“Why does Johnson always sound so in tune with the political troubles of the time? This could be 1986. Or 1993. Or 1980. Yet it still feels like the future.”
– THE GUARDIAN
“Naked Self throbs and growls with expressions of deep dissatisfaction, both personal and political. It’s a grimy low-down rock record. A thrillingly gritty and distorted adventure. The man’s muse has clearly never deserted him.”
– THE TIMES
“Naked Self finds Johnson returning to the slow-burn industrial grind of his best work. Everything on the album is driven by storm-trooping drums, a battalion of distorted axes and Johnson’s ominous echo-chamber vocals. It is as darkly insidious as a toxic IV drip.”
– ROLLING STONE
“Matt Johnson has returned from shadows few ever emerge from.”
– NME
“This 12-track set houses some of Johnson’s most impressive song writing to date. A frequently beautiful, moving and thought-provoking addition to the THE THE catalogue”
– Q ****
“Johnson provides desperately sad lyrics wrapped lovingly in beautiful melody lines and delivered with a voice that communicates straight to the gut. Naked Self is worth paying for.”
– THE SUNDAY TIMES
“Matt Johnson proves to be one of the few Eighties figures who deserves reappraisal. Naked Self may prove that he was ahead of his time.”
– EVENING STANDARD
“Not many other songwriters can dissect both the personal and the political in their lyrics with equal conviction. He is by no means as gloomy as his reputation. His lyrics are full of reassurance in the face of loneliness, consumerism and the other evils he sees in the modern world.”
– THE INDEPENDENT
“The same conviction and idealism that underlie his conversation shine through his art, imbuing his songs and performances with an almost physical sense of passion.”
– THE DAILY TELEGRAPH
“This record is an enormous sonic pleasure. Repeated listens required, but well worth it.”
– TIME OUT NEW YORK
“This is THE THE’s catchiest, prettiest and downright most enjoyable album in years. Think Led Zeppelin at their more folky spliced with The Stone Roses at their peak and THE THE at their most subtle and you’ll get a rough idea.”
– THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
“From ambient to Middle Eastern, startling is the breadth of noises Johnson derives from various guitars. Compelling, uncompromising and often beautiful music.”
– UNCUT
“An uncompromising and intense album that makes you realise how soft, inoffensive and unpolitical alternative music has become. Remember when it took about 10 plays to get into an album and that made you like it even more? Well, this is one of those.”
– LATER
“Albums and indeed bands like this are a dying breed and you are left hoping that Matt never lightens up.”
– POP CULTURE DETOX
“The maturity is also in the winter weariness that dominates the disc: On the brisk ‘December Sunlight’, you can almost see Johnson’s breath as he sings, and his bracing acoustic-guitar figures slide off one another like ice sheets dropping off a giant berg.”
– DETAILS
“The loosest, most aggressive-sounding record that has ever carried the moniker of THE THE. Stripped down musically, guitars dominate the proceedings, and most of the songs sport dark, ominous atmospherics. What remains are the deeply personal and introspective lyrics, which, through the years, have revealed a man whose cynicism and optimism create a constant inner struggle, one which was taken to its limits in the emotional tumult of the last ten years.”
– FLAUNT
“The guitars are on stun for almost 12 songs. And what songs they are!”
– ALTERNATIVE PRESS
“He continues to sound like nobody but himself”
– DrDREW.COM
“A vertiginous, psychedelic splatter-fest.”
– MAGNET
“Naked Self’s exposed-nerve sonics only serve to illuminate the mix of anger, criticism, turmoil and hesitant hope that comprises Johnson’s emotionally- and politically-charged song writing.”
– CMJ NEW MUSIC MONTHLY
“A beautiful, vital work untouched by fads or fake emotion.”
– SAIN
“Matt johnson has always had something meaningful to say. He’s also a songwriter whose delicate touches provide songs of extreme beauty. And in the world of pop and rock, where ephemeral and shallow are generally key words to chart success, exhibiting concern and talking about issues is hardly a passport to fame and overnight fortune. Luckily, Johnson cares less about such vagaries than he does about either making creative and confronting music or addressing issues such as the pervading Westernisation of the world.”
– IN PRESS
“Naked Self is a stripped-back organic album devoid of studio augmentation. The message has always been more important than the sound.”
– THE AGE
“Naked Self is as challenging as it is enjoyable. Fantastic.”
MASSIVE
“Young, vital and very sexy, Naked Self is an album with a shelf life, an album that artists of the future will discover and name check as inspiration.”
– SAIN UNLIMITED
The pervasive gloom and apocalyptic imagery of Matt Johnson’s music has often overshadowed his sly wit and wry sense of humor. Naked Self, which could well be his most vicious and visceral release to date is a modern-day blues album, steeped in distortion and cynical takes on love and loneliness. Johnson makes clear that even though mass success has generally passed him by, he’s more than happy to have done things his own iconoclastic way.
– CHICAGO TRIBUNE
“The wildly disparate influences and sensibilities mesh to great effect on this stunning album.”
– SPIN CYCLE
“Johnson has hit a new level of menace here, like he’s become a subterranean dweller since 1993. It’s musically more free form and grittier. This takes some adjustment.”
– MTV.com
