We are terribly saddened by the news today that our beloved veteran scribe Mathew Davies has passed away after a long illness. He was 49. The news was shared by his wonderful wife Susan and many members of the music community and friends shared an outpouring of sadness, fond memories, and love for him on social media following the news. Mat was well known and respected in the music community working for magazines and websites as a thoughtful reviewer, and an editor with a brilliant mind when it came to a vast world of music history, not just rock, or metal. One of the longest tenured members of Ghost Cult, dating back to our origins as a magazine, Mat was promoted to Senior Editor for Europe for Ghost Cult from 2016 to 2017 and helped drive our process for features coverage and reviews for a time. Words can’t really do him justice, but he was a proud son of Wales, supremely gifted with words, kind, and loved music and life fiercely with a boundless sense of optimism few could match. He could talk to you for hours about a band over a pint, which is how we’d like to best remember him. In his 2020 tribute to late Rush drummer Neil Peart, Mat wrote “You were the best of us…” These very same words could easily be applied to him as well. We send our deepest condolences out to his family and friends at this difficult time.
Of all the bands that came to prominence in the 1990s, not many were as cantankerous or wilfully stubborn as Northern Ireland three-piece Therapy? Their extant determination and refusal to bend to the various vagaries and winds of fashion was part of the reason why fans took them to their hearts so passionately and may also explain why, nearly three decades later, they have endured.