Matthew Sweet set to rock Naper Days

Matthew Sweet, best known for his hits "Girlfriend," "Altered Beast" and "100% Fun," will be the headline performer at 8:30 p.m. Saturday during the Naper Days celebration at Naper Settlement, 523 S. Webster St., Naperville.

The Daily Herald recently caught up with Sweet for a phone interview to talk about his music, life on the road and what's still to come.

This is an edited transcript.

Q. How do you describe your music and how it's evolved?

A. In a certain way, I don't think it's changed that much because I'm very much like a singer/songwriter. My voice sounds a certain way, my feelings are kind of a certain way.

However, I always just kind of explored, even within most of the records I made, kind of two sides - the more normal, human loving side and the more frustrated, hopeless, nightmarish side. Some of my stuff, I think is at radically polar opposites and then sometimes it's just much more blended.

But I've been known as a real rock kind of artist and when I toured a whole lot in the '90s I played mostly loud, electric rock music. Maybe later in the '90s, I explored more sort of melancholy, ballad type songs, but I always loved those kind of songs and they were kind of always on my record.

Q. What kind of concert experience should we expect at Naper Days?

A. It's pretty upbeat rock. We have a real basic lineup on this tour. It's just four of us. In a certain way, it's throwback; it's kind of like classic rock or something, compared to now. I think there's kind of something for everybody.

Guys who like rock 'n' roll and solos and all that will be happy and people who like songs you can kind of hum will probably be happy, too. We definitely are playing a lot of the old favorites that people from around Chicago would know really well.

Q. What inspires you most in your music and shows?

A. I think it's just that feeling of expressing something. When I started out I could only really do that sort of hiding out and making multitrack tapes on my own, and writing songs. But I've really learned over the years touring that there is a whole other kind of expressing yourself and getting to experience that song yourself, in the moment.

So I think that just the feeling of needing something in my life that I just can't get ... I kind of feel like I fill that little gap, and if I don't do those things for a long time I feel weird. But then once I write a song or do something really musical, I'll go "Yeah, I feel normal now."

Q. What do you like most about being on tour?

A. To see people who want to see music and like hearing songs. Usually I'm playing shows where people came to a club to see me so I know they want to hear my songs.

When I first started playing live, I was really nervous. I would kind of put my head down and just sort of go. I had a really hard time dealing with that there was an audience there. I'm talking about in the early 1990s. I think I've come a long way since then.

Q. Is there a difference when you play for a festival audience that didn't necessarily pay to hear you perform?

A. It's funny at festivals, you just never know. Like I've had some festivals where it's just so much fun because the people just are there. They're accepting of whoever you are, even if they don't know you that well. As long as there's some people that do, that kind of helps get everybody up.

I've played a lot of festivals and very rarely have I felt like the people weren't there for me, because I think when people go to a festival, they are kind of up for the whole thing. But there's something about playing little crowds that's really cool, too. If you get in a place with sort of three or four hundred people there's this kind of direct contact that's really cool. But I've also been in huge places full of people where it felt almost the same. It just depends.

Q. Is there a moment in your career that really sticks out?

A. I remember an amazing one actually was in Chicago. We played in Grant Park and I swear there were like 100,000 people there or something. I'm not sure what year it was, it would have been in the '90s. But it was just amazing, it was one of the hugest, most amazing crowds I've ever seen.

Q. Any upcoming projects?

A. In July, we're releasing a second volume of the thing called "Under the Covers." I did a covers record with Susanna Hoffs, just kind of the two of us. We made one that was '60s a couple years ago, and we just made a '70s one. . I'm producing a Bangles record and making my own next record. I (also) make pottery.

Q. Will there be any difference in sound for the new album?

A. I'm gonna guess it will be somewhat different, but it's just hard for me to say until I record them. I have a lot of songs for it. They kind of become what they do. That's how I work. Some people might have the idea exactly in their head, and they're gonna go in and try to make it exactly how they imagined.

But for me, it's sort of like I imagine it as I go. I'm always open to it completely changing. And that's very much how I think of pottery. If you are a great potter, you're supposed to be able to make a million of the exact same thing, whereas I've always been a kind of art potter, where no two alike.

That's another cool thing about pottery, you don't know what the glaze is really going to look like. It's very hit- and-miss when you put the glaze on. Sometimes it looks amazing that you couldn't have even imagined and sometimes you have to get used to it a little bit.

I'll look at a pot that I made that's all glazed, it's been a few months since I made it, and I kind of can't remember doing it. And it's very much like that with music, I'll hear something and just don't remember how it got to be like that.