Matt Minglewood is back on tour, showcasing his newest album Fly Like Desperados, the first in 10 years.

Although growing up in North Sydney, Nova Scotia, Minglewood has been playing out west since 1976 when his first record came out.

He’s also toured around the world, with performances as far away as Abu Dhabi, Egypt, Israel and Afghanistan.

“I don’t do the tours that I used to do from one end of the country to the other because I’m too old for that,” he said with a laugh, adding that he still goes out west once a year playing the casinos in Alberta.

Minglewood is now doing a bit more of an extensive tour with his band, going back through Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and will be heading out to perform at the Red Deer Elks Club Oct. 7th.

He will be performing some of his latest songs, along with some of his old hits from the past.

“I haven’t done a record in probably 10 years, so we decided it was time,” he said.

“I had the songs and I had some new guys in my band, younger people. It’s always good to have young blood, and I wanted to do a record for my fans.”

He said making a recording is kind of a leap of faith nowadays because not many places sell CDs anymore.

The song title Fly Like Desperados came from a song called Amsterdam, which he wrote for his wife.

Minglewood has been into music since an early age.

At the age of four he sang in front of his first audience, singing a couple of Gaelic songs. He later moved into fiddle lessons, then piano at age eight, and by his teens he was in love with the guitar.

“Music has just been a part of my life. It’s what I wanted to do since a young age and I didn’t get in it for fame and fortune, but it’s just that I had to play music.”

He joined his first band called the Rockin’ Saints’ in his late teens, and by his early 20s joined a band entitled Sam Moon, Matt Minglewood & the Universal Power.

That band soon evolved into the Moon Minglewood Band.

By the mid-70s that band morphed into the Minglewood Band and recorded their first album known as The Red Album in 1976.

Growing up in the Maritimes, a lot of Minglewood’s early songs, and even songs today, still have the essence of what life is like out east.

“My version of Can’t You See is a mainstay for me. It’s what I’m known for. It’s a Marshall Tucker song, but I wrote this rap thing in front of it about a young guy going out west and getting a job and that became an anthem for eastern Canadian people going out west, and it still is,” he said.

There’s another song called Long Way From Texas, which is about life out east – fishing, coal mining and the blues.

“And Me & the Boys, which was Country Song of The Year in 1986, is about growing up here and my life here.”

He said he’s had all kinds of great moments looking back at his career.

“My first record coming out, which we put out ourselves back then, but it sold great and then getting a record deal with RCA Records, that was great, and then our first record went gold and our second record with them went gold, and the third went gold.”

He later ended up moving to a country label, having quite a bit of success there, and received Country Song of The Year in Canada in 1986.

He later went full circle, doing bluesy rock and roll mixed with country, which he likes to call Canadiana.

For ticket information, check out www.centralmusicfest.com.

carlie.connolly@reddeerexpress.com

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