Matt Watson is an L.A. based mutli-talented creator best know for his work on the YouTube channel SuperMega with co-host Ryan Magee. After releasing his highly anticipated EP, Ouch!, Matt has been met with acclaim that he still couldn’t believe had occurred. Amassing over a million streams on Spotify in the first week and trending on Twitter in the first hour, there seems to be no signs of stopping for the new artist.
I had a chance to talk to Matt about his music journey, his production company, what’s in the works for SuperMega, and more.
I remember listening to this EP for the first time expecting it to sound like “Covid-19 Type Beat” but was completely blown away by how different it sounded in comparison.
That’s what a lot of people were expecting. Because people didn’t know if I was going for rap comedy or if I was trying to go serious. I hope it was a pleasant mix-up?
I was stunned, in a good way! What brought about this different tone? Whereas songs like “No Nut November” have more of a classic 80s vibe, Ouch! Is very early 2000s/retro.
You’re actually the first person I talked to that has said early 2000s which is exactly what I was going for. What brought about the change was that I’ve always wanted to make music. Before I even did YouTube I always wanted to release music but was too self-conscious to release anything. On top of that, I didn’t know how to work any software or play any instruments very well. Earlier this year, starting either January or February, I kept telling myself that I was going to eventually do it. I’ve been saying that for like four years. So I just sat down and just started doing it. Part of it was actually inspired by my cat running away and I was super depressed. Making music late at night in bed was kind of like an outlet to make me feel better.
Someone else had listed Ouch! as bedroom pop, synth pop, alternative RnB. How would you describe it?
That’s tricky because I think it could fall under all of those. I had a really hard time when I was uploading the EP to streaming services and selecting the genre because when I looked at the genre choices, and there weren’t that many to choose from, I couldn’t figure out which one to choose. I was like “It’s not RnB but it’s not necessarily pop”. I guess I would classify it as indie pop, that’s the best I can come up with. I just put it under pop since it’s a subcategory of that. And I guess it is bedroom pop because I made the entire thing in my bedroom. But I don’t know if it necessarily has that bedroom pop sound that other artists like Clairo have. I saw someone describe it as lofi shoegaze and I really liked that. Some of the new stuff sounds like that as well.
I wish that streaming services let you fill in the blank when it comes to genres because there’s so many artists nowadays that are a little bit of everything.
Exactly. That was why it was tricky because I struggled for a while with trying to figure out what genre the EP was because it kind of does go over the place. There’s upbeat kind of Sugar Ray sounding vibes, and hip hop/rap vibes a bit. And there’s so lo fi bedroom pop sounding stuff so it’s kind of a genre bending little project.
I like that. And I noticed everyone else liked that too.
Thank you so much! I also did that because I still can’t decide what genre of music I want to make. So by mixing it up later on, I’m not solidifying myself to a specific sound so that I can experiment more.
Continuing with the different sound, I had been reading the reviews of your EP and noticed that Joji has been mentioned in every single one. Was he a main inspiration when creating Ouch!, or is it more so, since Joji has become a popular lofi artist, anyone working in the genre will inevitably be compared to him?
Joji was the first person to transfer from comedy videos to a full on music career at such a large scale. Now, because of that, and because he’s such a hot topic, anytime a YouTuber makes music that has any success the first comparison people will make is Joji. I think that is why it gets compared to him because I am a YouTuber doing comedy videos and attempting to make more serious music.
I read an interesting article earlier today that talked about how social media and the general span of the internet has let people figure out how they can diversify and do a lot more than just one thing. That’s why I’m doing this because I love making music and I don’t want to just be known as making let’s plays or podcasts.
Would you pull a “Pink Guy” and release your comedy music not only under a different name but a completely different character, sort of like what you do with Nathan on SuperMega?
This has been something that I’ve been struggling trying to figure out an answer to. I’m going to continue making comedy songs, meme songs, whatever you want to call them. In fact, Ryan and I are in the beginning phases of creating a SuperMega EP. At the beginning of the year I didn’t know what to do because I had the comedy songs under Matt Watson. But, when I was getting closer for me to release Ouch! I didn’t want people to see that my top song on Spotify was about jerking off. It feels weird mixing those.
I’m trying to figure out if I want to create a new name to put all the comedy stuff under and re-upload to Spotify or, if I… I really don’t know. That’s a really good question because I have just been debating if I should just go under my username for the comedy stuff and Matt Watson for the serious stuff. I don’t know? I guess we’ll see!
I’m excited to see what happens. I remember listening to “No Nut November” and thinking this is a weird but really catchy song.
