All photos by: Tommy Cary
Genre(s): Indie folk-pop
Location: Charlotte/Winston-Salem, NC
Links: Apple Music | Instagram | Website
When brothers Matt and Michael Susong lost their father in 2017, they found their way back to each other through music. What began as an impromptu songwriting session just weeks after his passing, with their mom watching in real-time as a song materialized from thin air, has blossomed into susong: an evolving blend of indie rock, folk, and pop.
Their debut EP, We Are In This Together, earned them “Best Collaborative Project of the Year” honors from Queen City Nerve, with critics praising their “brotherly bone-deep blood harmonies” and calling the collection “a hauntingly beautiful collection of intensely personal and specific songs that somehow build a musical bridge to the universal.” The attention was unexpected, with interviews featured in Charlotte Magazine, South Park Magazine, and WCNC (among others).
Now, with their new four-song EP matae (pronounced “ma-tay”), the Charlotte duo is expanding their definition of togetherness. The title — borrowed from the martial arts term for surrender in their childhood favorite Bloodsport — suggests giving up, but the project itself tells a different story. Where their first record was about two brothers reconnecting, matae opens the door wider, inviting in collaborators like guest vocalist Ariadne, instrumentalist Alex Warner, Chapel Hill engineer Pablo Vega, and more.
What have you been listening to lately?
Matt: claire rousay. She’s an ambient artist that I saw at Hopscotch this year, and it was just mesmerizing. I listen to a ton of ambient music at work, with my headphones on and my head down, so that’s been fantastic. The new Nation of Language album [Dance Called Memory] is also excellent.
Blondshell is another one I was listening to the other day. She released a great record earlier this year [If You Asked for a Picture] and is soon to follow with a deluxe version featuring new songs, so I’m getting ready for that.
Who is the first musician that you remember discovering on your own and obsessing over?
Matt: The first tape I ever bought was Ten by Pearl Jam. While I listened to that until it wore out, the first one I really obsessed over was Siamese Dream by The Smashing Pumpkins. That was my first CD, and it was just constantly getting replayed.
I taught Michael how to play “Today” from that record, which was his first exposure to guitar and kind of what started him on that journey. Meanwhile, I learned to play guitar by getting into Bush and their song “Glycerine”. It seemed like everyone learned that song when it was popular. [laughs]
Michael was into some really cool stuff early, like Radiohead before they were big, or The Notorious B.I.G. and 2Pac when he was in middle school. He was so much cooler than me, always ahead of the curve.
What made you both ultimately decide to pursue music?
Matt: My dad was a great singer and musician in his own right. He put us up in front of the church to sing, starting when I was like four. That was our exposure to getting in front of people and learning how to do this thing, which helped us get used to it.
After that, we took piano lessons. That never really took, so my dad tried to teach us guitar and how to read sheet music. But that wasn’t very fun at all. So we were singing in school, there were different classes here and there. It wasn’t until I went to camp one summer and heard “Glycerine” that I got into it. By that point, the internet was exploding with tabs, so I printed out and filled up a binder full of them. That’s how I learned all the Nirvana albums, punk songs, and stuff like that — they were easy to pick up and play.
Michael started playing around the same time and immediately started wanting to write songs. I didn’t have a pure artistic vision at that point, but he was like, “I want to write songs and do this for real.” He had a band in high school called A New Way Home that was part of the emo scene that was happening with bands like Taking Back Sunday.
How did you two ultimately come together to form this band?
Matt: Our dad passed away in 2017. I was playing in a band here in Charlotte that I still play with called To Better Waters and Michael hadn’t been doing much music at all.
A couple weeks after he passed, we were sitting around and Michael had some lyrics he’d been working on. I just sat down with him and started working on this chorus together. Our mom was sitting there like, “What are y’all doing?” We said, “Writing a song,” and she’s like, “Oh, that didn’t exist like 10 minutes ago.” It happened very easily.
We really started writing together in 2021 for the RPM Challenge, which invites musicians to write and record an album for the month of February. But instead of trying to do it all in one month, we decided to pick the ones we liked the most and put them together into our first EP [we are in this together].
What was the process of putting that EP out and having this creative outlet with your brother?
Matt: It’s just fun. We’ve always played music together. We attended the same college and would often hang out together. But we’ve never been as close as we have become over the last 3-4 years.
