The Suitcase Junket, Ben de la Cour

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courtesy Matt Lorenz

A close-up of The Suitcase Junket.

The Suitcase Junket

The Suitcase Junket, the moniker attached to singer/songwriter Matt Lorenz’s one-man-band project, is the real deal — crunchy electric guitar riffs propel songs where the lonesome blues meet the hard walls of 21st century reality. It’s all heartfelt — from a guy who even builds his own instruments from found materials. His last album, The End is New (his sixth), came out in 2020; he’s now touring and testing new songs for a forthcoming recording. Hardscrabble Nashville-based troubadour Ben de la Cour makes a fitting opener.

media release: Matt Lorenz aka The Suitcase Junket -- called "Master of musical imagination" by NPR -- returns to Minnesota and Wisconsin this month for a quick run of shows. Lorenz will be road testing new songs, working toward his first album after four years. 

He will be performing from July 23 to 26 in Madison, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, and in Pipestone.

The last four years have been a period of extremes for Lorenz. He and his partner welcomed two children to the world. His record, The End is New, was released by Renew Records/BMG in the fall of 2020, in the throes of the pandemic and a US election. Like all performers, Lorenz was unable to tour a release until all restrictions were lifted. Then, in 2022, as the world was returning to normalcy, Lorenz and his family faced the tragic loss of his sister, Kate Lorenz, who died of an allergic reaction to a wasp sting. Kate and Matt were longtime supporters of each other's music. He credits her with teaching him to sing. and often now adds a song of tribute to her in his sets. 

"Being home parenting two toddlers, I'm not on the road as much as I used to be but that usually means the shows end up being wilder and less predictable, which for me is a blast," says Lorenz. "I'm also really excited to bounce some of these new songs off of live audiences and see how they resonate." 

The Suitcase Junket is a project that developed in the tension between the grand and the solitary. Grand in imagery, sound, and staging. Solitary in thrift and self-reliance. What instruments he requires, Lorenz builds from scratch and scrap. What parts five players would perform, he performs alone. The spectacle of his one-man band bears comparison to legends of showmanship, brilliance, madness, and invention. While audiences are captivated by that extraordinary show, Lorenz is most serious about the songs. Over the course of six full-length releases, he has written a world into existence, crowded with characters, narratives, voices, imagery, sounds as wide and varied as mountain throat singers and roadhouse juke boxes, plus newsreels of the planet's destruction and salvage. Lorenz homesteads in rural Western Massachusetts.

The Suitcase Junket videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/makingwhatiwant

The Suitcase Junket thesuitcasejunket.com   

“A living, breathing, throat-singing, road-tested, avant-garde, one-man-band who is in a state of perpetual motion… gutsy, fuzzed-out, groove-laden psych rock.” – National Public Radio 

"Now this is the shit I'm talking about, Jack. The Suitcase Junket is a lo-fi, low-tuned, low-down blast of end-times folk blues. It's crude; it's magnificent. With a stage set-up that resembles a junkyard foley stage or Fred Sanford's living room, The Suitcase Junket — one man band leader Matt Lorenz — incants and intones like a cross between Hound Dog Taylor and a Tuvan throat singer who has swallowed a bird. Take the singer-songwriter idiom, give it a low grade fever and a guitar and this is what you get. Captivating, mesmerizing, and gone ... real gone." – Rochester City Newspaper 

“Jaw-dropping... It’s the biggest sound I’ve ever heard come from a solo performer. Matt is definitely his own thing and it is something. The live experience is pretty, darn unforgettable.” — Beale Street Caravan

"Bluesy guitar riffs, tenacious melodies and a singing voice both weathered and nimble. You don’t need to witness his physics-defying performance to be captivated; the music stands on its own... astonishing."  – WBUR Boston

Ben de la Cour is coming to town to play songs from his excellent new album New Roses.

"Ben De la Cour is a master of building foreboding soundscapes, turning over the cracked pavement in our souls and kicking up whatever lies underneath." - No Depression

"Three albums tied for first place this month, two by old masters [Willie Nelson & Taj Mahal] and this by a relative youngster and outlier... ...These 11 songs are haunting, dark and poetic in a Townes Van Zandt or Mark Lanegan kind of way." - MOJO