Music like Matt Johnson

Matt Johnson (born 15 August 1961) is an English singer-songwriter best known as the vocalist and only constant member of his band The The. He is also a film soundtrack composer (Cineola), publisher (Fifty First State Press), broadcaster (Radio Cineola), and conservationist/local activist.

Johnson was one of four brothers growing up in East London. Much of his youth was spent in or around ‘The Two Puddings’, a London pub run by his family over the course of 40 years.

In 1979, Johnson placed an advert in NME looking for like-minded fans of the Velvet Underground, the Residents and Throbbing Gristle to form a band with him. The The began as a duo, then a four-piece, then a singular entity with a rotating cast of musicians that has included Johnny Marr, Simon Fisher Turner and Sinéad O'Connor. “I like to think of The The as a fluid thing,” Johnson said in a 1993 Melody Maker interview. "People can work with me, then stop for a bit, then work again."