The most important thing for me is to actually make good music and then do the comedy side of it. If it’s actually a good song, people come back and listen to it and it’ll stick in your head more. If you have a comedy song that’s funny but the song itself is shit then it won’t be that memorable.
My favorite comment to see is: “This was really funny, but it actually slaps.” I want to make sure that the music is always the highest priority and then the comedy comes in. We did that whole thing in one night. Freddie threw the beat together, we recorded it, and then in four hours we went out and filmed the video and edited it. It was a fun night.
The second your EP was released I saw your name everywhere. From trending on Twitter and r/indieheads on Reddit to getting a million streams on Spotify, this is the first time I, and a lot of people have mentioned, have seen someone brand new to the scene get so much attention. First of all, congrats on all of your success! How do you feel after a week of your EP being out in the world? And how does it feel that people who have never known of your existence before are becoming a fan of your music specifically?
It’s really weird because, like I said when I did the interview on Medium, I knew it would have success in the sense that my core followers would get it. But I didn’t expect for it to blow up so fast and bump Big Sean to #2 on Twitter’s trending list. I’m sure his marketing team wasn’t happy by that.
My hopeful estimate was that the first week it was out I would get a couple hundred thousand streams, that was the really good scenario. Now, it has 1.4 million and it’s still going up. I’m just honestly blown away. It doesn’t feel real. It feels very dreamlike, and I’m just pinching myself. It scares me because I feel like I’m never going to have this feeling again, I’m never going to hit out of the park again like I did with this EP
I honestly feel like you will. Even though this is your first EP, there’s a lot of potential. You have a lot of room to grow and it’s really admirable.
That means a ton to hear. What my fear is is that this is so hyped up just because it’s the first thing I’ve ever dropped and future things won’t be the same. Even if that’s the case, not every single thing is going to be a home run. I’m gonna try.
I was reading your interview with Floyd Gomez on Medium right before this interview and you said you “have this thing where [you] feel like everyone is just being nice.” I also saw that you had actually read some criticism about your EP and are utilizing it to create your upcoming works. Did reading that criticism, at first, motivate you or bring you down?
Actually, I would say it was more motivation which is usually not my response to reading negative comments. I’ve seen a lot of negative comments and they really do bum me out a lot of the time. I don’t believe people realize that creators actually see the comments and take all of it to heart. But seeing the criticisms on the EP, I didn’t feel bad because a) it’s the first thing I’ve done b) I did it all myself, so it’s not going to be perfect. And that’s where I saw most of the criticism, people talking about the mixing and master. I’m really new to it so I expected that. I wanted to make sure I did this all by myself, and, in a way, the mixing and mastering being off gives it a little more character and allows for room to grow.
I hope we can do another interview in 5 years to compare your work!
I would love to!
The theme that I noticed in Ouch! is overcoming. Have you experienced a lot of self growth not only with creating this EP but in general during quarantine?
Yes and no. Quarantine has been one of the most interesting periods of my life so far, and I’m sure that is the way for 90% of people out there. It gave me a lot of time to reflect, and is also opening my eyes to a lot of problems I need to fix with myself. A lot of motivation issues, time management, stuff like that. When quarantine started it felt nice because we all got to relax. Now, it’s September and it’s like “holy fuck, please end.” Anytime I’m given an excuse to take it easy and relax all my motivation goes down the drain. The biggest change during this is realizing depression and lack of motivation. Which, I think in the long run it’s gonna be good. Quarantine is going to be one of those things where I look back and reflect on all the things I’ve fixed so I can do better.
Someone had asked if there were any instrumentals of your tracks available? Would you ever release them?
I am absolutely down to… I should do that! That was the first time I’ve actually thought of that. I know a lot of people have been requesting the stems, which are just the vocals, the drums, and the guitar by themselves so they can remix it. I’m thinking about making a big ZIP file with all the instrumentals as well as all the stems so people can do whatever they want with it.
One thing that I love is seeing what other people do with the art I create. I love hearing a remix someone makes, or seeing a cover. I saw recently that someone did a pop punk cover of “Feel This Way”. Someone else did a really cool remix of “Come Over”, but they said they could have made it a lot better if they had the stems. So, I’m just gonna release that and see what other people make. I really like making something and putting a lot of emotion and myself to it, and feeling like it’s a representation of me and then seeing how other people see it and turn it into something of theirs. I think that’s a really cool thing.
I forgot which artist said it, but I remember this quote that went along the lines of them not wanting to publicize their personal meaning of the song because they wanted their audience to have their own interpretations.
