Jamming Out With Matt Koziol
Last Of The Old Dogs Powerhouse On Fly Fishing & Archery
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Matt Koziol admits he was a little bit out of his element when he jumped at the chance to go fly fishing in Montana. He was on the road as an opening act for Whiskey Myers, and the weather conditions that morning were nothing short of spectacular.
The 36-year-old Koziol has fished even longer than he’s been playing music, which is most of his life, but fly fishing was still fairly new to him. Most of his experience with a fly rod had been close to where he lives in Nashville or back east near his family in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
On the tour, he had some spare time between traveling and performing and decided to make the most of it.
“We were at this place called Rock Creek,” Koziol says, “and it was just beautiful with these big snow caps in the background. It was like a picture out of an Eddie Bauer catalog or an old Sports Afield magazine. I thought, ‘Man, I’ve never seen anything like this!’”
He was still dazed, almost dazzled, by the scenery when he aimed his first cast beside a large log not far from the creek’s bank.
“Right away, I feel something big hit, and then it gets off really quick,” Koziol recalls. “I got back to it in two or three more casts and suddenly I’ve got this massive native brown that is swinging me downriver.”
Matt Koziol takes his music seriously, and his downtime, too. That’s why he took a small pack, a rod and reel, and a pair of waders along on that tour that rolled through Montana. This past spring and summer, the roots-country artist has steadily given concerts in support of his new release, Last of the Old Dogs. Along the way, he made time for fishing and continued to work on his archery skills, another fascination that dovetails with his active, not passive, approach to the outdoors.
On Staying Sharp
“I love fly fishing because it’s intentional and it’s fun,” Koziol says. “It keeps me in the river so I’m part of nature rather than just observing it. And it’s probably the most artistic way you could fish. There’s a lot of finesse, a lot of feel, a lot of coloring outside the lines.”
On the other hand, part of the appeal of archery for Koziol is the attention to detail it requires. His father’s old compound bow drew his interest, so he pulled it back into action. Before long, he’d sharpened his skills enough to upgrade to a Mathews V3 and joined an archery club to further refine his technique.
“I love the focus of target shooting,” he says, “and it’s also about preparation to make the hunt itself more enjoyable.” Shooting accurately with a bow, he figures, is about 10 percent of what it takes to be a successful hunter, so he wants to nail down that aspect.
“So, when I’m out in the woods I don’t have to think about that 10 percent,” he says. “I just know that when I draw back and I let go it’s going to go where I want it to go. That other 90 percent is sitting there waiting, trying to call in an animal and being quiet. When I’m target shooting, I’m concentrating on keeping my left arm straight, pulling through the shot, focusing on my groupings, my release, my sighting … There are so many small variables that can improve performance.”
His Musical Awakening
Growing up, hunting and fishing were much more common in his family than making music. When he felt compelled as a kid to grab a guitar and belt out a song, his parents were surprised, but very encouraging from the start. One major inspiration was vintage early footage of Elvis Presley in action.
“I remember seeing him in a TV commercial or something with the gold suit and the guitar around his neck, and I thought that was the coolest person I’d ever seen in my life,” he says. “It was like watching a wildfire.”
Koziol was singing by age seven and booking paying gigs by 14. As a young man, he moved to Los Angeles with hopes of becoming a recording artist, but nothing fully panned out other than a financial hole he’d dug. He ventured to Nashville to concentrate on songwriting and saw quite a few of his songs get recorded, some by major artists. He had settled into a quietly fulfilling life as a songwriter behind the scenes when a surprising fate intervened and reshaped his ambitions.
“I did that for six or seven years, and during Covid I made a record and a couple of the right people heard it and said, ‘We’d really like to give this a shot,’” Koziol says.
That album, Wildhorse, came out in 2022. Its follow-up, released in April, sounds contemporary but not overly so. You couldn’t pin it down as hardcore country, and it’s not glossy pop country either. You could safely say that Koziol’s second album lies more broadly somewhere in the middle, as traditional American music. His folksy singer-songwriter influences come through, and so does his firm handle on grittier Southern rock. Overall, there’s a seasoned, comfortable vibe, and it sounds professional but not overproduced.
Matt Koziol’s Balancing Act
Koziol loves writing and co-writing songs, singing, and playing guitar, and says he’s grateful for his renewed opportunities to shine as a solo artist. He embraces the challenge of connecting powerfully with audiences every time he’s on stage.
But even the greatest vocations in the world can grow tiresome, and having other outlets helps him keep a fresh perspective. That’s where the outdoors comes in.
“It takes my mind off everything else, even music,” Koziol says. “I’m very lucky that I get to play music for a living, but sometimes, just like any other job, it gets repetitive.”
And those special moments outdoors, like that big day fishing in that magnificent setting in western Montana, stand out for a long time. Koziol didn’t use the word “epic” to describe his experience of unexpectedly hooking that sizable trout on Rock Creek, but he certainly could have.
“It was just an amazing place to catch a fish, and it’s a place I probably won’t be often,” he says. “And I didn’t have a guide or anything. I just asked at the local shop, ‘What do you guys fish with?’”