.
Underpinning their adventurous and inquisitive spirits is a sense of real feeling, never shying from the difficult and unsettling moments, but embracing the breadth of human experiences that live in communication with the constraints of each project. Metallic Life Review continues to take a seemingly impossible premise—like making an album only with select, often commonplace objects such as sounds of plastic (Plastic Anniversary) or a washing machine (Ultimate Care II)—this time by entirely sourcing its sound from metallic objects: bronze, copper, steel, aluminium, and various alloys. In this case, they have collected field recordings of metal objects from around the world, sourced from moments across the entirety of their years as a band.
This life review documents their lives together, their curious collecting, and collages their magpie hoard into rhythmic patterns—sometimes writing melodies and basslines, but sometimes just letting sound be sound. Patient gathering yields to ADHD editing. Painstakingly made, but blink and you’ll miss the finer details. By employing the strong contrast between a harsh industrial clatter and a sweet melodic dimension, a deliberate counterforce, Matmos arrive at paradox: exceptionally beautiful music wrought from metal detritus.
The most dramatic difference from any previous Matmos album is that side two was recorded “live in the studio,” à la Throbbing Gristle’s Heathen Earth. For the first time on recording, Matmos capture the evolving, shifting, slithering dynamic that happens when they play live and let patterns emerge out of chaos and then collapse and re-form. Their playful blend of compositional brilliance and improvisational playfulness meld perfectly, truly capturing ecstatic moments in a way that can only happen live.
Metallic Life Review is a musical love story transmuted into sound, the result of a life filled with curiosity and powered by boundless exploration. Matmos have again made something spellbinding, brilliant, and emotionally resonant.

Drew Daniel is also available with his solo project The Soft Pink Truth.