Every now and then I’ll read a comment where someone explains what they think the song means and I’m like “Yeah, it is!” but that’s because I think, wow, that’s a better answer than what I had in my head, maybe I’ll just go with that. It’s really cool seeing people’s interpretations of what the different songs mean, and I like reading their theories. A lot of the time, people are pretty spot on with what the original meaning was. Maybe I should start being more sneaky with the message I’m giving.
Would you ever collaborate with your audience on any future projects?
I think it’d be cool to do a deluxe version of Ouch! down the road which would include some deleted tracks and a couple of my favorite remixes, with their permission of course. Mark Redito made an album I really liked back in my freshman year of college that featured other people’s remixes. I thought that was a cool concept because it’s still made by him, but the album felt like more of a collab. When you think of a collab you think of someone else jumping on a track to sing or playing instruments, but I like the idea of having other remixes on an album. I would love to collaborate with fans on something like that.
I’d love to learn more about Lazy Eye. On YouTube it says that your production company will be a year old at the end of October. How has it been working with Jackson, Harrison, and Carson on this project?
It’s been so cool. Back when I was in high school I was trying to do music videos for people around Charleston, and Carson did the same thing. Carson got his start doing music videos for artists around Charleston, which is where we’re all from. We all live together, and we have for some time. We’re all pretty creative guys and we were always wondering how we could collaborate. Jackson’s a part of SuperMega, but Harrison and Carson aren’t. We were trying to figure out how we could make something new. That’s when we decided to make this video production, label, company, whatever, but we could also design our own clothing and merch and stuff based on designs we really like and we would personally wear.
The main thing when we decide to make a shirt for Lazy Eye, or for anything, is that it’s something we would actually want to wear. We have a big launch coming up soon. It’s the first Lazy Eye launch where it’s not about an artist, it’s just Lazy Eye products. I’m very excited for that. It’s been a really fun year working with these artists and making something different from let’s plays and YouTube sketches. We’re hoping from here we could start to grow as a bigger collective. We have a long way to go.
What’s been the most gratifying thing since its creation?
Seeing a finished product after having this vision in your head for so long. For instance, the music video we did for FrankJavcee, you can think of what it’s going to look like when it’s done. But after filming and editing, being able to sit down and call everyone in the room to show them the finished product, that’s my favorite feeling. Being able to press play and lean back after working hard and take it in. And when the video is done and everyone has that unspoken buzz of moving forward. The icing on the cake is seeing everyone’s reaction to it. I love seeing everyone’s reactions and reading the comments on what they liked, if they enjoyed it or not.
Cha Cha by Freddie Dredd was the first video you guys had made, right?
Yes. Carson and I directed it before we actually founded Lazy Eye. The company started off as just Carson and I making music videos and then Harrison joined because he has incredible production and organization skills which we need badly. Jackson joined on, and he’s helping out with merch stuff. It’s been really cool. That was the first time I’d done a serious shoot. We rented a venue, rented cameras, we got actors off Craigslist, stuff like that.
Someone described it as a late night Adult Swim video and I feel like that describes the vibe of the music video perfectly.
I took that as a huge compliment because I would absolutely love to do something with Adult Swim one day. A huge dream of mine is to do something with them whether it’s just a bumper, voice something on a stupid cartoon, or something. Seeing comments like that is a huge motivation boost.
How are you feeling about your future?
I’m feeling good right now. It’s hard because of how certain everything is with the world right now. People tend to think that I have it all figured out and I’m all set for the future; that’s not true. I always think about what I’m going to do 10 years from now and it’s stressful because one day, when all the YouTube stuff ends it’s like oh I don’t have a degree. I know this won’t last forever. I’m just in a good phase of it right now. That’s really stressful for me to think about. It’s like those 3am thoughts when I’m awake in bed thinking about the future.
I plan on continuing SuperMega. My goal is for Ryan and I to bring it into a new golden era. We have a lot of plans to make SuperMega the best it’s ever been. In terms of music, I plan to keep releasing. I want to do another EP before releasing a debut album. I want to do more singles, I want to do music videos, and I want to do collabs with artists I love. The coolest feeling, for me, is being able to make a track with an artist I look up to. Other than that, I’m just going to keep doing different creative endeavors because I’ve been fortunate enough to have a platform where I can experiment with whatever I want to do. I hate it because I feel like I don’t deserve it. The imposter syndrome kills me. I feel like it can come crashing down at any second. I plan to just keep creating to put it in one sentence. I’ll always be creating.
Matt Watson
