Chad Randall Matheny, known professionally as Emperor X, is an American singer and songwriter.

Early life and career

Born in

Louisville Louisville is the most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeast, and the 27th-most-populous city in the United States. By land area, it is the country's 24th-largest city; however, by populatio ...

Kentucky Kentucky (, ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north, West Virginia to the ...

in 1979, Matheny got his start in music when he was given a

Casio SK-1 The Casio SK-1 is a small sampling keyboard made by Casio in 1985. It has 32 small sized piano keys, four-note polyphony, with a sampling bit depth of 8 bit PCM and a sample rate of 9.38 kHz for 1.4 seconds, a built-in microphone and line level ...

by his grandparents at age nine, and recorded his first album on a

Tascam TASCAM is the professional audio division of TEAC Corporation, headquartered in Tokyo Japan. TASCAM established the Home Recording phenomenon by creating the "Project Studio" and is credited as the inventor of the Portastudio, the first casset ...

four-track before the age of 20. Matheny tours across the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

regularly and performs around the world as well, including tours in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

, the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, and the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

. In a self-described attempt to "address the diminishing utility of physical copies of music and the expanding role of marketing in the experience of art", Matheny often hides or buries one-off physical copies and associated visual artwork of

b-sides The A-side and B-side are the two sides of vinyl records and cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a single usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or ...

at GPS coordinates and posts them online as a part of a

geocaching Geocaching (, ) is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called ''geocaches'' or ''caches'', at sp ...

game to unlock

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany under the lead of Karlheinz Brandenburg. It was designed to greatly reduce the amount ...

copies of the audio. For the release of the 2011 Emperor X album '' Western Teleport'', 41 "translucent purple audio cassettes" were buried across

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

, many of which remain undiscovered. This received a feature on

NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...

's "

Weekend Edition ''Weekend Edition'' is a set of American radio news magazine programs produced and distributed by National Public Radio ( NPR). It is the weekend counterpart to the NPR radio program ''Morning Edition''. It consists of ''Weekend Edition Saturday ...

" program. In 2014, Matheny was commissioned by ''

99% Invisible ''99% Invisible'' is a radio show and podcast produced and created by Roman Mars that focuses on design. It began as a collaborative project between San Francisco public radio station KALW and the American Institute of Architects in San Franc ...

'' to write a song titled " 10,000-Year Earworm to Discourage Settlement Near Nuclear Waste Repositories (Don't Change Color, Kitty)" based on Françoise Bastide and Paolo Fabbri's concept of a millennia-long nuclear waste warning message in the form of a folk song about genetically engineered cats. Matheny wrote it to be "so catchy and annoying that it might be handed down from generation to generation over a span of 10,000 years". In 2020, Matheny and Christian Holden from The Hotelier started an artist-managed record label cooperative known as Dreams of Field Recordings.

Personal life

Matheny is a former

high school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., ...

science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

teacher, and in 2004 he stopped his pursuit of a

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

in order to dedicate his career to music. Matheny is a

testicular cancer Testicular cancer is cancer that develops in the testicles, a part of the male reproductive system. Symptoms may include a lump in the testicle or swelling or pain in the scrotum. Treatment may result in infertility. Risk factors include an c ...

survivor and has

low vision Visual or vision impairment (VI or VIP) is the partial or total inability of visual perception. In the absence of treatment such as corrective eyewear, assistive devices, and medical treatment, visual impairment may cause the individual difficul ...

, which makes him unable to legally drive.

Discography

Full-length albums

*''The Joytakers' Rakes/Stars on the Ceiling, Pleasantly Kneeling'' (1998, self-released) *''Tectonic Membrane/Thin Strip on an Edgeless Platform'' (2004, Discos Mariscos) *''Central Hug/Friendarmy/Fractaldunes'' (2005, Discos Mariscos) *''The Blythe Archives Volume One'' (2008, Burnt Toast Vinyl) *''The Blythe Archives Volume Two'' (2009, self-released) *'' Western Teleport'' (2011, Bar/None Records) *''Nineteen Live Recordings'' (2013, Plan-It-X Records, re-released in 2020 on Dreams of Field Recordings) *''Jetzt Christmas'' (2013) *''The Orlando Sentinel'' (2014, The Bomber Jacket) *''Oversleepers International'' (2017, Tiny Engines) *''The Lakes of Zones B and C'' (2022)

EPs and singles

*''Wuss/Strike/River/Preacher/Magnet/God/Unwuss'' (2006) *''Dirt Dealership'' (2007) *''Defiance (for Elise Sunderhuse)'' (2010) *''Brown Recluse/At a Rave with Nicolas Sarkozy'' (2013) *''10,000-Year Earworm to Discourage Resettlement Near Nuclear Waste Repositories'' (2014) *''Wasted on the Senate Floor'' (2016) *''Sad React'' (2020, Dreams of Field Recordings) *''United Earth League of Quarantine Aerobics'' (2020, Dreams of Field Recordings) – as Chad Matheny *''Suggested Improvements to Transportation Infrastructure in the Northeast Corridor'' (2023)

Tour-only releases

*''Gasheater/Raytracer'' (2004) *''East Coast and Freedom From/Freedom To'' (2004) *''Everyone in Jacksonville'' (2006) *''Australia Tour Tape'' (2010) *''Several New Songs in Various Digital Formats'' (2011)

References

External links

"Weekend Edition" Story on Matheny's Burial ProjectL Magazine reviewInterview with Artist Connection Podcast
{{Authority control 1979 births American indie rock musicians Living people Singers from Jacksonville, Florida Singers from Louisville, Kentucky Rock musicians from Kentucky Songwriters from Kentucky 21st-century American singers Tiny Engines artists