Music is such a conduit to vulnerability; all of a sudden, you’re talking about life in the same breath as “How many beats per minute should this song be?” and “What key should this be in?” It all meshes together in a cool way that has brought us closer than we ever could’ve imagined.
Where did y’all get the title matae from?
Matt: It’s from the movie Bloodsport, one of our favorite movies growing up. That’s how they surrender or tap out from a fight. It’s also in a recent season of The Bear, which we both love. Michael and I went back and forth with ideas for a month or so, then he called me up with “say matae” but I preferred just “matae”. So ultimately, the decision took forty-five seconds or so once the idea came up.
In contrast to your first EP, this project had more guest collaboration, from guest features to outside production. What was it like to expand the creative process that you and your brother had made with them?
Matt: Just amazing. We have our normal job and lives, so unless you invite that kind of creative or artistic expression into your day-to-day, it’s not going to manifest. Especially when working with other people. If you tell somebody, “I like what you do,” it’s always a good gateway to working together. So we just started reaching out to people in our network, and even a little bit beyond.
Like the person who did the artwork is one of my favorite artists in Charlotte. I sent him our previous EP and was like, “Hey, I love your stuff. This is what I do. I hope you like it.” That was it. And we’ve gone back and forth since then. I started painting and sent it to him, he sent me stuff, then we met up. I asked if he’d be interested in letting us use a piece for the project, but he was like, “I’ll just make you something!”
Now, this guy sells painting for prices I can’t afford, so to have him do that almost as a donation for the process was incredibly special for us. And that’s how it was across the record: asking people to show up and do what they do. We gave some direction but it was mostly “let’s see what happens.”
That’s such a testament to community and what happens when you reach out to somebody you like and respect. It’s easy to put those feelers out when you know the worst thing they can say is “No thanks.”
Matt: Exactly. There’s a vulnerability there, but putting yourself out there is the hard part. Once that’s done and you realize it doesn’t hurt, and only good things can really come from it, then it’s super easy.
There’s a standout moment in the song “Tethered”, specifically the latter half, where it transitions into this synth-heavy, Stranger Things-esque breakdown. How did you wind up in that space, from a composition standpoint?
Matt: It comes from a willingness to try odd things and left turns. I love Bon Iver, as does Michael, and how certain records of theirs feel or sound a certain way compared to the others.
Michael sent me an FL Studio track that had the guitar line into the bridge, so the chords were there. And he had the heavy synth part, which was where the drums were gonna come in and all these different things. We broke it down into “verse, chorus, verse” and mapped out the transition, which took us a long time to get correct.
Part of that was because Michael doesn’t hear time signatures that well. He might think he’s writing in 4/4, but it’s actually 6/8. So with this song, I’m doing it in 3/4 and he’s in 4/4, so that’s why some of the rhythms don’t match up completely. But then all of a sudden, they lock in together, and it goes from there. It’s this cool accidental moment.
Michael ended up writing the guitar and chords, I wrote the lyrics and the melodies. We always knew it was going toward that section and Michael said “Hey, now that you’ve done these melodies, I’d like to try to put them on top of each other and have them kind of talking to each other.” And it worked perfectly. The voices work in concert together, all because of Michael’s unique way of looking at things.
It’s just that kind of willingness to do different things and not knowing what’s correct. No one is saying, “You can’t have an acoustic guitar song end with a synth section.”
What was it like to work with Pablo Vega at The Workshop?
Matt: He’s been a friend for a long time and teaches music production at UNC Chapel Hill. Being able to have someone like that who wants to be involved and can take your work to the next level is massive. We sent our first EP to him and he gave great feedback that helped us improve the mix. But I was even more grateful to sit with him and see how he does it in-person.
It’s easy to hire somebody who’s awesome but they’re not interested in you asking a bunch of questions and telling you how they’re doing this process or how it sounds like a different record. Working with a friend like Pablo is such a more fun experience.
Who are your favorite local/NC musicians?
Matt: Cassettiquette is an awesome Charlotte band. I really love Whistler, Modern Moxie, and True Optimist. Pullover might be defunct now but they were one of my absolute favorites. bedrumor from Greensboro is really good. And then there are bands like Oceanic and WOAH that are a little bit bigger than the local scene.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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