Matt Eaton

Born in Dallas, TX just as the guitar began to become a popular instrument...and rock 'n' roll began to explode onto the radio airwaves...Matt heard the guitar many times as a small child and remembers playing quite a bit of air guitar. "I pretty much knew what I wanted to do by age 8...and even had my look goin' on...but later this other guy named Joe beat me to it...ha-ha...so I just forgot about the hat. I actually started on drums...and I think that helped me quite a bit with timing. Drums didn't go over too well though...as my dad liked a quiet house most of the time. One day...at about age 10...I heard the most beautiful sound I'd ever heard. I had to know what that music was that my friends older brother was playing in his room! It was an album called Abraxas by SANTANA. Later when I was in 8th or 9th grade...Freddie King would do a show at the high school auditorium. (His kids went to that same high school and had talked him into it...I guess.) That was the first live show I had ever seen...and for it to have been Freddie King was even more inspiring. Freddie was an absolutely professional showman in every way...and no one had a voice like Freddie. I decided right then that I was going to learn to make those beautiful sounds! (On guitar...that is...ha-ha.) It took several months of incessant whining, begging, and inconsequential lashings from dad...ha-ha...but then mom finally gave in and bought me a guitar. I don't remember ever taking a formal lesson...just did a lot of ear training, studied a few books jammed with a lot of different people, and absorbed those little tidbits in the back of guitar magazines. In the beginning I mostly learned by ear though from jamming with albums."By the time Matt was in high school...he had put a band together and was playing parties at the local lake. After high school they started playing the local clubs, recorded a demo, and had a momentary bit of success. After a couple of years musical tastes changed, band members went their ways, and Matt got married and settled. That would have been the end of the story except that one day Matt's brother insisted that he not waste the gift he had been given and took him to buy some recording equipment. The spark was ignited once again.In 1997 Matt and Billy Blax formed the band SPITTIN JONAH with Mike Rich and James Young. After releasing their first CD "Louder Than Hell" and playing many live shows to support it the band took a year long break and during that time Matt began to record some ideas for instrumental guitar tunes that had been trapped in his head. Now...after releasing the second Spittin Jonah CD "SPHERE OF RESISTANCE"...Matt is slowly piecing together his home studio and writing some instrumental tunes for an all-instrumental CD...This profile was edited with Thomas' myspace editor™ V2.5