Drawn to the arts as a child, he studied music at Sarah Lawrence College and began to play local gigs, eventually signing a recording contract with Third Side Records. Developing an atmospheric folk-pop style that featured acoustic settings combined with electronica-influenced touches that sounded a bit like a hybrid between Nick Drake and Radiohead, Matters released a debut album, A Whisper and a Sigh, in 2003 on V2 Music, following it two years later in 2005 with Someday We Will Foresee Obstacles. Things get a bit confusing from there, after V2 issued Someday We Will Foresee Obstacles to the U.S. market under the title Syd Matters and then combined that album with his first and issued both as a double-disc package under the same title, Syd Matters, making things even more confusing by using the same cover art that went with the original release of Someday We Will Foresee Obstacles. In 2008 Syd Matters, now officially a quintet and a band, issued a third full-length set, Ghost Days. ~ Steve Leggett